Why the protected status, why the concern for Christians being morally judged? Their book's shit, I mean there can't really be any argument about that. It says that girls ought to be stoned to death for Christ's sake! That's a shit book. — Isaac

Or it's a book that forces us to think in terms of existential urgency. A tribe that wants to survive and obtain and keep power has to maintain strict norms regarding everything that pertains to reproduction and the prospect of producing new members of the tribe. Hence all the rules about women and sex.

It's naive to think that nowadays, people are somehow above and beyond existential urgency, beyond concerns for survival and power.
Nowadays, we are actually no more existentially safe, our survival is no more guaranteed than it was for the old tribes millennia ago. It's just that these are largely tabooed topics, we brand them as "barbaric".

For me, one of the most interesting parts of the Lewis article is not the argument itself, but the reminder of how 'hidden' it is. Arguments about whether God exists are two a penny, the misdoings of the Christian Church are well known, but what's less often accepted is the simple fact that we accept (even venerate in our political leaders), adherence to a religion which is fundamentally flawed. God does some abominable things in the bible - no doubt about that.
/.../
Yes they can be interpreted in some way as to make them less abominable, but that's not the point. The point is that in any other circumstance can you imagine uncovering this kind of writing in a book one of our political leaders had in their briefcase - there'd be outcry, scandal, the politician concerned would be sacked and disgraced, interpretation go hang. It simply would not be tolerated in any other guise than religion, but religion is actually admired as a characteristic in our leaders. Why? History. Christianity has been with us for decades, so we've learned to live with it, learned to wear it as a badge on our sleeve, not to actually follow its edicts, but just as a token that we're the morally serious. — Isaac

No, it's more than just history. Politics is, literally, about matters of life and death, it's about survival, about wellbeing, people's careers being at stake, people's lives being at stake. Politicians decide about things that affect us all, that are a matter of life and death for us all.

Religion addresses those same fundamental existential concerns.

It's just that in "civilized" society, people don't talk about these things openly, straightforwardly. The Nazis, on the other hand, did spell it out, and "civilized" society called it "barbaric".

I agree with the distinction, I think the point made in the article in the OP (and argued by Banno) is closer to judging Christians though. Namely because once their beliefs are interrogated, it is arguably a sensible decision to take their ethical intuitions and reasoning abilities with, at best, a large pinch of salt. Something is definitely found wanting in the believer due to their belief, here. — fdrake

Or the believer understands the urgency of existential issues in a way that a philosopher doesn't.

You can't lock someone up on the suspicion that they might do something "problematic". Would you want to live in a society where that was common practice? — Janus

Refer to

Initially, let's disabuse ourselves of the notion that ancient religion typically stoned people... — Hanover

Special pleading. Stoning is on the statutes of more than a dozen countries, and horrifyingly it is occasionally still used.

https://news.trust.org/item/20130927165059-w9g0i

Where do you think they got the idea...?

Where do you think they got the idea...? — Banno

Stoning simply is not part of the Western tradition, at least not for 2000 years. You've offered no examples of the death penalty being carried out by any Western religion or theocracy in thousands of years. It's a part of our secular tradition however, but not by stoning. None of those examples in your Wiki article contradict that. Why stoning exists in Muslim nations, I don't know, perhaps there's a historical reason I'm unaware. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoning

To the extent you argue the OT has caused these abuses, you have to explain why the other Abrahamic religions don't do it. The special case (i.e. the exception) appears to be in certain Muslim nations, but I no more attribute that to the Koran as I do to the OT. Politics typically offers the best explanations.

In any event, I believe you realize it's possible to be a devout Jew, Muslim, or Christian while fully condemning the exact things you currently do, so what is your point here? That to be a good Jew, Muslim, or Christian. I must accept that stoning is just one of those things I'm going to have to do from time to time?

To summarize: factual beliefs (i) are practical setting independent, (ii) cognitively govern other attitudes, and (iii) are evidentially vulnerable. By way of contrast, religious credences (a) have perceived normative orientation, (b) are susceptible to free elaboration, and (c) are vulnerable to special authority.

So I believe I have almonds in the cupboard. I can imagine that these almonds are chocolate coated, but that does not change the almonds, nor my belief. I can't just make up new stuff about factual beliefs and then believe whatever I've made up. But that's not the case with other beliefs. Jesus said "this is my blood", so one imagines the wine really to be blood, and treats it as such despite the facts. One is uncomfortable with eternal damnation, but one is free to extemporise all manner of excuses.


Did you glance at the article? It clarifies how the consequence - it calls them forward effects or downstream consequences - are open-ended; one can extemporise on religious beliefs in a way that does not happen with factual beliefs.

Saying, “I believe religious X” doesn’t change the conversation in the slightest around how/why that belief is maintained, it just gives you additional information about the belief being discussed. — Ennui Elucidator

Yeah, it does. It is in the nature of certain beliefs that they permit, even encourage, the making of excuses.

Folk like to talk of religion as "meaningful", as "giving meaning to our lives" and so on. Religion is like one of those incredible machines with vastly more moving parts than are needed to achieve the task at hand. Religious thought encourages the addition of even more parts, either disengaged with reality, or which when they engage lead to contradiction or abomination.

Hanover, restricting the discussion to "the Western tradition" is special pleading. It remains that stoning adulterers is accepted in places because it is in the scriptures. If it is rejected in other places, that is despite it being in the scriptures.

And yes, again, this does into apply to all ,"Jew, Muslim, or Christian". It doesn't have to for the point to be made that evil consequences flow from those texts.

This seems a difficult way to say that belief-in is categorically different from knowledge-of. — tim wood

No. See my post above or flick through the article.

Religion seems to be a mixture of several different type of belief propositions. — Isaac

Yes. Philosophers, myself included, have not talked much about differing beliefs so much as differing justifications. The alteration might be productive.

Yes, I'd forgotten that. I'm suspicious of certain forms of cognitive dissonance though. It's not going to be easy to explain why without going into great detail about my theories of beliefs systems, but I'll try to be brief. Say if someone had a belief that one should exit the house by the back door, and also a belief that one should exit the house by the front door, and contextually they continued to switch between the two with a suppressive dissonance each day. If we model beliefs as propositions then we have a model including dissonance - but as merely propositions, where's the tension? At t1 the proposition is x, at t2 the proposition is y. Tension arises when we expect a person to act according to these propositions (and they can't act according to both). So we could look at what it is that they act as if were the case. They act as if it were the case that sometimes the back door and other times the front door were the most appropriate doors to exit the house by. Now we have a statement of their belief which is consistent with their behaviour. What we now need is an understanding of they post hoc rationalise that belief. In the case I described (and the priest, in your case), it's their post hoc rationalisation that's flawed. Instead of rationalising a perfectly consonant story involving context, they've rationalised it as two stories which cannot both co-exist in a unified narrative. — Isaac

Maybe I'm missing context, but I don't see the difference in perspective the two accounts provide in thread. If what matters for the purposes of the thread is:

( 1 ) In order for a person P to believe X, P must act in accordance with X.
and ( 2 ) P acts in accordance with X at some times (contexts etc) but not others.

We're left with that either 'acting in accordance' doesn't need to occur in all times and contexts - and P's believing X is preserved. Or alternatively a violation occurred in ( 2 ), and P can no longer be accurately described as believing X.

It seems to me that if ( 2 ) being true automatically removes P's belief that X, that opens up a can of worms. If you require that someone follows X at all times or contexts in order to believe X, then contexts in which X is irrelevant and even momentary lapses in judgement suffice to remove P's belief that X. A less absolute position, that in the aggregate P acts in accordance with X is required for belief seems necessary, but it has rather a lot of wiggle room and doesn't seem to help with the puzzle.

The puzzle being when it's appropriate to transfer judgement from worshipping a God who is believed to have a murderboner for stoning to the moral character of the worshipper? (@Hanover - you seem to be taking on an easier version of the problem where a believer doesn't believe in the horrible bits of doctrine, which isn't the target of the OP's article)

As an attempt towards a solution, let's imagine that there are a collection of relevant contexts/times C in which P's believing X can be tested against their conduct. Ergo if P fails to act in accord or violates X in a context/time not in C, it doesn't remove their believing X. Conversely, if P fails to act in accord or violates X in a context/time in C, P's belief that X is removed by their conduct. P can still claim to believe that X, but they don't believe in practice.

I suggest that when we're talking about cognitive dissonance, we're imagining a context in which the believer's worship is present with the horrible acts of the object of worship. Like people in Warhammer offering prayers to Khorne for butchered innocents. I imagine that for the believer, the scenario of worship is less like 'blood for the blood God, skulls for the skull throne' or equivalently 'Praise be to the god who cursed humanity never to communicate adequately again", it's directed towards God as a placeholder in the context of their immediate concerns and general associations. If they manage to keep the literal horrible bits out of mind, or out of their faith entirely, I don't think it's right to say they worship a God who stones, curses etc.

Even if they believed in bible study that God approved of stoning, I don't think they'd have to worship the entity as if they approved of stoning. Albeit this comes with the price of making God's definitive properties, opinions and dispositions towards them depend upon what the believer is doing at the time.

With that in mind, the contexts in which P's believing X could be assessed would therefore be dependent upon P's state at the time of assessing their believing X. In other words, which contexts count as relevant for trialling P's accord with X vary with how P is and what they're doing at the time. There is a drought of neutral epistemic space for the contexts and beliefs to be assessed within.

It therefore seems plausible that a unified narrative over these is in principle impossible, but maybe that lack of unification is part of the structure of faith.

they've rationalised it as two stories which cannot both co-exist in a unified narrative.

Or alternatively they have not rationalised it and live in the space of the open question?

If it is rejected in other places, that is despite it being in the scriptures. — Banno

Yes, it is literally in the scriptures, yet it's not advocated by the overwhelming majority of those who read the scripture, which means what I've been saying all along: you're misreading it as if the literal meaning is where the meaning lies.

The puzzle being when it's appropriate to transfer judgement from worshipping a God who is believed to have a murderboner for stoning to the moral character of the worshipper? (@Hanover - you seem to be taking on an easier version of the problem where a believer doesn't believe in the horrible bits of doctrine, which isn't the target of the OP's article) — fdrake

My position is that it must all be read for its underlying message, not as an account of what happened. It's not that I don't believe the horrible bits didn't literally happen. I'm not committed to any of it actually happening. Whether it occurred or not is entirely irrelevant. It's metaphor.

Yes, it is literally in the scriptures, yet it's not advocated by the overwhelming majority of those who read the scripture, which means what I've been saying all along: you're misreading it as if the literal meaning is where the meaning lies. — Hanover

You keep saying this, others including myself keep pointing out that there are folk who do take it literally, that ignoring them is special pleading. No, we are not "misreading". You are reading selectively.

We all understand that you do not believe the nasty bits in those books. But some folk do.

you're misreading it as if the literal meaning is where the meaning lies. — Hanover

But also, I offered the Leeuwen article as a contribution towards working with the sort of non-literal meaning you espouse, in addition to the usual reference to unconformable and influential metaphysics. It's not that these alternate readings havn't been addressed.

Perhaps you did not recognise that these issues are being addressed?

Refer to ↪Banno — baker

So what? Outlining a theory that actions are driven by beliefs says nothing about restraining or punishing, or even judging, people by their beliefs. Even if it were granted that all actions are driven by beliefs, it certainly doesn't follow that all beliefs lead to actions.

You keep saying this, others including myself keep pointing out that there are folk who do take it literally, that ignoring them is special pleading. No, we are not "misreading". You are reading selectively.

We all understand that you do not believe the nasty bits in those books. But some folk do. — Banno

Reading it non-literally is not special pleading. Reading it literally is. The majority of adherents to the Abrahamic traditions don't believe in stoning.

In any event, should you identify those who have used the Bible to advance their horrible agendas, I stand with you in fighting against them. But that really has less to do with theology than politics. Some preachers preached for civil rights, others against it. I'm not sure the opponents really cared what the book said.

Perhaps you did not recognise that these issues are being addressed? — Banno

Let me find the article you're referring to. 22 pages. I keep up the best I can

Reading it non-literally is not special pleading. — Hanover

Sure. But ignoring those who do read it literally is. What are we to make of their moral character? Yes, on this we are in agreement.

And than there is the issue that, once one entertains non-literal readings, any reading will do... So we can add a nice derangement of epitaphs. There is no fixed meaning for the text.

You didn't answer my question.

Anyway, the point is that you're setting yourself up as the epistemic and moral authority over Christians when you expect them to justify their beliefs to you. Why should they submit to you? — baker

None. You argued that the situation I described as 'fair' was not, in fact, the case. What's 'fair's and what's 'the case' are two different things. So the 'fairness' of x is not made illusory by showing that x is not the case. If you want to argue that x is not fair (ie, it's apparent fairness is merely illusory), then the matter of whether x is the case is immaterial. — Isaac

What use is fairness, when people can live just fine without it?

I can't see a way in which a priest, considering a little 'extra-curricular choir practice' with the boys would actually think "I'll be tortured in hell for eternity if I do this, but at least I'll get my rocks off for a five minuets - whatever, I'll do it". No-one's thinking that way. — Isaac

Actually, it's the kind of thinking that some Christians impute upon outsiders. It's what all those "Knowingly rejecting God's mercy and freely choosing hell" are all about.

- - -

The problem of hell is how to reconcile our ideas of it with the perfect goodness of God. — Srap Tasmaner

By leaving the ivory tower, and going to live in the real world, the world of blood, sweat, and tears.

And than there is the issue that, once one entertains non-literal readings, any reading will do... So we can add a nice derangement of epitaphs. There is no fixed meaning for the text. — Banno

I'd start by saying that we have to agree upon an interpretive method, and there's nothing special about literalism that might lead one to think it's the default or primary method for interpretation. It's clear the Bible, as we know it, is a compilation of at least 4 different works sewn together, with duplicative and conflicting accounts of the same events. There are two flood stories and two creation stories, for example. One would assume the author therefore did not intend the story to be taken literally. Of course, to what extent you think author's intent is relevant for interpretation is another matter.

For some discussion on why we now have those who take it literally, see: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/belief/2011/feb/21/biblical-literalism-bible-christians.

Attacking the literalists might be justified, but then moving beyond that and attacking religion generally would not be. It may just be you're attacking those with the weakest justifications for their beliefs.

I don't follow how non-literalism is more prone to lack of fixed meaning than literalism is. Words change meanings in very subtle ways over time as do the context in which they're used. The notion that we speak directly and clearly and convey exact thoughts with our words is the analytic philosopher's perfect dream, but that's not what really happens. How many books have been written on what Wittgenstein really meant and how many confict with each other?

And on the other side of things, we all accept that Aesop was not speaking of an actual tortoise and hare, yet the metaphorical meaning of that story seems to have withstood time. That is, despite it being literally false, no one would say that any reading will do when deciphering the metaphor.

And then let's look to the US Constitution. What does it mean? Are you a literalist when it comes to it? I don't read the word "abortion" anywhere in that text, but it apparently contemplates pregnancy and it divides it into three trimesters, each one allowing for differing amounts of state regulation that can be imposed. Do you look to the author's intent, or is it a living document, interpreted with the evolving morality of the times? If it is subject to changing interpretation, does it follow that "any reading will do," or are there is still incorrect readings.

My point here is that you've beaten the holy hell out of what any half-way sophisticated theist would consider a strawman.

But also, I offered the Leeuwen article as a contribution towards working with the sort of non-literal meaning you espouse, in addition to the usual reference to unconformable and influential metaphysics. It's not that these alternate readings havn't been addressed. — Banno

I did locate your Leeuwen article (https://philpapers.org/archive/VANRCI.pdf). I note he went to my alma mater, apparently having benefitted from the wisdom I left behind. I really don't dispute that the religious versus the non-religious likely adopt very different epistemologies depending upon how divergent the two group's worldviews are. My position is that when it comes to facts about the world (the very type Leeuwen identifies), I rely upon the same methods for knowledge as you do. That is, I don't use religion to figure out whether I have almonds in my cupboard (his example). I use it to find meaning, purpose, and morality. I don't know how anything Leeuwen says addresses the credulity of those beliefs just because they are based upon religious doctrine.

His point is well taken, but obvious. If you want to know actual facts about the world, like where it came from, who first occupied it, whether sometimes manna falls from the sky, or sometimes bushes burn but go unconsumed, religion isn't where you should look. If you want to know what to do with the life you've got and why you might want to do that, religion might be where you want to look.

, doesn't have anything to do with me in particular, nada.

here, here, here, ... (has to do with moral character and such)

to find meaning, purpose, and morality — Hanover

Why morality? History (including legal cases) and living are the better teachers. I suppose you might find moral lessons in religious tales (if that's what you meant).

Did you glance at the article? — Banno

The article misses a bunch, I think. I am happy to discuss it more, but it strikes me as far afield of this conversation. Suffice it to say that “social facts” appear to fit in the box of “factual belief” as he is using the term. There are many social facts that come from a religious context, so it is difficult me to see in a straight forward way how those social facts are any less “factual beliefs” because of how they originated. Perhaps you can elaborate your view on it in a response to a particular situation: a man walks into a room and sees a piece of food - he then declares it haram. A man already sitting at the table says, “No, it is halal.” What type of belief are we discussing and why? How does that differ from the man who knows facts about the streets of Cleveland mentioned in the article (“ An evidential authority, who can produce factual belief, knows about some objective information, such as plant life or streets in Cleveland.”)?

Did you glance at the article? It clarifies how the consequence - it calls them forward effects or downstream consequences - are open-ended; one can extemporise on religious beliefs in a way that does not happen with factual beliefs. — Banno

With regard to the Leeuwen article, I see it as clearly showing the inherent weakness of relying upon religious doctrine to prove physical facts about the world. The scientific method is the proper epistemology for such questions.

Questions of good and evil and what to hold out as sacred and what to hold in low regard and what it means to live a life well lived are not addressed through the scientific method. We rely upon wisdom, derivable through our intellectual and spiritual histories, which includes, among other things, religious doctrine.

We have 2 categories here and therefore 2 methods of obtaining answers. The mental world doesn't derive answers from the same sources as the physical world.

As to those who insist we can look to Genesis to determine how we came to exist and disregard the fossil evidence, they make the same mistake as those who try to discover the meaning of life in a petri dish.

Anyway, do you take Leeuwen to contradict what I've said?

My point here is that you've beaten the holy hell out of what any half-way sophisticated theist would consider a strawman. — Hanover

:clap:

If, however, you wish to speak to people that find meaning in the book, you have to speak to them about the book in ways that they will relate to. — Ennui Elucidator

I agree.

Foisting your opinion of what the words mean (e.g. “It is a literal telling of mythic history and the dinosaurs prove that the story is untrue and the Bible is a lie!”) does not mean anything to someone who cares about the story because your meaning is so far from theirs. — Ennui Elucidator

Why not? If I'm talking about the Lord of the Rings with someone, is it a mark of a reasonable adult conversation that I simply refuse to listen to anyone whose interpretation differs from my own?

The argument is not about what it says, but what it means; what the value is in including that story both on its own and within the greater context/s of the book. If you aren’t willing to engage with the material on that level... — Ennui Elucidator

Who says I'm not? Again, the same special pleading. I'm not entitled to an opinion about what the meaning is to me, what it's value is to me. Only positive interpretations are welcome. What other text gets that treatment?

One can find merit in both positions (and even agree with one or the other) without willfully misrepresenting one position or the other. — Ennui Elucidator

Again, why am I refused an opinion on their position? I've spent an entire lifetime studying people, specifically people's beliefs and how they're formed and defended. Am I still not allowed an opinion on why people form their beliefs? Do you really believe people have such faithful and privileged access to their psychologies that my even venturing an opinion contrary to their own is nothing short of an insult?

Both methods lead to an interpretation of your writings, but one cannot objectively say which is right and which is wrong, just that they are different. — Ennui Elucidator

Right, but one of those ways here is being rebuked. Or is it that you just thought I was unaware of the other and might benefit from having it pointed out to me?

If you want to engage with their meaning (be it to describe or critique), you need to identify their meaning in the first place rather than supplanting it with your own. — Ennui Elucidator

No, I've no interest in going that (at least not here). I'm talking about the danger inherent in the ways in which it could be interpreted.

The Bible “opens” with Genesis. — Ennui Elucidator

'Opens' is not a technical term, it's a conversational one. I'm not objectively wrong for referring to some of the early books as being in the 'opening' part. Just about anything in the first half could arguably be called the 'opening'. Again, more special pleading. I gave direct quotes relevant to the claims I was making and you're trying to wriggle out of them by quibbling over whether they're really in the 'opening' or not. Honestly, I doubt you'd find a single secular commentator who doesn't know that the Bible starts with Genesis, so even the slightest charity in reading would gather what I meant.

Maybe it is better to learn from a book with some prickly parts and some rough edges. — Srap Tasmaner

You might have to draw this out a bit for me. It seems like, if true, it would make a good counter to what I'm saying (that the book is an undesirable offering as one of the available narratives), but it's not quite clear what advantage you see the 'prickly parts' having.

But they refuse to do so. Now what? — baker

I walk away I suppose. I'm not going to progress to fisticuffs.

What use is fairness, when people can live just fine without it? — baker

Again, you're misconstruing my intent. I never claimed fairness was indispensable.

Maybe I'm missing context, but I don't see the difference in perspective the two accounts provide in thread. If what matters for the purposes of the thread is:

( 1 ) In order for a person P to believe X, P must act in accordance with X.
and ( 2 ) P acts in accordance with X at some times (contexts etc) but not others. — fdrake

I'm saying there's two ways to look at (2), we could see that they do, in fact seem to show two beliefs, or we could say that the belief is something we've yet to establish (something which explains both behaviours) but the story to rationalise that belief is confused) The difference, as I see it, is an important one. I hold that beliefs themselves are quite deeply ingrained and difficult to shift, they're almost directly causal of the circumstances in which we find ourselves. That we model X as x1 is a result of the properties of X as much (if not more) than it is about our priors about x2. The narratives we use to make sense of what we've just done (and which do influence our priors in future) are, however, much more malleable and depend largely on what narratives are available to us in our community. We'd rather pick one off the shelf than construct one ourselves from scratch, so it matters greatly what's on the shelf currently.

It seems to me that if ( 2 ) being true automatically removes P's belief that X, that opens up a can of worms. If you require that someone follows X at all times or contexts in order to believe X, then contexts in which X is irrelevant and even momentary lapses in judgement suffice to remove P's belief that X. A less absolute position, that in the aggregate P acts in accordance with X is required for belief seems necessary — fdrake

It depends what you mean by 'aggregate', or rather how you intend to 'aggregate'. We could say that I believe I ought to go for a run every other day; or we could say, on a Monday, I don't believe I ought to go for a run, then on a Tuesday that I do believe I ought to go for a run, then on a Wednesday I don't believe I ought to go for a run... The former seems more parsimonious.

If, on the other hand, you're going to include every lapse in judgement or attention, we get a failure of pragmatism the other way - which is why I always refer to beliefs as 'a tendency to act as if...'. We've got to include the scholasticism of mental activity at the very least.

But the priest... Well, it seems unlike a momentary lapse of attention, or a few randomly firing neurons messing up the system. It seems we simply haven't described what he actually believes properly, relying too heavily on his poor explanatory narrative and not enough on his pattern of behaviour - what is he acting as if were the case.

Even if they believed in bible study that God approved of stoning, I don't think they'd have to worship the entity as if they approved of stoning. Albeit this comes with the price of making God's definitive properties, opinions and dispositions towards them depend upon what the believer is doing at the time. — fdrake

Yeah, I don't think either account prevents us from doing this, but the problem with this, and...

the contexts in which P's believing X could be assessed would therefore be dependent upon P's state at the time of assessing their believing X. In other words, which contexts count as relevant for trialling P's accord with X vary with how P is and what they're doing at the time. — fdrake

...is that we're left with shifting the important question further down the road. Why? Why then and not then? It's like the 'interpretation' argument. If we accept that there are these different beliefs at different times, then we're left with the actual belief no longer being the important question (after all, it might not be the belief in a minute). The important question becomes the connection between context and belief. I'd personally still couch that in terms of belief "the subject believes that in context A they ought do X, but in context B they ought do Y", but we could couch it in terms of two incongruous beliefs that one ought do X and Y respectively, beliefs which vary by context. I think we'd still need the meta construction in either case.

Only positive interpretations are welcome. What other text gets that treatment? — Isaac

Canonical texts: Homer, Dante. Shakespeare. Goethe, Walt Whitman, other religious texts, texts with a long historical tradition of interpretation.