Kantian Naturalist and I have been hopscotching from thread to thread, discussing the nature of religious language. The main point of contention is the assertoric/disclosive distinction: When is religious language assertoric — that is, when does it make claims about reality — and when is it merely disclosive, revealing attitude and affect without making actual claims?
I’ve created this thread as a permanent home for this otherwise nomadic discussion.
It may also be a good place for an ongoing discussion of another form of religious language — scripture. For believers who take scripture to be divinely inspired, the question is when it should be taken literally, when it should be taken figuratively or metaphorically, and whether there are consistent and justifiable criteria for drawing that distinction.
*fist bump*
Yes, we’re quite awesome.
To be honest, creepy theists are outliers, too.
I’ve met literally thousands of theists, mostly christians, all around this nation. Offhand don’t remember even one of them who’s creepy in person. Doesn’t mean I agree with their politics, or their trite Jesus slogans, or anything their religions touch, really .. but I’m decent enough not to call them “creepy” just for believing.
And when they’re stupid and prejudiced enough to call me “creepy” just for not believing like they do, that says more about some specific theists than it says about my inherent worth as a human being.
I’ll look more closely into religious naturalism and see if that is a view where I want to hang my hat.
FYI, In accordance with my customary (annoying) practice, I added some stuff to my last post–this time subsequent to your response above.
Robert Hunter:
Oh, for goodness sake, KN, do you need people to help you see the conclusions of your mixed-up, confused ‘atheist-Jewish-religious’ statements? You already promote the ‘horizontal transcendence’ of Ursula Goodenough, who advocates (a likewise confused and convoluted) ‘religious naturalism’ (apparently just googled it for the first time, yet who apparently isn’t a Judaist). Is this really the kind of “I’m really religious” statement you wish to make as if seeking credibility?!
hotshoe_,
Now that’s my variety of religious language!
Gregory,
You’re really not good at the whole “address the post, not the poster” thing.
Creepy stalker speculator would be inquisitors, I’ll bet!
Could you link to those studies? Or it looks like you’re making things up.
So, when you say (A) “I believe that all human beings are created in the image of God, and that we are God’s partners in improving the world” and then next you say (B) “I believe that all human beings evolved from earlier species of hominids through various evolutionary processes” then you are using “believe” in different meanings. Are you being inconsistent wilfully? Why?
Multiple social surveys indicate/demonstrate/show(?) the majority of atheists are ethical misfits? Do you have a link to twenty or so of these multiple surveys?
Gregory,
Here’s my attempt at rewriting your comment to respect Lizzie’s not terribly onerous rules:
It’s refreshingly succinct, I think.
Erik,
When you say that playing by the rules is the moral thing to do but refuse to clarify or retract your claim about a supposedly historical event, are you being inconsistent willfully?
Patrick,
Yes, mine too. All I’m trying to get across is that Hunter’s language here isn’t the same kind of pragmatic usage of language as what we use in constructing empirically testable explanations of causal processes or in constructing deductively valid proofs in formal systems. I’d think that’s a rather obvious point, yet getting it across is like pulling teeth and/or herding cats.
Kantian Naturalist,
We can crack open some Rumi and thoroughly confuse the issue if you like.
If I’m being inconsistent, it is certainly not willfully.
Yes!!
The only companion is love.
No beginning nor ending,
Yet a road.
From there the Friend calls:
“Why do you hesitate when lives are at stake?”
–Rumi
I’m not seeking credibility from anyone here, and certainly not from you.
Don’t be like that if you can help it, Erik.
The whole point is that the word “believe” does indeed have different meanings, which is no surprise to any rational human — if it’s a genuine surprise to you, we do know from previous conversations that you have a truly bizarre problem with dictionary definitions … but we can’t take your failing into account before we say anything (or else we’d have to say nothing). What KantianNaturalist is doing here is separating out the shades of those different meanings.
You’re welcome to disagree with him about what he believes, especially if the expressed content of his beliefs doesn’t match our intersubjective reality. But you’re not welcome to ask him if he’s “being inconsistent willfully” as if that were a fault he should stand accused of. It is, in fact, your personal fault in making such an accusation, not his. You’re entitled to your opinion, but you’re not entitled to your own sole definitions.
I would say that you are willfully … something … but I think I’ll refrain for now, pending your improved behavior (or not) in your next comments.
I actually have said it explicitly several times in several ways tens of pages ago – about history we only have findings and recorded testimony, but we know that history contains more than the records we have found. This should be self-evident, but I said it anyway due to some people’s subrational behaviour here.
What here does not answer this question? http://theskepticalzone.com/wp/the-varieties-of-religious-language/comment-page-34/#comment-94200
Using the same word in perfectly parallel statements in different meanings is being inconsistent. Since the statements are perfectly parallel, you know that you are doing this. Do you think that inconsistency is a problem that should be corrected?
Bottom line, in KN there’s a former avowed ‘atheist’ now claiming to be ‘religious’ (with heterodox ‘religious’ language) and yet ‘secular’ (plus socialistic, Marxist, naturalistic, etc.) at TAMSZ who astonishingly yet identifies as a ‘Reform Judaist.’ No clear explanation for this has been given.
No ‘spiritual interpretation’ based on ‘spiritual commitment’ has been offered. (And KN may even run away from this observation to Sodom for shelter!) Just (celebrate happy, non-Jewish) Rumi! 😉 This is the kind of self-contradictory, quasi-global philosophistic posturing ‘position’ that KN has presented here for several months. Just doesn’t know what he believes or isn’t really committed to it, this ‘(ex-)Reform Jew.’
Religious or not? Atheist or not? Agnostic or not? Naturalist or not (though, he’s certainly not a natural scientist)? Why should others be obliged to choose for him? He is thus not credible in his communicative attempted ‘pedagogy’ here.
None of that explains why you saw fit to mention fossils on Everest as if they could possibly lend support to your backwoods claim that the Flood really happened in real world history.
You’re confused – or at least, you give every outward sign of being confused.
If you don’t think the fossils on Everest were washed up there by some high global-or-nearly-global flood, then why did even mention them in the first place? But if you do think they were washed there by the big Flood, then why do you claim (elsewhere) that Noah’s flood is story which contains several separate floods combined, which were local and important only to the proto-Hebrews? Which is it? Fossil evidence, or not?
I mean, we do actually know the real-world answer: Everest fossils are not from any flood whatsoever, were lithified in marine sediment hundreds of millions of years ago and gradually uplifted with the continental smashing of India into Asia …
But the question remains: why did YOU even mention fossils as if they support a global flood, then refuse to answer an honest question about whether YOU personally believe there was a global flood within human history?
No, it’s not.
It’s reality. And it’s perfectly clear, and acceptable, to everyone but you. Which suggests that the problem is in your receiver, not in the sender.
Get your head out of your … whatever.
Aaannd … we’re back to the creepy-stalkerish overly-personal guano-worthy Gregory comment we know and love.
We cannot always determine from recorded history whether everything happened exactly as written, but there are times when we can say with assurance that something could not have happened exactly as written.
Yes, that’s a good distinction.
hotshoe,
Yes. Let’s hear your answer to this, Erik.
KN,
It is an obvious point, and I don’t see anyone contesting it.
The dispute lies elsewhere. More on this later today.
Gregory:
KN:
walto:
That’s my view as well. When KN says he shares that belief, a reasonable listener will conclude that:
1. KN believes that there is, in reality, an entity called “God”.
2. KN believes that in reality, we are created in the image of that entity.
3. KN believes that we are partnered, in reality, with that entity, and that our joint goal with that real entity is to improve the real world.
Those are claims about reality.
keiths,
What I really want is to capture the difference between what Rumi, Robert Hunter, or (I would say) Ursula Goodenough are saying and what scientists, mathematicians, and scientific metaphysicians are saying. Making that distinction is what’s really important to me. If we agree that there’s a distinction to be made in the neighboring bushes here, then we’re 95% of the way to agreement.
Suppose I grant the point — made by walto and keiths — that “belief”-talk belongs to the second group — what I’m calling ‘assertoric discourse’. (Note: walto and keiths in agreement! There really are miracles!) What terms can we agree on for first-person expression of utterances belonging to the first group, what I’m calling ‘disclosive discourse’?
Erik,
No, you have not.
As I’ve already pointed out at least three times, this is the part that doesn’t answer the questions:
That’s a refusal to align your behavior with the goals of this site and your own standard of moral behavior.
Answer the questions about your claim or retract it.
Erik,
I do. Please answer the questions about your claim, as demanded by your own standards of playing by the rules, or retract it.
I am taking you as expressing acceptance of a metaphoric sense of those statements, as they are used within the culture.
Let your word be yes, yes or no, no.
Yep.
KN,
Yes, I think everyone agrees that when Romeo says that Juliet is the sun, he is not asserting that she is a giant ball of incandescent gas 93 million miles away. He’s expressing his feelings about her.
It’s actually not that rare an occurrence. People tend to overlook it when it happens due to the lack of accompanying fireworks. 🙂
I don’t think there needs to be a fixed formula. It’s just a question of choosing the right words to communicate your meaning in a given context.
If in conversation you say something like “I believe God is watching over all of us”, people will naturally take you to be asserting a truth about a real entity, God, who stands in a watchful relationship to us.
If instead you say something like “Sometimes I get this warm feeling, as if I am being watched over by a loving, benevolent God” then you will still be taken as making an assertion; but it’s an assertion about your feelings, not about the existence or behavior of a hypothetical deity.
Now apply that reasoning to religious language.
Mung,
I do. When Luther wrote “a mighty fortress is our God” he wasn’t asserting that God is a building, and that is clear from the context and his choice of words.
But when Luther wrote “I believe that God has made me and all creatures”, he was asserting the existence of an actual entity, God, who was responsible for the existence of all creatures.
He got his meaning across in both cases.
Well said.
walto,
Thanks.
You didn’t notice when I answered this point too pages ago? Then I can consider it proven – you say you want answers, but when given, you ignore them.
When I brought up fossils in mountains, I wanted to see what you had to say about them. You had nothing to say about them. So, certainly I don’t have to say anything more about them either.
Erik,
I’d like to understand exactly what you are saying happened when you claim the biblical flood was an historical event. Answer the questions or retract your claim.
No, Erik, that is not at all what happened. To refresh your apparently defective memory:
Erik wrote:
hotshoe:
DNA_Jock:
Erik:
That’s NOT the behavior of someone who “wants to hear what [we] have to say about them”
In fact hotshoe went into further, considerable detail about why fossils in mountains did not support any Flood story. Comments that you studiously ignored.
As you put it: “you say you want answers, but when given, you ignore them.”
Indeed.
No one noticed, because you did not answer this point [two] pages ago, or at all.
I’ve read every comment on every page of this thread as it has occurred, and to make sure I didn’t miss anything, I searched back through more than two pages (because I figure you might not be able to count to two accurately) and you did not answer as to your beliefs about the reality of some global or near-global flood in human history.
If you still claim I’m wrong, please do quote plus link your actual answer.
It’s not even close to true that I had “nothing to say about them”. You can’t be lying so it must be that you are severely mistaken.
Maybe your problem is that I didn’t say what you wished to puppet-master me into saying. I didn’t say that fossils on Everest are a problem for me when I deny any possibly-global Flood. I didn’t say that fossils on Everest are quite reasonable evidence for backwoods creationists of any sect. I didn’t agree with any of your unspoken implications about those fossils. So I guess, for you, you can honestly tell yourself that I had “nothing” to say about them.
But every other witness here knows differently.
And it’s still true that YOU haven’t answered whether YOU think the fossils are “evidence” of a global or near-global flood.
Sure, you’re telling the truth when you claim you brought them up just to see what we would say. Fine, I believe you. Sure I do. Turnabout is fair play, though. I said what I had to say about them. Now I’m asking YOU. Legitimate questions in good faith:
What do YOU think about the fossils you oh-so-casually mentioned on Ararat and Everest? Take a stand, give us your best guess. How did they get there? What do they signify in real history rather than in “exegesis”? What, exactly, are they evidence for, geologically?
Thank you very much for digging up this convo so I didn’t have to.
As you say, there was at least one more comment where I went into a lot of detail about the geology – but given Erik’s untrue statement that I had “nothing” to say, this is okay for now.
Here you go.
from the archives…
Yeah, nothing to say.
For some values of nothing.
What was hotshoe’s argument beyond declaring “Fossils are not evidence for the flood. Folk tales are not evidence for the flood.”? Can you point out an actual scientific/empirical detail?
By the way, hotshoe’s “It’s probably true that ancient peoples thought fossil seashells in their inland/mountainous homelands deserved “an explanation” ” is a speculation all the way. And this particular speculation does nothing to explain the fossils. It’s psychoanalysing ancient people by first assuming they were driven by fantasies.
You normally notice speculation when you see such. Why not in this case?
And yes, I studiously ignore posts of that troll. Every time I answer, I find out shortly that it was a mistake to do so. I answer you, not hotshoe.
We could amend Erik’s statement to read, finding sources or inspirations for flood stories is not a problem.
Finding evidence for an actual flood is more difficult.
Well Erik, fantasy or no, they certainly were not driven by memories of an actual global flood. And we do know that people reading the bible, for many years, thought shells on mountaintop so were evidence for Noah’s flood.
People such as Ken Ham? And in turn, what is your evidence that they are not evidence for flood?
This is what I have been asking and nobody is answering beyond “You.Have.Been.Lied.To” What specifically is the lie when people make the inference fossil of sea shell –> this layer has been sea floor?