Sir,

Time ago I found myself musing on the lesson we can derive from fossils.

Isn't it that in time we'll be fossils?

Unless we self annihilate before that time, as it seems we are in the process of doing.

here we go again. Another corrupt human shaking his puny fist at his Maker. Pathetic really! If David is smart enough to see that humans have invented and designed things then surely he is clever enough to see that he himself has been designed. Denying the obvious seems to be a favourite past time for god deniers. No wonder they need pseudo science to back up their unintelligible rubbish.

runner,

The burden of proof is not on the 'god deniers' such as David Fisher but on those people who believe in the supernatural,whatever that might be.We have all been 'designed' by evolution through natural selection,no supernatural designer is needed

mac

you say we have all been all 'designed' by evolution. Have a think about how idiotic that statement is.

Thank you, David, for another thoughtful, clearly worded and honest article. Especially refreshing is its lack of bitterness,hysteria and egotism -- unusual in articles on this topic.

I'm pleased to find someone else who places particular emphasis on semantics and etymology. They are almost always neglected in discussions of this sort, and yet the words we choose and how and why we use them are crucial in framing our own thoughts and communicating them to others.

Thank you also for bringing "Dover Beach" to the attention of readers, many of whom have probably never come across it before. The poem has echoed in my mind for almost fifty years with the same deeply authentic voice I heard when I first read it as an adolescent. Humanity needs such poets as Arnold so much.

We obviously share an appreciation of that poem and, dare I say,we probably share much of the attitude and values it implies. Where we disagree is about its implications regarding "God".

This will have to be the basis for an article in reply. In the meantime, thanks again.

runner,

Read my comments carefully and you'll notice that 'designed' is in quotes,which means that the usual, literal meaning shouldn't be assigned to the word. It's a trap for the unwary---such as you.

"Why not eat pig? Why not eat oysters and lobsters? Not eating pig is a consequence of the fact that Jews and the Arabs who also follow the injunction were nomadic, desert people..."

It is all too easy to make up 'explanations' after the fact for religious injunctions, and this can give them a veneer of semi-rationality which they may not deserve. Many years ago someone (Kurt Vonnegut?) suggested that laws like those against soft drug use and homosexuality had no intrinsic value but were a way for a government to demonstrate that it had the power to enforce rules which were completely useless and arbitrary. It may be that many or all religious rules are there for the same non-reason.

Perhaps some high priest way back when said: "Pork! Faugh! I hate the stuff! Let's tell them all that God loathes pork." And when it actually worked he was probably as surprised as everyone else. "Hey, do you know what else I hate? Seafood. Yeah, seafood and beards..."

Dear David,
Thanks for the stimulating stuff. All I have is some challenging free association.

Chimpanzees lack more than the “linguistic capacity to express” their appreciation. But then the immodest human capacity to make a symphony out of a cacophony is comparable.
I believe Sir Paul Acton came up with the Voltaire quote (Voltaire believed in God btw), just as the Exodus quotes definitely plagiarise our Lords Monty Python!—who were not averse to hyperbole.
Forget pigs! The far more interesting question is, why not eat humans?
Thousands of years ago the Middle East wanted for minimifidianists! Now history testifies that “they” were the cause of desertification—poor PR!
The Buddha died of eating spoiled pig!
Guilt and loathing are the obverse of desire (read the Bards 129th sonnet).
We should all rejoice in Marx!
But do people have the wherewithal to make a good decision? What is the burden of the human soul (sorry, psyche).
“...and I have tried to apprehend the [Monty?] Pythagorean power by which numbers hold sway above the flux...”.
And what about Eisenstein’s theory of montage?
Plato’s cave?
Hegel’s dialectic=Marx’s materialism!
“mathematics and science transcend”; indeed they do, God-like!
Arnold was suffering from a religious hangover, which he cured by making a religion of literature---and Sartre’s repost: ‘twas “a symptom of the dehumanizing effect of capitalist economy”.
The world is not changing at all, just our dreamy perception of it.
And what of the alienating effects of “techne”?

A religion requires numerous dichotomic relationships. It needs believers and unbelievers. It needs those who know the mysteries and those who only fear them. It needs the insider and the outsider. It needs both a god and a devil. It needs absolutes and relativity. It need that which is formless (though in the process of forming) and that which is formed.

Religious Engineering, secret writings of Amel, quoted by Frank Herbert in The Godmakers

A lovely article and interesting discussion thus far. Thanks David - I don't think I've expressed directly my appreciation of your prolific articles and comments on OLO over the time you've been posting here.

In the unlikely event that I live to your age, I really hope that I can approach the wisdom, wit and calm that you display here. I can't recall anything you've written here over the years with which I significantly disagree.

Anyway, on topic - my understanding of technology is much in accordance with yours, except that I have no problem with numerous kinds. Perhaps it's a category difference: as a former academic anthropologist I regard technologies as the myriad cultural adaptations that humans create, which enable us to collectively survive and reproduce ourselves as a species.

I think that religion/God has been an enormously adaptive technology that humans created in various forms over millennia, but that it is in the process of being superceded by superior technology in the form of the unprecedented availability of knowledge and mass communication.

While in evolutionary terms humans are still generally physically adapted to being hunter-gatherers, in sociocultural terms we've moved beyond the stage in human evolution where the cohesive collective belief in shared mumbo-jumbo is very useful.

It seems to me that the technology of God/s has passed its use-by date in terms of adaptation. Belief in human-invented gods seems to cause more division than cohesion in the contemporary globalised world.

Humanity will eventually outgrow religion in order to survive, but the process will be painful, particularly in the context of AGW.

Thanks anyway, David :)

Good article David, I’d prefer a greater separation of the application of various elements of what we might describe as “human intelligence” because we apply each quite differently.

Our imagination and creativity have multiple applications. Yes, our language has been “invented” and forms the basis of social structures, << ethnicity, nationality, class and other attributes that separate human groups >>, all products of our social intelligence.

However, our “imagination” is also one cornerstone of our “sciences”, the exploration of possibilities and “what if’s”. But unlike social and religious domains, science is directed to our tactile attributes, the understanding and making of “things”.

Religion I agree needs to be separated into its two key elements. Religion as in “spiritual self knowledge” needs to be set apart from “institutionalized religion”. Since there are now some 34,000 registered institutionalized religions worldwide, we can be absolutely sure the human “inventiveness” is at work. Spirituality, as an internally focused assessment of whom and what “self” is, requires no rules. As you say << Religion can be without God or morality.>>

Institutionalized Religions on the other hand require rules, millions of them, all “invented” by humans. So when you suggest << We invent God, religion, philosophy, mathematics, art and the supernatural in addition to technology >>, I think it should be redefined to say that what we actually do is invent the “rules” that govern each domain, because it is the rules we have invented that define each domain.

Everything in our lives today is driven by rules, social, political, economic, religious, ecological and scientific, millions and millions of them. Our media produces a daily feast of what rules were broken, by whom and what should be done about it?

The concept of God and the rules imposed by institutionalized religions are also man made, a product of our inventiveness. Like the rules for every other domain, their origins were to stop us doing bad things. The theology of religions is a logical extension, “enforcement of divinity” by intellectual bullying.

The complexity of our “invented” society disenfranchises many and makes them vulnerable.

CJ Morgan

I can only faintly reflect such an illuminating post. David remains one of the most consistent contributors to OLO. He epitomises the concept of the wisdom of elders.

David I wish your thoughts were broadcast further than the narrow band of OLO.

CJ your drawing of a connection between the religious and the most vociferous of the AGW deniers is most apt. And with good reason; of all the human institutions, religion has the most to lose from advancing knowledge of the natural world. Even the fossil fuel monopolies can transition to cleaner technology, but religion is based upon a chimera of ideas well past any use other than control over its believers.

Dear skeptic,

Most organisms don't become fossils. They disappear without a trace mainly due to fungal action unless special conditions exist.

Dear runner,

Maimonides, the great medieval Jewish sage, was asked how you can show love for God who is an impalpable presence. He answered, "Use your divine mind to ask questions." I have done so and have come up with answers different from yours. That doesn't make you corrupt. You seem given to wrath – a Deadly Sin. It is easier to love God than your fellow humans.

Thanks mac, crabsy, CJ Morgan, spindoc, Severin: Flattery will get you everywhere.

Dear crabsy,

80 Great Poems by Geoff Page contains "Dover Beach" with fascinating commentary.

Dear CJ Morgan,

I don’t think humanity will outgrow religion. The need to accept the absurd seems present in most humans. The apparently growing belief in New Age mumbo-jumbo and alternate medicine appalls me.

Dear Jon J,

The anthropologist Marvin Harris wrote "Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of Culture" which, among other things, describes the origin of pig and anti-pig cultures. That's where I got my information. You could be right about shellfish.

Interesting comment, Squeers. Why not eat humans? Good protein wasted on worms. I feel Marx bottled religious nonsense in secular clothes - Private property from primitive communism = original sin, a messianic class, paradise revisited in the ultimate classless society, the class struggle with its slaughter of millions replacing the race, national or religious struggle, justifying slaughter by faith, Which side of the barricades we are on is as much an accident of birth as which army we are in. Secular rubbish replacing religious rubbish.

Dear spindoc,

Each key element of religion can lead to and is dependent on the other. The lonely experience called spirituality depends on belonging to a community of others who have also trodden that path and use the inadequate instrument of language to tell about it.

Dear Daviy,

Religion is plastic. It can do without gods and devils. As most of us do, Frank Herbert defined religion by the religions he was familiar with.

Dear David,

Your gloss of Marxism is “perhaps” mostly a fair assessment, except for the last bit, (we’ll know at the end of time. I don’t believe in Fukuyama’s utopia either, do you?), and indeed a clever analogy, but the insinuation that mass slaughter was part of the theory is shocking. Do you have any evidence for this notion of messianic genocide (what’s a collective noun for the slaughter of an entire class)? With the example of the French Revolution behind him, Marx famously said that revolution proceeds by its dark side, but he was hardly endorsing or “justifying slaughter by faith”. If anything he was a pacifist, the equivalent of a conscientious objector, asking a correspondent here for instance, “is there any sphere in which our theory that the organisation of labour is determined by the means of production is more dazzlingly vindicated than in the industry for human slaughter?” http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1866/letters/66_07_07.htm
Marx would have been naive, in the context of his day, to imagine that the bourgeoisie would give up its newfound ascendency without a fight. I’m sure he would have preferred a peaceful settlement, but when in history has any dominant power given it up willingly for equality?
These days notions of grand historical narratives are mocked, especially their prophetic elements, yet is there any doubt that human history is dynamic rather than random? At present, for me, it is driven by negative human attributes; capitalism is predicated on them and is now going global (admittedly any system would be subject to human corruption--making theodicy our most urgent discourse). The mythical proletariat may yet turn out to be mother nature and "her" abused equilibrium.
I do think that Marx's humanism deserves a better hearing; its critique of our culture is as true and damning as ever.
Btw, my rhetorical “why not eat humans” was an allusion to the ethical injunction against it--far more visceral than religious or humanist ethics.

Dear Squeers,

I doubt very much that human history has an inner dynamic driving it in any direction.

I don't regard Marx as a humanist or a pacifist. He was a Jew hating bigot. Read his "On the Jewish Question." He ranked countries in order of their progression in his scheme of the march of history. Thus he could support the Turkish suppression of the Greek revolt on the grounds the Greeks were less advanced.

One can look at some of his 10 points in the Communist Manifesto:

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
The above prescribe tyranny as far as I am concerned.

I live in Australia and get my Social Security payments from the US. If 4 were applicable I would not.

6 pretty well eliminates freedom of expression if means of communication are in the hands of the state.

'the bringing into cultivation of waste lands' I doubt that Marx had much of a notion of ecology so I excuse him for that. However, a more equable distribution of the populace over the country can only be realised by coercion.

Industrial armies mean more coercion.

He prescribed tyranny, and he got tyranny.

Also from the Manifesto:

“You must, therefore, confess that by "individual" you mean no other person than the bourgeois, than the middle-class owner of property. This person must, indeed, be swept out of the way, and made impossible.”

That sounds like a recommendation for mass murder to me.

I regard Lenin and Hitler as the two evil geniuses of the twentieth century.

Sure. God talk, not God . Lets leave it open cause all our words on the subject of how big this place is could be just an inadequate series of words - hot air. Not that there isn't logic there - perhaps just not enough to convince most of us about "what it all means ?"

Modern psychology, as a tested theory of behavior and logic , supports the idea that all men have gods of some kind. The question might then be, say if we lay on the couch to do this , " why do you in particular believe in gods that are always changing" or if you are observing someone lying on the couch "Tell me, do you think your god taller than you are "
Maybe a more mature discussion then is strangely " why my god is better than your god "

David Fisher,

you(and others) might be interested in this article explaining the psychological/neurological basis for religious belief.

http://tinyurl.com/cobwmv

It was Thomas Aquinas who is said to have used Hellenistic Reasoning to lift Christianity out of the Dark Ages.

However, also as a Christian philosopher with his feet on earthly soil, he wisely saw the need for the beginnings of the learning institutions we have right now.

So it seems as a Saint he gave us the right to choose.

Or if he did not, was it the Greeks then who gave us the right to choose?

Cheers, BB, WA,

Dear David f,

>>We invent God, religion, philosophy, mathematics<<
I think you know my opinion that “God created man to His image” and “Man created God to his image” are “two sides of the same coin”. And that in my ("Platonist") mind this dilemma is somehow related to the invention/discovery understanding of most mathematicians of the subject of their research.

I find the following a very cute explanation of this dilemma that you might be interested in:

“We propose a metaphor capturing this distinction. Imagine a plain on which a vast, invisible edifice supposedly rises up to the sky. We know it’s there because of its effect on the plain and the climate around it. People plant near what seems to be the base of the edifice the seeds of a vine that grows up the invisible walls, feeling its way along the nooks, crannies, and statuary, slowly producing an outline of. . . something there. This vine does not grow at will, for it needs constant care. It needs water and fertilizer and even directing, hence gardeners. These caretakers constantly prune and poke at it, from the ground or while standing on totteringly tall ladders. The result is that the shape of the vine and the outline it appears to make reflect not only the edifice within but also the interests and agendas of the gardeners.” (http://www.ams.org/notices/200704/fea-mccolm-web.pdf)

Dear David,
the dynamic is nothing grand; we are competitive social animals and our societies are built on economies of trade; since in wealthy countries this is based on surplus, we have to look beyond “need” for its success. Capitalism thus harnesses “negative” human drives (evolutionary positives) such as avarice and one-upmanship, making a virtue of consumption. The economic model of human history is perhaps the most objective. What is it about this that you “very much doubt”?
The “Jewish question” per se can only be reprehensible in our day and age, yet hatred of Jews was common currency when you were a lad. Where is your evidence, in “On the Jewish Question” that Marx was a “jew hating bigot”, beyond the prejudice of the day?
Von Ranke had the whole world in raptures over his periodisations and hierarchy of history well into the 20th century; is Marx to be singled out and condemned for subscribing to the scholarship of the day?
Similarly the mania for progress; at the dawn of the industrial revolution and without the benefit of environmental hindsight, was Marx expected to back sustainability? He was an empire builder like the rest; his idea on labour was that "everyone" gets their hands dirty.
Marx’s stuff on individuality is of particular interest to me http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch03abs.htm#p246
He simply deconstructed bourgeois conceit and was certainly not recommending mass murder. His key insight was into the veil of ideology that flatters and prevents us from thinking critically, so maintaining the status quo. Marx wanted individuality to flourish, but believed that communal equality was prerequisite. The strength of capitalism is largely built on maintaining the ideology of the inherent evil of communism, especially in the US where even equality in the health system is denounced as communism---hysterical and pernicious nonsense maintained by and maintaining bourgeois paranoia.
As your countryman says, “always historicise”. It’s anachronistic to criticise Marx’s manifesto based on today's world; I agree that his utopianism was mostly nonsense, but his critique of capitalism remains compelling.
I regard Hitler and 'Stalin' as two of the many evil geniuses of the age.

Why all the doom and gloom of death wishes , that sounds quite biblical and end of days Sceptic; The only Gods man has invented is the Socialist/ Communist Idols, the worshiping of Murderers – Liars and thief’s , Self professing destruction ;

Once you shift outside of the parameters of what was Accepted behaviour and good will , Good ethics and a NON Postmodern outlook and the post subscription to Nihilism ; We were doing OK.

It must be obvious now that what had taken place in WW2 with Socialist hatred of Jews, Christians are the new Jewish substitutes for annihilation ; and once again it is a threat to the evils of Socialism – and , well lets face it ;- The Lucifer principle .

A scientific Expediation into the forces of History

Thanks for an interesting article, David.
On the question of eating swine, the quoted passage appears to me to be a specific injunction against eating an animal which is not entirely herbivorous; although cloven hoofed, pigs do not 'chew the cud'. Pigs will eat anything -including excrement, unfortunately; a habit which certainly makes them 'unclean' in my book.
Being copraphagic is obviously not an endearing trait in an otherwise very intelligent and surprisingly affectionate and loyal animal.
Interestingly (to me, at least) although pigs love investigating and eating the excrement of other animals, they are quite fastidious when it comes to their own.
Years ago, I started up a travelling farm animal pet show, and as a result kept pigs as pets, inside our house yard. We made the mistake of putting their kennel as far from the house as possible, as we were worried about their smell. We discovered the pigs always shat as far away from their own abode as possible; right at our back steps.
Their house smelt fine... ours didn't.
"Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer".

I,m not sure we can say we invented maths and physics.We discovered the rules that govern us by using these tools.The laws of maths and physics were always there.We just had to adapt our minds to understand them.

We invented the concept of God to try to explain the universe and make us feel secure.The existence of god or otherwise is irrelavent.It should be about the progression of our consciousness at all levels,ie social,ethical,scientific etc.

When you understand human motivation and it's foibles,the journey of truth can begin.Our present obsession with power and money will destroy us.It is merely a reflection of our insecurities fostered by our ignorance.

We only have to look at global politics to see the USA and China trying to dominate the world scene.

david f, now you’ve really confused me.

<< Each key element of religion can lead to and is dependent on the other. >>

Is this a reference to institutionalized religion? If so then any element is by its nature, a human construct and any consequential links that “can lead to” and yet “be dependent on the other” are part of the (seemingly contradictory) rule base. Surely, such contradictions can only be “explained” by that other consequential human construct, theology?

<< The lonely experience called spirituality depends on belonging to a community of others who have also trodden that path>>.

How can spirituality, as an intensely personal experience, be dependent upon group “belonging”? Surely any religious group is defined by “its” collective rules and to belong, one must subscribe to their rules?

<< and use the inadequate instrument of language to tell about it.>>

Isn’t it language (communication) that converts the personal spiritual experience into something humans can then impart to others? Therefore, each experience handled likewise forms another “group belief” which actually “creates” yet another religion? Isn’t this the very process that has led to the creation of 34,000 religions?

Until possibly the last century, where is has become increasingly difficult to separate God from aliens and sciences, the construct of God was “the” basis religious rules. As an increasingly difficult concept to “sell” in modern society, God based religions seem to be giving way to those simply based upon power and wealth

Arjay, a good account of the human invention of mathematics written for laymen/women, including a discussion of the idea that parts mathematics are discovered as well, can be found in Phillip J. Davis and Reuben Hersh, The Mathematical Experience. It can still be bought (try Amazon), but you should be able to find it through a library. The authors are mathematicians, with a good knowledge of the philosophy and history of maths. Be careful of their account of Lakatos--they omit the most important feature of his work, on concept stretching.

Imre Lakatos gives a classic account of the extent of human choice in solid geometry, with an appendix that draws on similar material in the harder to understand area of analysis, in his book Proofs and Refutations. That is a classic work, by a notable philosopher who was also a mathematician. Be careful of the footnotes, which were inserted by the editors (the book was published after Lakatos's death)--the editors don't understand the implications of concept stretching either.

A couple of quick examples, to whet your appetite: the introduction of zero as a number (you don't count with it) was a contested choice, which involved stretching the concept of number. The introduction of infinitesimals in accounts of the calculus was highly controversial. When arguments about limits were improved, so that infinitesimals could be abandoned, they were. But a few decades ago, I think in the 1070s, they were re-introduced.

The notion that 1 is not a prime is not a discovery, but a choice--it makes a good deal of mathematics simpler.

Humans believed in gods before they came to believe in one god. Speculation (aided by archeological evidence) on why is interesting.

Squeers wrote:

"The “Jewish question” per se can only be reprehensible in our day and age, yet hatred of Jews was common currency when you were a lad. Where is your evidence, in “On the Jewish Question” that Marx was a “jew hating bigot”, beyond the prejudice of the day?
Von Ranke had the whole world in raptures over his periodisations and hierarchy of history well into the 20th century; is Marx to be singled out and condemned for subscribing to the scholarship of the day?

Dear Squeers,

Relevant to nothing you wrote: "We should all rejoice in Marx!" You singled him out and characterised him as humanist and pacifist. A humanist and pacifist should transcend the prejudices of his day.

That prejudice was not universal. Napoleon, neither humanist nor pacifist, threw open the ghettoes where he conquered. George Eliot wrote "Daniel Deronda" which had a Jew as hero. The British parliament chose Disraeli, a man of Jewish descent, as prime minister.

Some transcend bigotry.

Marx’s father was a Jew freed by Napoleon. After Napoleon was expelled from Germany Heinrich converted to Christianity to keep his status as lawyer. Karl was a convert at the age of six.

When the horrible pogrom took place at Kishinev Marx who protested other injustices was silent.

Many writings exhibit his pathological hatred. Eg. a letter to Engels referring to the Jew, Lassalle:

"Always this constant babble with the falsely excited voice, the unaesthetic, demonstrative gestures, the didactic tone. . . . And also the uncultivated eating and the horny lust of this "idealist." It is now completely clear to me that, as his skull shape and hair prove, he is a descendant of those Blacks who accompanied Moses on the exodus from Egypt. (If his mother or grandmother on his father's side did cross with a n----r.) Now this combination of Jewishness and Germanness upon the Black basic substance must bring forth a strange product. The pushiness of this fellow is also n----r-like."

Marx was a vile, Jew-hating, black-hating bigot. Read Sander Gilman’s “Jewish Self-Hatred” for details.

Dear David,
My “we should all celebrate Marx” was a throw away line of “free association” designed to get a response. Of course I know nothing of the man except that like us all he was a flawed human being.

I’ve done a quick search of prominent Jew haters from history and find it well nigh a universal list of “great men”, including Jesus Christ, Benjamin Franklin and a bevy of Popes. It’s a fascinating read: http://www.stormfront.org/jewish/antisemite.html
Marx, however, is a notable exception! Indeed, he and Marxism are rounded upon severally as being a Jew lover and a Jewish conspiracy respectively!
If Marx was an out of the ordinary “vile, Jew-hating, black-hating bigot” (sounds like the average white 20th century US citizen?), the world really is divided between wolves and lambs. Let's not forget the "sciences" of phrenology and physiognomy,(apropos of your quote)popular at the time.
The sad truth is that anti-Semitism has been around for ever, and continues to flourish along with racism generally. One of the most moving books I’ve read on the Jewish plight is Primo Levi’s “If This Is A Man”.
With respect (and I do highly respect your obvious learning and humanism) it seems to me that if you’re going to maintain this stance, you are either a misanthrope (since Marx's ostensible antisemitism is comparatively benign) or your benighted in ideology (like the rest of us), at least where Marxism is concerned.
Personally, I have always hated racism of any kind or degree.

Middlemarch also has a Jewish protagonist.

There’s a wonderful new version of “The Merchant of Venice” with Al Pachino in the video store btw

Certainly the greatest weakness of our OLO or OLO's is the lack of an Adjudicator or the inability to either find one, or design one.

Reckon that is what our OLO smart arses should be thinking about rather than tearing mental strips of each other, as well as off Prominent Thinkers of history.

Must say, in my experience with the group, as far as solving global problems, we seem to be getting no-where?

Dear George,

I knew of the Platonic forms but not of the views of Aristotle. Aristotle sounds more reasonable. Gibbs and Heaviside can claim more credit for vector calculus than Grassman. Someone would have thought of it, as it is a logical extension of previous mathematical developments.

You may find the following re Heaviside interesting from page 83 of "Father Figure" by Beverley Nichols:

“The Times, for instance, did not mention that he seldom dressed, and was usually attired in a kimono of pale pink silk. Nor did The Times see fit to mention that Heaviside, in a moment of pique, had caused most of the furniture of his house to be removed, and had replaced it by large granite rocks, which stood about in the bare rooms like the furnishings of some Neolithic giant. Through those fantastic rooms he wandered, growing dirtier and dirtier, and more and more unkempt - with one exception. His nails were always exquisitely manicured, and painted a glistening cherry pink.

Was Professor Heaviside mad? Presumably not – his scientific record shows him to have had a brain of exceptional range and delicacy; he was probably one of the few men of this century who could have argued intelligently with Einstein. But to me he was just another figure of whom to be afraid; he was surrounded with a childish aura of terror. Sometimes I used to creep under the bushes and peer through a gap in the wall, and watch him prowling about his ragged, thorny garden. Through the unwashed windows I could see the rocks, standing against the walls of his drawing-room. Now and then he would pause, and glare in my direction; he had a habit of suddenly pulling his pink dressing-gown very tight, and nicking his glistening fingers above his head.”

Peter Atkins in "The Periodic Kingdom" uses a geographical metaphor to describe the relationship of the different masses, number, reactivity and other properties of the elements in the periodic table to each other. http://www.chem.ucla.edu/dept/Faculty/scerri/pdf/Atkins_critique.pdf contains a critique of his book.

I'm with bushbred on having a little adjudication - someone from the psychology, philosophy of science, or should we dare to be so old fashioned, the theological fields.
After all , the question is important - it's on people's minds. Perhaps a possible rephrase " To what extent is talk about God /or even gods, limited by human metaphor and words" - The answer to that seems simple.
But what about the beyond?
If psychologists are right , there may be at least too types of gods - the ones in our minds, and the one "out there" .
As raised , we might well ask how the constructs of the past merged into one ? Clearly its got a lot to do with the quite rational deduction that "if there is a creator ?" he had a hand in it all . As each year passes since those early days, science speaks of integrated function in a way which prescience days could only dream of. The gods of the greeks , like ours , presumably have their limits .

Moving onto Big G ( you don't have to , of course ) - if there really is no all powerful one outside and beyond what we can see and observe , a one who created and is behind all the creative engines around us, the boundaries we forge for our gods can be expected quite logically to be just lost in the limitations of our own knowledge .

So I'm with saying to the question- I say " we don't know whether what we might call God is necessarily a human invention".

The maths may explain function, but the growing wonder of the structure is not explained by just one equation ( A+T+G+C)or one man in a pink dress.
I need my god and if my version is an inadequate construct , at least i have somewhere concrete to keep coming back to- maybe what a costly session on the couch might tell me

Ozbib,people talk about spirituality in a religious sense,yet fail to see it in a mathematical or scientific sense.Notions of approaching zero in calculus to determine volume and acceleration,infinity,and now in physics,black holes,parrallel universes, etc are non ordinary realities.These things are revealing an entire new reality that the traditional religions have failed to deliver.

I do not believe in the traditional concept of a singular divine being,but I do believe in a greater consciousness afforded to us by the disciplines of science, maths and the humanities.That does not mean however that we will have a consciousness beyond this life or that there is a singular awareness guiding it.

Thanks for the references.

Dear David,

I was not referring to Plato’s philosophy as such (as far as I can see, both he and Aristotle had far reaching philosophical insights) only to the understanding of mathematics - referred to as “Platonism” (remember, I used quotation marks), sometimes called “realism” - an attitude that many working mathematicians share, namely, that (pure) mathematics is a description of an ideal structure that exists independently of humanity. The alternative is “formalism” that sees mathematics more or less just as a game with symbols that humans invent. Of course, both approaches acknowledge the seminal role of applications, in describing physical reality - c.f. Eugene Wigner’s “unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics.

I indeed think BOTH approaches have their point - namely that mathematics is about BOTH discoveries AND inventions - although for my world-view purposes I like to emphasize the discovery side. The metaphor about the edifice and vine was just an attempt to illustrate/explain this seeming discovery/invention dichotomy.

I am not sure I understand the relevance of Atkins and Heaviside to this. Heaviside, like Dirac, belongs to pioneers in applied mathematics, working intuitively. They needed Laurent Schwarz to turn their intuition into “kosher” (pure) mathematics, a task that is still waiting for somebody e.g. in the case of Feynman integrals.

Thank you for the information about Heaviside. I was not aware of his mental disorder, however he would not be the only mathematical genius thus affected (c.f. John F. Nash of “The Beautiful Mind” or recently Grigori Y. Perelman).

bushbred:

"Certainly the greatest weakness of our OLO or OLO's is the lack of an Adjudicator or the inability to either find one, or design one.

Reckon that is what our OLO smart arses should be thinking about rather than tearing mental strips of each other, as well as off Prominent Thinkers of history".

I don't know what you mean. So far as I'm concerned, I've debated an interesting topic using the proper form and manners. It may have gotten a little off topic but it was otherwise productive and worthwhile, I think. At no time have I been "tearing mental strips off" anyone. So what qualifies me, and my antagonist presumably, as a "smart arse"? I for one am here to learn and adjust my views accordingly. I try to make thoughtful contributions on important issues. I challenge peoples thinking, which in some cases is seized, and I don't pull punches as a rule. I expect the same treatment myself.
A sure way to get rid of me would be to get your adjudicator, that would save any of us the effort of independent thought. We could just mouth our prejudices then have the adjudicator overrule with hers.
We certainly need someone to keep an eye on the tone and language (though Graham, could you please change the designation from the puritanical "profanity" to "expletive"!)
I look to OLO for rigorous debate, as well as more light-hearted discussions and a spot of satire, but I have no desire to be glib.
I'll leave that to others.

I'll say again, Squeers, that tearing strips of each other, is no way of looking for answers regarding what is the matter with today's world.

Reckon the lack of female participants shows how OLO has sadly become male territory.

Dear David f

Exactly. Frank Herbert showed our plastic religions for what they are and defines them at the same time. His basic theme that religion, ceremony, dogma et al are BS. I agree. But because our concept of 'God' in all the BS forms that we have invented do not exist that does not mean that there is not something beyond our comprehension. All we can say is that if there is then we cannot comprehend it.

Dear George,

Perelman not accepting the Fields prize does not indicate mental disorder to me. It may be simply good sense in that he felt accepting the prize would move his life in a direction he didn't want it to go. I know of no other reason to ascribe any mental disorder to him.

I see Plato's theory of forms as an unpleasant expression of conservatism. Everything has degenerated from original perfection. There is no hope. Everybody hates me. Guess I'll go eat worms.

I included Atkins because the castle metaphor you cited made me think of his metaphor.

I included Grassman because mathematics is not only invention/discovery. It is also getting your work accepted and known so other people can build on it. Like Mendel in genetics and Wegener in tectonics Grassman's vector calculus was not immediately accepted. Heaviside and Gibbs encouraged its use. I brought in Heaviside's eccentricities because I thought them interesting.

Squeers: ... his [Marx's] critique of capitalism remains compelling.

Dear Squeers,

Marx's critique predicted the disappearance of the middle class as most of it would sink into the lower class. He predicted a greater concentration of business in great monopolies. There is a plethora of small business and an increasing middle class in the capitalist countries. Bernstein noted this in 1899 and was attacked by orthodox Marxists for noticing that Marx was wrong.

Marxism is tyranny appealing to authoritarian peasant countries such as czarist Russia while fascism is tyranny appealing to authoritarian capitalist countries such as Germany and Italy. Wrong-headed Marx predicted that the capitalist countries would be first to adopt communism.

It was no accident that both tyrannies adopted the policy of mass murder of those they dehumanised. The class struggle has the same dynamic as the race or national struggle.

Dear bushbred,

I agree that it is sad OLO is primarily male territory. I think that’s a reflection of Australian society. In Norway boys and girls from an early age are encouraged to interact, and the sexual roles are not as sharply defined.

DavidF: "Marxism is tyranny appealing to authoritarian peasant countries such as czarist Russia".

David,
Correction: Marxism is a philosophy that has never been put into practice. Theory and practice are two different things, and “the best laid schemes of mice and men” etc.
As I've said, I'm more interested in Marx's critique of capitalism and is theory of how it would pan out.
You might like to look at this short article http://www.keghart.com/node/623
based on a piece by Leo Panitch, "distinguished research professor of political science at York University", which discusses Marxism in the context of the GFC. Among other things it says:
"there was as little in common between Marx and Stalinism as there was between Jesus and the Inquisition", "Marx's prescience on capitalist globalization...","Marx's profound understanding of capitalist dynamics".
But whatever you care to make of Marxism, surely you acknowledge the vast and growing disparity between rich and poor, the disgustingly rich and the destitute (mostly offshore, out of sight out of mind), and are just as scathing of the other evils of capitalism? Among which is the unsustainable devastation of this planet.
Fredric Jameson (he who said "always historicise") has come up with a novel new theory of the impasse of "late capitalism", which he calls a "spatial dialectic", designed to account for anomalies in Marx’s crude, linear model. Jameson notes that Marx predicated revolution on the notion of global capitalism as its final and fatal horizon, globalisation and the inevitable limits to growth would spell its demise, but argues that the current impasse is due to the “spatialization” of commodity culture and the interdependence of global capital and consumption (Valences of Dialectic 2009 p.66). Capitalism is literally "too big to fail", a point I've made elsewhere on OLO.
Sadly, I think we're stuck with it until its inevitable "big crunch". Hopefully the survivors will learn something from our madness.

Squeers wrote: Among other things it says: "there was as little in common between Marx and Stalinism as there was between Jesus and the Inquisition"

I accept your analogy. I think there was a lot in common between Jesus and the Inquisition. In the New Testament it states: John 10:9 I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.

It doesn't matter how good a life you have lived or how decent a person you are, you are only saved if you accept the Christian mumbo-jumbo. There is an intolerance for the people who didn't wish to accept the mumbo-jumbo expressed there and in other places in the New Testament. I see a direct link between the words of Jesus and the Inquisition.

I have already cited the words of Marx which called for murder.

The seeds for the Holocaust and the Inquisition are in the New Testament, and the seeds for the communist murders are in the words of Marx.

Squeers also wrote: Correction: Marxism is a philosophy that has never been put into practice.

The apologists for Christianity say something similar. No philosophy or religion has ever been put in practice since philosophies and religions always have to be put into practice by humans. The reality of Marxism is what you got when humans implemented it. Marx recommended sweeping away all the protections between humans and the state that had set up to protect people from the state in the bourgeois democracies. They wouldn't be needed in his utopia. What happened was pretty much what one would expect to happen.

We disagree.

I think we would better off without either Marxist or Christian intolerance of those who don't accept either mumbo-jumbo..

Squeers, concerning the failures of capitalism, maybe your term MADNESS should be replaced simply by LOOSENESS, thus we might blame Adam Smith for the term Free Market, moving on to the more modern term Deregulation.

It is so interesting that when first learning economics, new students are told that politics and economics can be related to good family structures.

Thus we might say that business politics and economics could have been ruined from the start simply owing to the use of two terms that should never be used in a growing up family.

Free Market and Deregulation.

There have been over 2500 religions and Gods invented by mankind, the only reason we have these last few remaining corporate religious cult brand names we have today is simply because the cult puppet masters and their devotees slaughtered and burnt alive every single person that ever opposed them in inter religious warfare over the last couple of millenniums. It really is that simple these people have perfected killing for Gods. If you people haven't noticed yet, we are on the precipice of an abyss into a new religious dark age! We are de-evolving back into the darkness of the primitive superstitious religious. Don't just worry about the Bin Ladens and Netanyahu's destroying the planet! The murdochbots from Fox News channel and limited News Limited, the Pat Robertsons and Sarah Palin's tea bagging confederates and the Australian equivalents Steve Fielding, Paster Danny Nalliah, Tony Abbott, David Clark are just as capable of making your skin crawl!
The high court of Australia ruled that "charlatanism" is the price we pay for religious belief and if any religion was asked to prove their "superstitious religious" beliefs, "ALL WOULD FAIL"!
Ask any neurologist, most religious fundamentalist have Temporal lobe epilepsy. The rest of the religious are simply indoctrinated and hypnotized as vulnerable children by bizarre religious rituals designed and perfected over a millennium, threats, fear, lies, false hope, chants, rants, smoke, lighting, music you name it, they scare you into believing anything they say no matter how ridiculous you know it really is?

David Fisher's essay relies so heavily on a fundamentalist style of discourse that it makes me think he is scared of where a more rational, honest and evidence-based discourse would lead.

Dear David,

OK, Perelman is an eccentric (geek?) with no mental disorder, so was Heaviside. However, from what I have read about Perelman - and there is more than just not accepting the Fields medal - he is certainly not in the same category as e.g. Paul Erdoes, an eccentric mathematician par excellence, whom I had met personally (as his interpreter in Prague), and to whom nobody would assign mental disorder.

Apparently your criticism of Plato’s philosophy was meant tongue-in-cheek. There are many (e.g. Catholic) conservatives who derive their philosophy from Aquinas who built on Aristotle.

>>mathematics is …  also getting your work accepted and known so other people can build on it. Like Mendel in genetics …<<
This is not peculiar to mathematicians: everybody wants to get his/her work accepted and known. Also, most mathematicians, like everybody else, like to earn a living from their mathematical activities. This is irrelevant to the inventing-discovering dichotomy.

Perhaps you can compare Mendel’s investigation with that of an applied mathematician, whereas I had in mind the activities of a person “doing” (inventing and discovering pure) mathematics. Well, this introduces a third dispute - beside the theist-atheist and science-literary criticism (C. P. Snow) - on these threads, namely concerning pure-applied mathematics. I am happy to be involved, only I doubt many people would be interested in what they might see as hair-splitting.

Well still, I know, the clear distinction between pure and applied mathematicians is peculiar to my generation. Newton did not distinguish strictly between “pure” mathematics we was “inventing” (calculus) and its application to the understanding of physical reality (phenomena if you like). Later the distinction became very explicit (c.f. my remark about Dirac, Heaviside vs “kosher” mathematics, or yours about Grassman vs Heaviside).

Today the distinction still exists, however it is blurred: applied mathematicians, even theoretical physicists, create/discover new mathematics - to use in their applications to physics - working more rigorously than their predecessors, and many pure mathematicians work on their abstract and rigorous (“kosher”) mathematics while explicitly using imputs from contemporary physics (and, to a lesser degree, from other science).

I think Squeers has just convinced me that Gods are manmade; after trying to digest the Theses supplied in the account and Biography of Karl Marks ; I now realise how a murderer – Paedophile - barbarian can now be known as a Messenger ; And Lucifer is actually the Cumming of Christ ; That was a very ill-informed spurious falsehood account ,but I don’t think it was intended to be a dishonest account of Marx and friends ;-
but it certainly is as close to the truth as the Beagle Mars Lander finding is mark on the red planet ;
( It did not make it ) Smart people allegedly – could not know the difference from Metric and Imperial measurement , and therefore manufactured its demise.

Try an Objective approach , and read Marx own words. And submissions for publications, as well as Personal mail, you will know and be very embarrassed, and probably angry; Karl Marx is not the god of intellectual knowledge and ability , or the saviour of mankind; he is archetypical of , and the antipathy of evil. History proves that.

Condemned by his own words and his deeds, by that shall you know them.

I thought we agreed that gods are a human invention? If we have a abcess on the brain -we all seem to have one. Is this the deniers class? Can we move on .
So what if there are millions of gods .The interesting inventions are the ones that have a lasting effect: they work or at least sort of work. They may be rough edged and even ridiculous to us , but if they work , they work for a reason.
I therefore can't understand why going through old and failed ideas ( that have been tried and don't work) is really helpful- If Marx and others mentioned at length are so important , tell us what their ideas have done for practical peace keeping in our own time and lives ?
A more upto date question surely - Why has Islam retained interest amongst certain cultures over the last 1000 years? What groups of people are taking up this religion and why ? What balance of the force of habit and the force of ideas? What growth is because of the force of failed ideas?

I would think Islam is – Perhaps not so much growing, maybe call it a newer primitive Imperial hubris. Do not consider it as Ideas that makes it grow; consider the consequences if you do not grow with it, or become an apostate of it ; death in any form will follow , and using that formula and what we already know in today’s Media , that is why it is convenient to cause argument and attempt to destroy Christian or Jewish Ideology ; If they were as forth coming in describing Islam in the same manner ; and that is why it is never done – The Fear of retaliation and possible of, and imminent execution.
Islam is a cult , just like the many mutating factors of Crypto Marxism’s Socialist construct , whatever purpose it serves is to destroy , in so much as to gain property that had never been theirs to claim , or possess any ability to construct, or appreciate value and earn something that has value and worth ; The Lazy and brainless Thugs take it by force; or as in the Marxism theses ; by simple Psychology and by statute , due to the occupation of what was our public institutions.

Dear George,

I wrote: "Perelman not accepting the Fields prize does not indicate mental disorder to me. It may be simply good sense in that he felt accepting the prize would move his life in a direction he didn't want it to go. I know of no other reason to ascribe any mental disorder to him."

You know of other reasons. Please tell me. I never heard of him before.

My criticism of Plato was not tongue-in-cheek. I do not buy his theory of forms and agree with Karl Popper that Marx and Plato were enemies of an open society. I would not want to live in a society such as that envisioned by Plato in "The Republic."

I agree with your distinction between pure and applied mathematics. I don't see why it makes any difference if others are not interested in our discussions. They don't have to bother with it.

I also knew Paul Erdoes and have dined with him several times at Syracuse University. He could be quite an amusing fellow. One of his bits was to go down the menu pronouncing the items phonetically. Pineapple upside down cake was memorable. He was a free spirit who simplified his life by subcontracting as much as he could to other people. "The Man Who Loved Only Numbers" is his biography.

Dear grateful,

Please substantiate your criticism by an example.

HFR wrote: "If you people haven't noticed yet, we are on the precipice of an abyss into a new religious dark age!"

Dear HFR,

With the domination of rock we don't even have decent music while we dance at the end of the precipice. Tickets have been sold out for the 2010 Global Atheist Convention
12-14 March at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre. The demand was much greater than expected.

Dear Squeers,

Capitalism has many flaws, but Marxism is no alternative. The environmental destruction in the Soviet and Maoist China was worse than in the capitalist states. Capitalism is blamed for the consequences of industrialisation.

Reckon both the bosses of this OLO, and the participants have got lost in platitudes of already worn-out religous arguments already well explained by us more philosophical historians.

Matter of fact, reckon its about time our OLO's got back to reality and discussed a piece in today's West Australian.

Media report that Israel now has huge pilotless planes able to fly as far as the Persian Gulf.

Might say through its illegal atomic capacity and more such help from certain well-known nations, tiny Israel has become much much more a threat to the Middle East than Iran with its more than 70 millions population.

However, an earlier report stated that China has already talked about backing Iran - which might finish up with what Henry Kissinger warned about to Nixon years ago, that an atomic Israel could bring on WW3.

Dear David,
In Perelman’s biography on http://www.notablebiographies.com/supp/Supplement-Mi-So/Perelman-Grigory.html he is explicitly called an eccentric and (almost) a recluse living with his mother. After his success, Perelman gave up mathematics entirely. This is exactly the opposite of what Erdoes did, although both are/were mathematical geniuses.

>>My criticism of Plato was not tongue-in-cheek. <<
Well, words like “Everything has degenerated from original perfection. There is no hope. Everybody hates me. Guess I'll go eat worms.” sounded like that. Besides, I objected to your out-of-hand dismissal of Plato’s (metaphysical) insights via Ideas (Forms| and the cave, not to Popper’s criticism of Plato’s political philosophy in his “Open society”.

I agree that Plato’s political model could not be used as an inspiration for organizing a just (and workable) society, however Western philosophy would not be what it is without his cave allegory.

Presently I am reading (and trying to understand) a paper by a (younger than us) mathematical physicist Shahn Mahd, where he - inspired exactly by this allegory - proposes a “principle of self-duality” for a (yet to be found) “fundamental theory of physics”:

“(W)hile Plato’s conclusion was that his cave was an allegory for a pure reality of which we see a mere shadow, our conclusion is exactly the opposite, that there is no fundamental difference between ‘real’ in this platonic sense and the world of shadows since one could equally well consider ... as ‘shadows‘ of what we previously thoughts of as shadows, and the latter as ‘real’ in the platonic sense.reality.” [Shahn Mahd (Ed.), On Space and Time, CUP 2008]. Self-duality then means that one should consider as actually real neither the reality that is supposed to exist independent of the observer, nor the observed phenomena, but the combined object consisting of pairs, one from each, reality on its own, and observed data about that reality.”

What an impressive CV: http://www.phy.syr.edu/PhysicsMatters/Volume2/Correspondence/David%20Fisher.pdf. I assume - and hope you do not mind me posting it - this is you. Am I right?

brushbred,you are right.Israel and the USA are out of control.The distressing reality is that China wants to be exactly like them.

The West have destroyed themselves by seeking power through an monetary system,and China has ursurped us by productivity.

The USA has the weaponry and is trying to starve China of energy to slow their progress.This is why Japan entered WW2.Have we learnt nothing?

DavidF
you have not substantiated your position on Marx or Marxism, and your links between the philosophy and subsequent practice, like your link between Jesus and the Inquisition, is tenuous and anachronistic; indeed, if the flap of a butterfly's wings is registered a thousand miles away, OLO might be incubating the tyranny of tomorrow.

DavidF: "Capitalism has many flaws, but Marxism is no alternative. The environmental destruction in the Soviet and Maoist China was worse than in the capitalist states. Capitalism is blamed for the consequences of industrialisation".

Your logic is a little binary for me; Marxism is no alternative so it's capitalism by default?
Capitalism does indeed have many faults. It is an engine that is on the point of exhausting its fuel and collapsing, laying waste to the planet in the process.
While capitalism has often been congratulated for pulling millions out of poverty, this has only been in order to exploit them. Moreover, capitalism and the false prosperity it's engendered is single-handedly responsible for our population explosion--ergo in Australia our politicians are talking up a population boom. This expedient has two motives, to promote economic growth and to protect our borders, both absolutely necessary responses in the global climate, and both unsustainable.
It amuses me (grimly) when parochial simpletons winge about population growth in Australia being "unsustainable"; they're still incapable of thinking in the global context--witness the annual Australia Day nonsense, a pie throwing celebration the Three Stooges would be proud of! Besides, population growth is fundamental! Build more infrastructure, desalination plants, new agriculture, urbanise the desert---more growth! Regional threats too are good--talk up nationalism, militarise---weaponise, more economic growth!
Ironically world government, the paranoiac fear of the Ostrich Right, is inevitable and spells the demise Capitalism. Marx might have the last laugh yet.

I agree about not accepting mumbo jumbo as doctrine, not Marx's or Christianity's. I'm certainly not in favour of Marx's vision of the future--that would be anachronistic. But he sure had capitalism pegged.
But let's agree to disagree, it's not a fair debate anyway--you have the wind of ideology at your back.

David you asked me to substantiate my claim that the essay “relies so heavily on a fundamentalist style of discourse that it makes me think he is scared of where a more rational, honest and evidence-based discourse would lead.”

Your essay is entitled: “God is a human invention”

And you begin with the assertion that: “We invent God, religion...”

But this statement is not substantiated. Instead it is merely posited as the premise of the rest of the essay starting with the question: “How did the invention of God come about? We can make a guess.”

And so David in my eyes you become just another one of those people who say “We have the truth!” which as you say “is a recipe for oppression and conflict”.

Why is it such a recipe? Because in the absence of a reasons to support the assertion, any concerted attempt to propagate of such ideas must invariable lead to oppression and conflict.

David, you have not provided any reason for us to accept your premise that “God is an invention”. There are other atheists who say the same thing and are quite willing to incite hatred to propagate this sort of belief.

There are a number of points at which i would like to challenge your premise, but only if i could be convinced that you are not one of these atheists but someone who can accept that “God is a human invention” is a premise that needs to be defended/supported by reason and evidence, and not simply accepted as a matter of faith.

So tell me, is your proposition that “God is an invention” refutable in your eyes? If so what would be the criteria? Do we appeal to pure logic or is it a matter of looking at the evidence and only accepting your proposition if it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt? Or should it be treated as the maintained assumption, so we only reject it if we can do so based on the balance of evidence (beyond a reasonable doubt)? And what sort of evidence would you require?

Dear George,

It is my CV.

Western philosophy would not be what it is were it not for Plato. I think many of his insights were harmful. The doctrine of the forms with their degeneration supported the idea of Original Sin when the neo-Platonists influenced Christianity. Unreasoning guilt, neurosis and all sorts of unhealthy ideas have proceeded from the idea of the forms. I wrote a book going into the subject at length, but it is unpublished since I got into an argument with the publisher. As a consequence of the argument I no longer felt like publishing as I felt it should be completely worked over. I have lost interest in working it over.

In that I identify with Perelman. Once you have done something the joy may simply be in the doing. The joy was in developing the ideas. The world has a plethora of books. It can do with one less.

I identify with Perelman in another way. From his bio: “A hobby from back in Russia that Perelman described to friends was hunting mushrooms on hikes in the woods.” My wife and I belong to the Queensland Mycological Society, and I am giving a paper on cultural attitudes toward fungi.

From page 19 of Fungi by Roy Watling

“The reasons for the lack of scientific knowledge of fungi compared with groups such as mammals, fish, birds and flowering plants originate with the early naturalists. They usually considered the fungi to be connected with the devil, and studying them at all was frowned upon by the church, right up to the 19th century, when the rest of natural history was blossoming. As a result of this taboo, scientific understanding of fungi, and especially their classification, has been hindered so much that it is no exaggeration to say that it lags almost 100 years behind that of many organisms. Thankfully, this unfortunate state of affairs is now rapidly changing as biologists appreciate the importance of these remarkable organisms and are searching for them in previously unexplored habitats.”

The above is English. Perelman and I have a different attitude.

Many thanks, Arjay!

First, my main worries as a mature age political scientist and historian, is that our OLO seems to be avoiding what it was originally designed for, major global problems.

However, apart from global warming, it seems the preference seems to be with our own OLO right now, apart from Global Warming, mostly every day stuff, religions of course, and personal problems, being part of it.

It reminds me so much of our Mandurah U3A (Uni' of the 3rd Age), which I was asked to take over the major suggested topic from Universities, World Affairs.

Helped a lot by Murdoch I battled through for nearly 13 years, but found the interest was still mainly on local affairs, or just High School age stuff.

One of the suggested topics when I first began was a Uni' topic Aboriginal Affairs, which not only produced grumbles from our U3A group, but also a stern local call to myself from a well known descendant of an early Mandurah family.

The same worries me right now with our OLO, especially the lack of feminine interest, which we believe is so important to repair a troubled world. I

Regards, BB, WA.

Squeers wrote: you have not substantiated your position on Marx or Marxism,

Dear Squeers,

I have shown where the manifesto calls for murder and specifies tyranny. That and the mounds of corpses substantiate my position. There is no reason to think that more of the Marxist garbage will not yield more corpses. I want something better than capitalism. However, Marxism is worse. I see no point in further discussion.

Dear grateful,

You wrote: "Your essay is entitled: “God is a human invention”"

True, but I submitted it under the title "Human Inventions." OLO changed it. I don’t care for the title.

I really don't see how ideas without a verifiable reality can be categorised as other than a human invention. If you had grown up in Rome over 2,000 years ago you would have been taught about a supernatural consisting of a number of humanoid gods. There is no more reason to think that the present deity of the monotheists has any more reality. You probably are an atheist regarding the Roman pantheon. There is no more reason to accept the belief currently popular. No matter how many people believe in the existence of an entity that is not evidence for its existence. I cannot see where that view is not rational, honest and evidence-based discourse. There simply is no evidence for the existence of a supernatural of any kind.

I don't say I have any truth. I do say that I see no reason for believing in anything where there is no evidence to support the belief.

One who makes an assertion should produce evidence to support that assertion. There were several proofs of the existence of God at the time of the German philosopher Kant. There have been no new ones since. Kant found none of them valid. However, he maintained a belief in God. Perhaps the fact that he was a professor at a Lutheran institution had something to do with his belief. I think it is up to those who maintain there is a God to show that such an entity is other than an invention.

DavidF.
I agree, there's no point discussing the matter further, however you said: "I have shown where the manifesto calls for murder and specifies tyranny".
Rubbish!
Here is your "specification": "Also from the Manifesto:

“You must, therefore, confess that by "individual" you mean no other person than the bourgeois, than the middle-class owner of property. This person must, indeed, be swept out of the way, and made impossible.”

That sounds like a recommendation for mass murder to me."

Try reading it in context!

Apologies, but with your back-biting each other, and not enough agreeing with each other, reckon you are acting like a lot of spoilt kids thus getting pretty well no-where.

Reckon a couple of female Phd's or even Professors would do us a lot of good.

Notice I also include myself.....?

Cheers, BB, WA.

r

For heaven's sake bushbred why don't you but out! Who put you in charge of setting the agenda?
I can assure you that I'm 100% committed to improving the world. I'm battling against ideology!
I agree that OLO is male dominated, and it's a shame, but what do you propose we do about it?
This has been an important issue and I'm damned if I'm going to let DavidF feign triumphalism.
Now, Bushbred, the floor is yours; what earth-changing contribution have you got to make?

DavidF
You say: " I think it is up to those who maintain there is a God to show that such an entity is other than an invention."

I agree. So how would you judge whether or not someone has shown that God is other than an invention?

Perhaps a more useful question would be: What does Judaism, Christianity or even Islam lack which leads you to conclude that they are merely human invention, despite their claims to the contrary?

Squeers, as I turn 90 next year, must say that the attitudes of even our own people, makes me worried about my 15 great grandkids.

Might say that my mature age studies have left me with a poor conception of religous faith - any faith as a matter of fact.

So as with many philosophers my main feelings before I go are based on Hope and Charity, believing that Hope is more everlasting.

Might say that apparently as with Mandela, though the Sermon on the Mount may not be a true story, it could be the most needed story ever written.

Cheers, BB, Buntine, WA.

grateful wrote: "Perhaps a more useful question would be: What does Judaism, Christianity or even Islam lack which leads you to conclude that they are merely human invention, despite their claims to the contrary?"

Dear grateful,

All of the above lack any proof to substantiate their claims. Why 'even Islam'? Islam does not have a primitive humanoid god like the Romans and the Christians. It seems less unreasonable than Christianity.

bushbred wrote: "Might say that my mature age studies have left me with a poor conception of religous faith - any faith as a matter of fact."

I agree. Gullibility is not a virtue.

Squeers wrote: "I'm battling against ideology!"

Isn't Marxism an ideology?

Squeers also wrote: "This has been an important issue and I'm damned if I'm going to let DavidF feign triumphalism."

How does one feign triumphalism? I don't even feel like exhibiting overt or any other kind of triumphalism. It's not good form.

Bushbred,
sorry my attitude was a bit brusque, but then I do recall being called a "smart arse" and a "spoilt kid".
It seems OLO is dominated not only by males, but by elderly ones. We spend half our lives getting some sense and the other half repining its colossal expense. As Montaigne says: "To learn that one has said or done a foolish thing, that is nothing; one must learn that one is nothing but a fool, a much more comprehensive and important lesson."
I turn fifty this year, but I can boast of not being spoiled; after an indifferent education I worked in factories from the age of fourteen until about seven years ago, when I was widowerred(?) with four kids under eight (one still in nappies) and (delightfully) obliged to chuck it. Of course child rearing is a tedious business so to pass the time I sat the QTAC nonsense and got a degree in my spare time, then honours, now PhD. Of course I had a huge advantage--lots of reading and very little schooling!
My mature age studies left me disillusioned too--in an aesthetic that seemed almost palpable when I was reading (my eclectic list of) the greats. It was all chucked away (Arnold, Leavis et al) for culturalism and an anti-aesthetic. I'm in the process of redressing the balance!
Anyway, I wouldn't worry about the attitude of the grandkids; Some of us are slow learners, but nine (more like 5 probably) out of ten come to realise (as the dear queen mum put it) that good manners will get us through most of life's disasters.
...Of course I'm afraid, however, that manners no longer help in the world we leave behind, they may even hinder.

Squeers, thanks for the more tender comments, mate. After all, guess the best way to keep the OLO going is to finally get along with each other.

Anyway, guess we are bit the same in a way.

What I mean is your determination to look for some sort of good in this world.

That's why with others I am trying to give Obama a go, though could say with what's been happening lately it's likely to be close to a touch and go.

Bushbred: "I am trying to give Obama a go, though could say with what's been happening lately it's likely to be close to a touch and go".
Obama's just hit the wall of establishment--the geo-political "reality"; idealism can't stand up to that, it's just political fodder after all (Joh feeding the chooks, writ large). We live in a world of political realism, the rest is spin. Witness DavidF's CIA hitlist; 6mil and counting wasn't it?)

DavidF: "Isn't Marxism an ideology?"
Yes, but I'm not trying to resurrect Marxism.
Also: "How does one feign triumphalism?"
You were dishonestly triumphing over me: "I have shown where the manifesto calls for murder and specifies tyranny."
"Dishonest" because you must know that Marx was answering charges, here, that his system denied individuality. I cannot believe that such a learned man would "incompetently" quote out of context.
FYI: Francis Fukuyama instances another case of "feigned triumphalism".
Enough though.

God is certainly a human invention. But it surely wasn't an arbitrary invention? It was based on something. Why should human consciousness/intelligence be out of kilter with its experience of the world, such that metaphysics is entertained so obsessionally down through the ages?
The issue isn't that man invented God, it's why?

Squeers wrote: "God is certainly a human invention. But it surely wasn't an arbitrary invention? ... The issue isn't that man invented God, it's why?

OK. We agree that God is certainly a human invention. We can ask why the eastern religions such as Buddhism, Hinduism and Shinto didn't invent God. Why is it that the JCI religions invented God and others didn't? Is it arbitrary or is it a consequence of the difference in the societies?

I voted for Obama and still like him. His health bill will see 30,000,000 more Americans with cover. He is increasing taxes in the upper bracket, and that will reduce the disparity between them and the rest of us. He has started to funnel money into education. His Cairo speech was magnificent. Unlike most past presidents he is capable of admitting US wrongs and by interacting with such as Chavez indicates that the US is no longer the bully that it has been. He is ushering in a new era in US international relations. He has announced his priorities as health, education and energy. His health bill does not do everything I would like it to do, but it goes farther than any move in that direction in the past. He has announced that the US will be out of Iraq in 2011. If McCain had been elected we might be at war with Iraq. The US is in a de facto war economy, and that cannot be changed in a moment without great social dislocation.

DavidF: "Why is it that the JCI religions invented God and others didn't? Is it arbitrary or is it a consequence of the difference in the societies?"
I don't see the question of deity as all that important, since all religions (I think) are baed on the human sense of the numinous, for want of a better word. The reason, "why" humans inveterately invent gods is to make sense of their experience of the world; not because of their existential angst, mind you, but because of an inate capacity to perceive the anomolies in "reality". They're gods of the gaps. The answer might be simply that; that humans have genuine "spiritual" or uncanny sensations, perceptions. Religions rise up to cater for or exploit this capacity. So the next question is, what is this anomolous perception?

I like Obama too, he's an idealist like me. The problem, imho, is that the system is rotten; it has to be changed. As the rabid republicans are screaming, socialising healthcare will send the US broke. The so-called "third way" is unsustainable without increasing taxes, indeed without steep progressive taxation; it's also only sustainable in a global context. Australia's celibrated healthcare system is crumbling for the same reason; drastically uneven distribution of wealth. This third way is arguably what has prolonged capitalism, by creating a broader bourgeois base, its members happy to fantasise themselves as (petty) capitalists. The only way capitalism can keep going is to share the wealth more evenly (actually, it also has to become ecologically sustainable)--which would be preferable to a disastrous revolution. Reinforcing ideology with pathetic chants of "that's communism!" will eventually lose its efficacy (the masses are dim but will eventually wake up). Capitalism based on perpetual growth is unnecessary, as is creation of ever more production (rationalised as raising the masses out of poverty!). Such is only necessay to sustain the obscene wealth of a tiny minority. Capitalism is 'too big to fail', but it must reform

Hiya, agen', Squeers.

Yep, had a fair bit to do with capitalism, actually and naturally it was copied from a Jewish term early in the Enlightenment, interesting that the term sacrificial appears to be part of it.

Certainly sound original terms should make a difference as do stupidly simple terms like Free Market and Deregulation, sounding too much like - go for broke or rip, sh-t and plunder.

Seems like Michael Moore wants to get rid of Capitalism, with his call for a New Economic Order....

Dear Squeers,

I think the most decent modern societies on the planet are the capitalist, welfare states of Scandinavia. They have succeeded in creating societies with a reasonable distribution of wealth - few very rich and few very poor - along with great political freedom. In Norway there is no political advertising allowed. Candidates are obligated to face each other in open debate. They all had much poverty about a hundred years ago. Many left to emigrate to the United States or Australia. They are not doing it any more. Their prosperity predates the discovery of oil resources in the North Sea. Brazil is also a capitalist state, but there are great extremes of wealth there - some very rich and many in dire poverty. Scandinavian style capitalism is worth emulating. Brazilian style capitalism is horrible. US style capitalism isn't too great either but much better than Brazil's. Scandinavia has produced more humane societies than any of those built on the Marxist model. There are different capitalist models.

My uncle was a Bolshevik before the February Revolution and Lenin's counterrevolution. He was arrested and imprisoned by the czarist police. In 1921 my father brought him to the United States. He was no longer a Bolshevik and was very happy in the United States. My cousin Rose was also brought to the United States. She used to get glossy magazines from the USSR extolling the glories of communism. She left Russia as a little girl and was not as aware of the actuality as my uncle was. As far as I am concerned we cannot have a decent society unless people have a degree of freedom from coercion. Coercion may be from state power as in the Marxist and fascist societies. It may be from corporate power. I think the Work Choices of the Coalition government was coercion. A worker by himself or herself does not have power equal to that of the corporation. The option offered to the worker under Work Choices was 'take it or leave it'.

continued

QUOTE
grateful wrote: "Perhaps a more useful question would be: What does Judaism, Christianity or even Islam lack which leads you to conclude that they are merely human invention, despite their claims to the contrary?"

Dear grateful,

All of the above lack any proof to substantiate their claims. Why 'even Islam'? Islam does not have a primitive humanoid god like the Romans and the Christians. It seems less unreasonable than Christianity.

UNQUOTE

But DavidF, as you agreed, you did not substantiated the claim that God is an invention.

Anyway, since you find Islam more reasonable in its claims than some other religions (and yes i would have to agree) then let’s stick with this religion. Let’s see how your argument plays out using Islam as a concrete example.

Your comments raise two questions:

1) You argue ALL religions have been invented. How would you argue Islam came to be invented and how would you substantiate your case.

2) You say that ALL religions lack ANY proof to substantiate their claims. What are the claims of Islam that you refer to and what would constitute proof in your eyes (i.e., what is the benchmark you are using to reach your conclusion).

Dear grateful,

There is absolutely no evidence for the existence of any supernatural. It is up to the one who makes an assertion to provide the evidence. I do not have to produce any evidence that the goddess Venus, the Jewish, Islamic, Christian God or the Spaghetti Monster does not exist. It is up to those who assert that Venus, the Jewish, Islamic, Christian God or the Spaghetti Monster exists to prove that it is not an invention.

Dear Squeers,

I do not know that any human being can fairly be classed as an idealist or a realist. I think all of us are a mixture of good and bad and a mixture of devotion to ideals and to pragmatic concerns. Obama is president of the United States, and you called him an idealist. He is very much a realist and a practical politician as exhibited by the fact that he is president. One does not become president by idealism alone.

I agree that an unequal distribution of wealth is not consistent with a sustainable society. However, I think it has to be greatly unequal to be damaging. The attempt to eliminate all inequality in my opinion must produce tyranny. I think the capitalist Scandinavian societies have done a good job in that area. They have reformed capitalism. We certainly cannot have perpetual growth. We must reach a balance.

bushbred wrote: "Yep, had a fair bit to do with capitalism, actually and naturally it was copied from a Jewish term early in the Enlightenment, interesting that the term sacrificial appears to be part of it."

Please expand your statement. What Jewish term do you refer to and where does the term sacrificial come in?

You want evidence . H Margenau ( reflecting a lot of physicists who believe in God ) in reviewing the impact of physics and chemistry research over then last 30yrs says
"Science deals with the laws of nature as they understood by man . Theories of knowledge using constructs, definitions and rules of correspondence lead us to all the laws of nature ,but it does not account for their origin .They surely could not have developed by chance or accident.( from Cosmos Bios and Theos 1992)"
From my point of a view as a practical ecologist, there is a tendency to confuse processes which operate well at one level to decscribe all processes. This is a matter of faith rather than something we can prove.

DavidF: "I do not know that any human being can fairly be classed as an idealist or a realist..."

Of course words are blunt instruments, either devoid of subtlety or aporetic.
Listening to Obama's memoir on RN, I was inclined to think him naive, and in that sense idealistic, since he would have to confront the ingrained prejudices of republicans and the wider hegemony which, to my mind, they still broadly represent. In a country that so reveres its leaders, or at least the position of leader, the disrespect accorded Obama is, I'm afraid, an indictment against the prevailing national ideology--a resurgence of conservative elitism.
On the GFC, Obama was surely an idealist in the other sense, and republicans the realists; in the sense that the trillions of dollars "conjured up" is farcical.
Yet capitalism has to be saved, reformed rather than overturned, since the infrastructure it maintains would collapse if the precarious balance was broken, as it nearly was. Capitalism really is too big to fail, it would mean death on a biblical scale (which of course is what the planet needs).
While I'm idealistic about changing the world, I don't have naive illusions about complete equality; life is fundamentally unfair and that's not going to change--indeed disparity and injustice, in all sorts of ways, is what drives human innovation, creativity and even transcendence, in the natural (evolutionary) scheme of things. The problem with wanton capitalism is its dehumanising effects, its tendency to nullify these very attributes (innovation, creativity, transcendence--and I don't mean in the positivist sense remote from our humanity), to turn aspiration into gross materialism, "acquisitivism", the pursuit of wealth and possessions for their own sakes.
Ironically, dehumanisation is the charge often laid against communism; and I agree that any system that enforces conformity kills creativity and love of life. Communist states do it by coercion and capitalist states by prescriptive living; homogenising, commodifying and denigrating what should, ideally, be for all a unique experience of life. Under capitalism, life for most is degenerate, while for the few who would transcend it, it's reduced to sheer patronage.

I think you'll find that the Scandinavian welfare states are starting to tighten up; the third way is proving unsustainable in a global free-market where humanism has little currency. We can't have sustainable welfare unless the new tigers have it as well. The republicans are right, the healthcare bill will send the US broke--too much money already goes to the coffers of the rich, into outlandish "Enlightenment" budgets (space programmes, foreign interventions etc.), and servicing already unsustainable debt. The only way forward is global reform, in my view. We already have a global economy that transcends national borders, and multiculturalism too makes a nonsense of nationalism. Assertions of Australian or American “values” are pure rhetorical parochialism--more assertions of "economic" borders--idealistically cherished by the masses as though they actually meant something. Heaven knows how such idealism will ever be defeated, or how, in that event, it woeld ever translate into action (the instantiation of a relative equality, I suspect), but we really do have to think “globally”, to use the cliche. Once again the disparity of wealth, this time between countries, is what makes this so ideologically repugnant to the petite bourgeoisie. Look at the way Monkton’s hysterical evocation of world government caught on! I'm afraid humanism is embraced in the West only so long as it remains purely ideological. World (or “cooperative”) government “is” the way forward and would, as I conceive it, paradoxically, restore countries’ "cultural" distinctiveness--as opposed to their currently "straightened" or "affluent" distinctiveness. At the moment it comes down to what you're worth!

Dear Hanrahan,

We certainly operate on many levels in faith in regard to the laws of nature. All of our experimental evidence for a process does not prove that the process will be repeated ad infinitum. It is not like inductive reasoning in mathematics where we can prove that if a relationship is valid for n=1, an arbitrary n and n+1 then it is valid for all cases. However, the statement by Margenau: "Theories of knowledge using constructs, definitions and rules of correspondence lead us to all the laws of nature ,but it does not account for their origin .They surely could not have developed by chance or accident." is merely a statement of belief not based on any evidence whatsoever. It may have been made because it is consistent with Margenau's religious beliefs. It may be a case of faulty analogy. Nature's laws merely describe relationships in Nature. They are not laws such as we have in government which are made by humans by law givers. Nature's laws are not analogous to laws produced by legislation. The same word has different meanings. I do not regard Margenau's words as evidence - merely another statement of belief. Australian legislation involves a body of individuals who made the laws. Nature's laws do not imply a lawgiver. That is an inference made by Margenau and others. Even if there were a lawgiver it is an unwarranted assumption to assume that lawgiver was the entity mentioned in the scripture of any existing religion.

Dear Squeers,

I mostly agree with your last post. We can as individuals try to be as creative as we can and either ignore or resist the pressures to conform or give in to it where it doesn't matter. Obama seems more idealistic than most presidents have been. Actually his predecessor seemed quite idealistic in his primitive religiosity. I find Obama's idealism much more in tune with mine than Bush's. I have read both Obama's books and think he is a marvellous man and hope the ideas he expressed in his books will be translated into legislation and policy.

Dear David,
>>It is not like inductive reasoning in mathematics where we can prove that if a relationship is valid for n=1, an arbitrary n and n+1 then it is valid for all cases. <<
You meant to refer to mathematical induction which says that if a proposition P(n) is true for n=1, and P(n) implies P(n+1) then necessarily P(n) is true for all (natural) n (“valid for arbitrary n” and “valid for all cases” is here the same thing).

On the other hand, inductive reasoning (in science) - if a situation holds in all observed cases, then it will hold in all cases - is one of the pre-suppositions (beliefs) of scientific research, as you rightly point out, and science could not function without it. In mathematics that would mean that if P(n) is true for, say, all n<1000 then it is true for all n. That is not an valid proof (reasoning) in mathematics.

This makes mathematics that much simpler: it deals with the clear concept of (formal) proofs rather than with the more ambiguous concept of “evidence” that depends on the cultural, social or historical (also psychological) context.

Dear George,

Thank you for your clarification. I was sloppy.

David

QUOTE: DavidF
Dear grateful,

There is absolutely no evidence for the existence of any supernatural. It is up to the one who makes an assertion to provide the evidence. I do not have to produce any evidence that the goddess Venus, the Jewish, Islamic, Christian God or the Spaghetti Monster does not exist. It is up to those who assert that Venus, the Jewish, Islamic, Christian God or the Spaghetti Monster exists to prove that it is not an invention.
UNQUOTE
Yes, as i previously said, i agree that it is reasonable to expect those who make the assertion for the existence of God to prove it.
You say “There is absolutely no evidence for the existence of any supernatural.”

Have you read the Qur’an?

Here is the first 5 verses of the 2nd surah, “Al Baqara”
“1.Alif Lam Meem
2. This is the Book; in it is guidance sure without doubt, to those who fear God;
3. Who believe in the Unseen; are steadfast in prayer, and spend out of what We have provided for them
4. And who believe in the Revelation sent to thee, and sent before thy time, and (in their hearts) have assurance of the Hereafter
5. They are on (true) guidance, from their Lord, and it is these who will prosper”

For a Muslim these are the words of God (or more accurately they are a rendering of the original Arabic, the language in which the Qur’aan was supposedly revealed). How would a Muslim support this case?

Cont. 1/2

2/2 Cont...

At the very least a Muslim would have to prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that

1. The Qur’aan we have today is what was claimed as revelation over 1400 years ago

2. That the Muhammad was honest and reliable, for it was he who claimed it was revelation from God

3. That there is nothing in what the Qur’aan says that is a clear falsehood (e.g the world was created 5000 years ago, the sun revolves around the earth)

On the other hand for you they are the words of man, so you have the job of presenting evidence which would cast serious doubt on these claims.

For example, you may want to argue that there is reason that this COULD NOT be the words of God. Or you would want to provide authorative evidence that Muhammad was unreliable or dishonest.

Or you may even want to argue that it has been corrupted. There is a verse in the Qur’aan which clearly predicts (and is interpreted by all scholars as saying) that the Qur’aan will not be corrupted:

"Verily, we have sent down the Reminder, and, verily, we will guard it." Q15:9

Anyone who has played the kids game Chinese Whispers, will know how easily information gets distorted when passed on by word-of-mouth.

So you would just need to find a serious scholar in Islamic studies who would argue that the Qur’aan has been corrupted or at least argue that no authority is prepared to support this claim.

Unless you are prepared to make some effort along these line, as sort of "defense lawyer", then your own assertion that "God is an invention" can only be treated as a piece of fundamentalist rhetoric.

Runner, you hoist yourself on your own petard. If you yourself had any sense of intelligence, as opposed to your audacious approach to articles which question your self-worth, you might consider the idea that humans are intelligent. It's in our nature to search for our existence, even if that means creating a God to fulfill our moralistic assumptions.

I much rather believe that, then waste my life believing something with no proof, yet alone arguing in favour of it when at the end of the day you have NOTHING to show . .

Tom finch
Feel for you,some open honest reflections that do make sense

---You don't want to have to believe things you can't understand
---You see people blindly accepting things in faith and its offensive ( why do they hide behind jargon words and don't seem to use their brains as much as they should )
etc)
We are with you on that. Thinking is critical. All our constructs should be open to question.
But as for belief. that too . There is a strong case from peoples practical experience that it can help you move from the cave Plato described . This is the cave of mere shadow study that still threatens to overwhelm the West now as it did the Greeks 16 centuries ago .

(TRUE religious communities seem to have lots of people who don't allow themselves to think much but don't let that stop you from joining "a motherhood group" - Inventions, totems and sacred objects are common creations of humans. Maybe we need metaphors rather than pretend we can live without them in big picture areas .
One thing makes sense - not to ignore them, but to study them properly and thoroughly.
Most importantly, if the West is to deal wore effectively with Islam it needs to understand why its attractive to thinking people ( not just the lazy members so often targeted as we did above ) .
Evidence talk is not enough for many young westerners !
The stultification of waiting around in the cave for the shadows to make sense is enough to make some young people jump right out of the post modern blight of mere word fragments and try something new ; Something that actually includes some correspondence ( connections ) with esoteric things like love( can't put that into the lab) which at the end of the day -also interest most of us deeply and practically .
The problem with inventing metaphors then , is that we all seem to do it ,not just the nutters next door . Go Homer go http://graceware.blogspot.com

Dear Hanrahan,

In Eindhoven in the Netherlands a Sunni, staying at my hotel, told me of what went on Friday night at the mosque. After the service the men (Prayer in the mosque is strictly segregated) would get together. The imam then asks if anybody has any problem that they would like to discuss. Then he asks the men the same thing one at a time. The problems mentioned are then discussed. Sometimes it is enough to just get something off one's chest. Advice or even financial aid may help with other problems. Anyway there is sociability, and the men feel they are not alone.

I visited a mosque in Brisbane to ask the imam some questions. He invited me to attend the service. It was in a large room with big windows and no chairs. A row of men put their faces to the ground with their rumps in the air away from Mecca. One ten year old went the other way and put his rump toward Mecca. His father (I assume it was his father) picked him up, smiled and pointed him in the right direction. It seemed like teasing on the kid's part, and the man took with good nature. After the service they got a copy of the Koran in Arabic and English and discussed one of the chapters. It contained a dissertation on knowledge which brought forth a discussion of free speech as a way to gain knowledge of differing points of view. This was shortly after the fatwa against Salman Rushdie for "Satanic Verses". One of the men said that he had read "Satanic Verses" and didn't like it. They agreed that the fatwa was a bad thing. All you had to do was not to read the book if you thought it would be bad although you were free to read it. After that the imam offered me some tapes on Islam. I refused as I did not want him to think of me as a possible convert but thanked him for his hospitality.