A Facebook 'friend' has posted a photo of one of those sign's you see outside of churches -- and now a cause célèbre on the web -- saying "A Freethinker is Satan's Slave". This friend is very smart and pretty eccentric, and a bunch of his friends are too, and a lot of them are posting comments, slamming the idea that freethinking is a sin. But we could put what they're doing another way -- falling right into line to agree with each other about freethinking not being a sin. And that they don't believe in sin anyway. The tribe of freethinkers -- whose bible is Atlas Shrugged, and whose religion is atheism.
Ok, that's a bit harsh. This guy and his friends bring you some of the smartest, funniest, quirkiest writing, film, and television you know. But, if you put those details aside, it's possible to view this as one side in the religion culture wars, and as such it is relevant to the kinds of things we try to say here -- and try to stay away from. It's more of the same 'freethinking' ideology that you find all over the web, often in blogs that start out as science, and then get derailed (in our view) by the creation/evolution 'debate' into the fervent defense of atheism. These blogs have lots of followers -- but they are no longer doing science. They're advocating another ideology.
And, seen from an even greater distance, it's further evidence of our tribalism, of our need to conform -- to something. Indeed, Facebook itself is evidence of that -- the great potential of the worldwide web to expose us to different people and thoughts and ways to define ourselves we now use by and large to reinforce what we already think. And on Facebook we all define ourselves according to the dictates of the software; job, schools, religion, marital status, friends -- what else do you need to know?
Of course science is tribal, too. In physics you've got your string theorists and your anti-string theorists, and in biology you've got your evolution by regulatory region and your evolution by coding region people, and in ecology you've got people who believe we're bound for disaster if we don't stop contributing to climate change right now, and people who believe we're ok doing it in baby steps. These are issues that data should support or not, but often the two sides are looking at the same data and interpreting them differently. Based on values or preconceived notions or assumptions, so that one's commitment to a point of view ventures beyond the realm of science into ideology. And an ideology brooks no heresy. The stronger a view is held, especially against other views, the more it becomes hardened and uncompromising.
This is no different when free-thinking no longer allows freedom of thought!
like ;)
ReplyDeleteThe stronger a view is held, especially against other views, the more it becomes hardened and uncompromising.
ReplyDeleteAw. Well, I guess I'll have to try to reduce my uncompromising attitude toward the young earth creationists who are trying to pollute my local school district with their nonsense. After all, as Ken Ham always, YECs and evolutionists are looking at the same data, but reach different conclusions because of their different presuppositions. Oh! That's what you said, too, no? Sure enough:
These are issues that data should support or not, but often the two sides are looking at the same data and interpreting them differently.
Hm. Perhaps we could compromise on an earth that's just 2.25 billion years old, rather than 6,000 or 4.5 billion. Think Ham would go for that?
Hm, slammed for things we didn't say. Such as that facts need to compromise with fantasy.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is that everyone (who is sincere--and it's unclear about some young-earthers) believes his own view is the truth. Polarized antagonisms don't help solve any issues that might actually be discussable between sides.
ReplyDeleteWe may both agree about 4.5 billion years, and in a specific dispute (i.e., vis-a-vis 6000 yr) there should be a resolution--an actual truth. But (again if we assume both parties' sincerity), hardened positions don't let this happen. 2.5 Bn is a compromise which may be fine in politics but not in this kind of specific dispute.
We think it's a fact that often typifies science, that people have the same data but may selectively use it to back their point of view. We are not advocating tribalism, we're saying it exists and isn't good.
You may not agree, but we think a lot of the more strident libertarianism or atheism these days is tribal in the sense we wrote about. We didn't comment on what constitutes truth and how in a given situation one can know it so surely as to be closed to other ideas.
By the way, we happen to think 4.5 Bn is a lot better than 6000! And we don't agree that freethinking is sin, either!
If we carry your argument to at least one of its logical conclusions, RBH, we would not be allowed to question the party line on evolution. It would be considered an unchallengeable axiom of biology -- in terms of formal theory, not logically different from Genesis being axiomatic to creationism. We're a bit sensitive on this subject because we do just that in our book -- question the primacy of natural selection as the ubiquitously important force of evolutionary change. This means we also question the centrality of competition, but fortunately for us a lot of people are seeing cooperation where they used to see only competition, so this wasn't a problem. Of course we could be wrong, but not because we question accepted theory per se, only if it can be shown that our reasoning or interpretation of data is incorrect.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, our questioning of natural selection gave us some trouble getting our book accepted for publication. One reviewer for the press (Harvard University Press) said that we were giving ammunition to creationists, and didn't want Harvard's name associated with our book. Fortunately for us, others didn't see it that way, and of course we do nothing of the sort. But apparently we're not supposed to venture beyond Darwin, even 150 years later.
"It's more of the same 'freethinking' ideology that you find all over the web, often in blogs that start out as science, and then get derailed (in our view) by the creation/evolution 'debate' into the fervent defense of atheism. These blogs have lots of followers -- but they are no longer doing science. They're advocating another ideology."
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if you meant to imply this, but the above quote sounds like you're saying that questions about the existence of god are not scientific ones. The existence of god is, of course, a scientific hypothesis and fervently arguing against it does not place one outside of scientific discourse.
Also, agreeing with a group of people does not equate with uncritical groupthink - especially when what you're agreeing with is that people should think critically.
Of course the existence of God could be the most important topic of all, and glory to the max for any scientist who ever proves the existence of (a kindly, heaven-providing) God!
ReplyDeleteBut so far, most scientists would say simply that there is no acceptable evidence and that, to quote Laplace to Napoleon "Sire, I have no need for that hypothesis"
But the fact that we think there's insufficient evidence doesn't disprove the hypothesis. It doesn't in itself warrant the assertion that atheism is true. Those who choose to cling to the God hypothesis can always resort to the things we can't yet explain, or to the evidence of personal testimony. Science doesn't accept the latter, but that's a decision on the part of science.
Of course agreement doesn't necessarily imply group think. But in our view tribalism is rife even in science, and we think it shouldn't be. By tribalism we mean unification under a particular world view that is suspicious of any dissension, especially when in response to some opposing group. When that happens, we believe it stifles advancement that would occur if the group's ideas could be open to question--which, of course, could end up supporting the ideas.
Also, agreeing that people should think critically--which we certainly do--should not mean that 'critically' means agreeing with the group's views or agreeing to denigrate some other group's ideas.