Dear George,

<<Do you mean to say that the pursuit of science, with the ensuing technological achievements, is - or resulted from - a human weakness that we should rather not succumb to?>>

In the ultimate sense this is so, in the ultimate sense the world is an illusion and one should not waste their time on it, directing their attention away from God.

But in practice, it is too much to ask: renouncing all interest in the world and focusing on God alone is a life-time pursuit if not longer - perhaps just one in a billion is able to simply forsake it all at once, just upon hearing this advice - the rest of us require long-term practices, morals and techniques that eventually and gradually lead one there, which is what religion provides.

So I cannot expect the clergy to abstain from being interested in the world and curious about it as they aren't perfect saints yet - but I would expect them to present this as their private human pursuit rather than associate it with their religious teachings.

Dear George,

Please forgive me for representing a vector as an imaginary number.

I find “I’ll pray for you.” insulting because I feel I am being treated as an object rather than as a person. They, presumably sincerely, are going to address the deity they believe in to change me in a way that they were unsuccessful in doing. They could do so without telling me about it.

Telling me about it shows a lack of consideration for my feelings. I don’t tell them that I hope they will abandon their delusions and adopt reason. Maybe I will if it happens again.

Dear Craig Minns,

The missionaries that go door to door have little effect although they occasionally get a live one. The numbers of Jehovah’s Witnesses remains relatively constant since the numbers of those leaving approximates the number of new converts. Sincerity is no excuse for anything. If it were we could excuse those who commit atrocities if they are sincere.

I was thinking of the way missionaries have taken Aboriginal children and put them in missions where they were forbidden to practice the religion of their parents. In the 1920s my mother was a teacher on the St. Regis Indian Reservation on the shores of the St. Lawrence River. The children were forbidden to converse in their native language and were punished if caught doing so. Missionaries have alienated people from their culture, and forcing another religion on them is part of it.

There were missionaries to the various Pacific island who plied a chief with presents to induce him to convert. He would then force the members of his tribe to convert. I am thinking of the way Christianity spread through Europe. It was generally accompanied by violence and compulsion. Richard Fletcher wrote “The Conversion of Europe from Paganism to Christianity: 371-1386” which tells of the process by which Europe was converted to Christianity. Charlemagne gave the pagan Gauls the choice of Christianity or beheading. It was most effective.

Continued

David, pulling up historical references is pointless, I'm afraid. The whole point of my argument, such as it is, is that what we need to be fostering is a great deal more "good faith" rather than carrying on such historical disputes and resentments and assumptions of ill-intent.

You're an old man, what do you need of such bitterness?

Continued

Compulsion in religion still happens. I worked with a Korean technician in setting up an MRI installation. He told me that when he was in the Korean army the soldiers were asked to attend Christian services and attend indoctrination sessions. Soldiers could refuse, but those who did were assigned to tasks like cleaning latrines.

In the modern world where countries have some degree of separation of religion and state missionaries are no longer as free to exert violence to bring in converts. They will work on people who are vulnerable through poverty, emotional upset or other causes. Medical missionaries may use their healing as a device to bring people into their church. In Asia ‘rice Christians’ were brought in the fold through food.

There was a convenience store near us run by a family with two sons. One son became a Jehovah’s Witness due to the appeal of a pretty JW who appeared at his door.

In my large family it has happened twice. One cousin was a drug addict. A fundamentalist Christian sect took him in. They were effective at curing him, and he even acquired a wife in the sect. Converting people by getting to them when they are at a low ebb is not unique to Christians. Another cousin was deeply troubled by the death of his father while he was a student at Cornell University. A Jewish fundamentalist sect gave him emotional support and helped him through the grieving process. Both cousins are still attached to their sects and alienated from their families.

I don’t know the statistics of converts to different religions, but people get alienated from family and/or culture by religious conversion.

Dear Craig,

I don’t think it is bitterness to bring in the past. It remains with us. Remembering it might make it less likely to repeat.

I prefer not to call other people bitter, ascribe other unpleasant qualities to them, assail their motives or make judgments about their person. I would appreciate it if you would do the same.

David, I had no intent to offend and I'm sorry if I did.

The thing about the past is that it contains good and bad; we can choose to focus on one or the other at our own whim.

Another person looking at the same events you have related might see the support offered to your cousin after his father's death as a good thing. They may see the provision of rice to the hungry as a good reason to think well of Christians. They may see a mission of doctors as an admirable endeavour and so on.

The fact that religion may be used to justify political power doesn't make religion a bad thing any more than the fact that science has been used to produce enormously destructive technologies makes it a bad thing. Some shonky salespeople don't make the business of buying and selling contemptible. A dodgy politician doesn't condemn the idea of politics and so on.

We should certainly do what we can to minimise the likely negative outcomes of misuse of any ideas, but absolutism can ONLY lead to bad outcomes, which is well shown by any number of historical examples and is a very strong result in game theory that has earnt two Nobel prizes of the 19 that have been awarded for work in that field.

You're a very smart man, David, with the benefit of age to allow you time to become wise. It surprises me that you are so determinedly absolutist in this.