Re: If I Were Pope

[John Robertson]

I find Jed's method of argumentation interesting, even effective, but 
in many cases inherently contradictory. Consider his opening sentence: 
" I know nothing about religion...." Later he repeats himself: " I know 
nothing about religion." His next statement, however, pretends that he 
knows something more than nothing: "It seems synonymous with 
superstition, as far as I can make out." He continues, saying that what 
religious people believe in are "nightmares, even as myths." I agree 
with Jed that he knows nothing about religion, given his lack of 
sophistication regarding the rich subtleties that genuinely religious 
people enjoy. As a religious person, I have to smile at the outburst (I 
think outburst is a fair word) that his innocent knowledge of religion 
produces. Even if he does not understand the intellect of those "taken 
in" by his caricature of religion, one wonders why he cannot at the 
very minimum come to some kind of appreciation for religion, at least 
anthropologically, that he has for "the Islanders and the Japanese." 
Whereas he "knows nothing of religion," by his own admission, he claims 
to know a lot about the islanders and the pre-modern Japanese: "I 
sympathize with them. I admire them, and their culture, arts, and 
languages." Are we religious people so stupid that what we believe has 
no inherent worth -- unlike the culture, art and sexual mores of the 
pre-modern Japanese? Jed represents himself over again as someone who 
knows nothing about religion, but at the same time represents himself 
as someone who knows enough about religion to imply that people are 
silly who find their religious beliefs sacred, valuable, even practical 
in every day life -- holding beliefs that are beneath contempt; --and 
if not beneath contempt, at least worthy of the derision (again, I 
believe derision is the right word) heaped upon them in his comments. 
It does not take a geiger counter to detect a hyperbolic, radioactive 
prejudice. To say that religion is inferior to agnosticism or atheism 
on grounds that religion is harmful and agnosticism/atheism is not 
betrays a silly scold. I won't here, but I could make a case that the 
systematic rooting-out of the putative opiate of the people among at 
least half the world's population has caused significant harm, even 
death, to scores of millions of people.

While Jed claims to know nothing about religion, he claims to know a 
lot about AIDS. One wonders. While it is true that there may be more 
than the Ugandan mantra "ABC" (abstinence, be faithful, use condoms if 
sexually active) that prompted a dramatic downturn in Ugandan AIDS, it 
is also true that something dramatic has happened to the minds of large 
numbers of Ugandans. To quote what I take to be a reasonable 
organization reporting on this drop 
(http://www.avert.org/aidsuganda.htm): "it seems that the message about 
HIV and AIDS has been effectively communicated to a diverse population 
by the government and by word of mouth. Ugandan people have themselves 
to thank, in part, for the reduction in the HIV prevalence rate. Much 
of the prevention work that has been done in Uganda has occurred at 
grass-roots levels, with a multitude of tiny organisations educating 
their peers, mainly made up of people who were themselves HIV+. There 
has been a reduction in some types of risky behaviour, and there is a 
high level of AIDS-awareness amongst people generally."

The Ugandan data give the lie to Jed's statement, "mumbo-jumbo about 
changing behavior will accomplish nothing. People never behaved 
differently than they do now." There is overwhelming evidence that 
behavior HAS changed, and there is PLENTY of evidence to show that the 
change has occurred at the grass-roots level -- it is not an imposition 
from without, despite claims to the contrary. Anyone who denies this is 
so blinded by their religious animus that they are willing to ignore 
the data. I do not know if this is directly owing to religion, but I am 
saying that whatever prompted the change -- "a multitude of tiny 
organizations educating their peers" -- squares with the idea that 
abstinence before marriage and fidelity after marriage (otherwise use 
condoms) (ABC) is a recipe that has literally saved lives and continues 
to do so. Why do anti-religionists despise the president of Uganda's 
ABC if its application (and it has been and is being applied) is true? 
I'm hardly a victim, but as one who has on more than one occasion felt 
the venimous effects of anti-religionsits' bite, the answer is not far 
to seek.

Jed says that "religion offers certainty without proof, just the 
opposite of science." I have been a linguist a long time -- long enough 
to know that the "scientific study of language" has produced beliefs 
with no substance. The idea that language is governed by rules that 
produce grammatical sentences and reject any and all ungrammatical 
sentences is not only without substance, but is so misleading as to 
have hijacked the genuine scientific inquiry for the latter half of the 
last century. More's the pity. I also know that we all hold unsteady 
beliefs, scientists or otherwise -- even Jed. Besides, there is ample 
room for ambiguity both in religion and science. Who on this list or 
who in the world can explicitly specify the nature of gravity, or 
vortices or cold fusion for that matter. The strength of science and 
religion is ambiguity and uncertainty, given the interface of our 
humble neocortex with the vast reality of the universe of which we are 
part. Unfortunately, Jed at his hyperbolic best caricatures not only 
religion but science as well when he says, for example, that science 
offers certainty with proof. The final step of the scientific method -- 
inductive experimentation -- offers confirmation of the deductive 
expectations based on the original hypothesis, but it certainly is 
fraught with ambiguity. I would reserve the noun/verb "proof/prove" for 
logic and mathematics.

In sum: I find Jed's attitude toward religion (and by implication us 
suckers taken in by religion) to be prejudicial, and if not 
prejudicial, uninformed. (--uniformed here implies "lack of knowledge 
producing a caricature of what religion means to people like me.") I 
don't doubt that his caricature satisfies perfectly the 
anti-religionist crowd, but as someone who holds religion dear, trust 
me, it is hardly a description that captures the essential nature of 
true religion).