--- Nick Arnett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I think some of the arguments in this thread beg important questions.
> E.g.,
> altruistic behavior doesn't require faith because it leads to success as a
> species; success is an outcome of evolution, so altruism evolved. Is that
> right?
>
> The first part begs the question of "success" as a species. If success is
> nothing more than survival (is there another scientific definition?), then
> this is the anthropic principal.
The week one, not the strong one.
>The second part (altruism is an outcome
> of
> evolution) is circular, since it assumes that our characteristics are
> derived exclusively from evolutionary processes.
There is no reason for it to be exclusive.
> Even if true, it begs the
> question of the origin of evolution as we understand it. Like everything
> else, evolution would seem to be grounded in the fundamental physics of the
> universe, but that doesn't really answer anything about altruism, does it?
> In fact, it starts to seem imaginary, doesn't it?
No, our behaviors, or at least our tendencies for certain behaviors are
genetic. Sorry, that is just the way it is. You might want to silence this
idea becouse a few idiots might try and use this in an atempt to lagitimize
raceism, but that will not change the reality of it (or the wrongness of
racesism). We are what we are -in part- becouse we evolved that way. Like it
or not, we all have differnt choices within our own posible range of "normal
behavior". Once again this does not lagitimize violence or damaging deviancy.
But it does mean that differing forms of emotional expression should be
tolerated, and that some individuals may be better suited to altruistic
behavior than others. It does not mean that each indiciudal does not make
their own choices, but that the range of choices avaialble to them on any
particular axis may be limited. The further out of the bounds of those
limits, the harder it is for that individual to make that choice.
> How about if we apply the same reasoning to religious behavior? It must
> lead to success as a species; otherwise it wouldn't have evolved. One can
> justify any human characteristic that way.
Yes you can. In the extream it is of course rediculous. Of course we do have
free will. No one is saying we don't. And yes religion, and the propencity to
be spiritual have been shown to increase ~some~ individuals happyness.
> I see bigger problems than the logical ones above.
I se no logical problems above other than your own. (pardon me for saying)
>First, nobody knows if
> anyone does anything for just one reason, I'd argue -- we never really know
> if our motivations are altruistic or not, and it's not a Boolean function!
> Clearly, we know a lot of what happens in our brains, so we have far less
> than perfect knowledge of our motivations. I certainly have had flashes of
> insight that some of my supposedly altruistic behavior had big selfish
> components. Imagine, for example, a person who is quite certain that
> disrupting this community to demand better behavior, who realizes that he
> actually is craving the disruption and attention that results (any
> similarity to persons living or dead is probably less than a coincidence).
But is that craving from a desire to make things better, and being an
instramental part of that betterment a sens of reward, or is it mearly the
simple attention, bad or good?
> I think the same sort of argument applies to us as a species. While
> evolution may be the mechanism that gave us altruistic behavior, none of us
> has perfect knowledge of what behavior in a specific situation will
> contribute to evolutionary success. Without that knowledge, such decisions
> cannot be logical, at least in the formal sense of logic.
I agree with that. I wonder how many here do?
> For me, faith is largely a response to imperfect knowledge.
Why have faith at all? Shouldn’t a state of not knowing be the appropriate
response to imperfect knowledge? Of course I am not talking about the kind of
faith you have in your own abilities or the abilities in others. I am not
talking about the kind of wishful thinking faith when you make a decision
based on incomplete data, but the kind of faith in a god or some
extra-ordinary spiritualism. There are big differences in these kinds of
faith. One is social group forming and confidence building, another allows
you to stay focused and actually make decisions rather than spinning in an
indecisive state. The last however makes no sense to be so I do not know what
purpose it might serve.
>Although I'd
> like to operate as if I know myself, my species and everything else well
> enough to remove ambiguity (supervisor-of-the-universe mode), I've only
> found peace when I accept that I will never fully understand my own
> motivations or those of humanity in general (humble mode, much harder to
> stick with).
Why not simply accept that you do not ~yet~ understand, and the possibility
and probability that you will never completely, but to continue to strive for
that knowledge?
>I have faith because I am convinced that it leads to greater
> wisdom than logical processes alone.
Why?
> This doesn't just mean that I accept
> a
> lack of knowledge, it means that I believe that some valuable ideas just
> cannot be understood rationally.
Why?
> Perhaps this means nothing more than the fact that a society is smarter
> than
> its individuals and no member can assimilate all that it knows, so we are
> obligated to accept some of society's teachings on faith or live outside of
> society.
Ok.
>Or perhaps it means that there is a God who has perfect
> knowledge,
> to which we have access in a less comprehensible way.
How could it mean that, and why?
> I don't know, but
> I've made a choice and while it isn't the most logical, it is the most
> life-giving, to paraphrase Rich Mullins.
Well, there you go, a logical reason after all, -it makes you feel better-. I
think on many levels I do not have faith for the exact same reason.
(408) 555-7198
That is a lot of faith, putting your phone number out there like that.
=====
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Jan William Coffey
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