Sells,

I have posted several times and you have not replied regarding Nicaean Christianity versus the historical Jesus:

Yesterday, in the paper, there was an account of this guy who 52 years ago, after Sputnik, as a ten year old, wrote the Government about his new design for a rocket ship. (expects a reply soon :-) ). The child's drawing was a very basic craft. What reminded me of Jesus and Nicaea was he partitioned off a sizeable quadrant and in block printed, "YOU FILL IN THE DETAILS". Herein, I thought, Jesus is the kid's rocket (an outline) and, Paul and Nicaea filled in Christianity's details (human doctrine and institutionalised creed).

Oliver

In response to you here:
"The above exercise does not disprove the existence of god, of course. However, it might very well describe the penchant of societies to produce religions. This raises the issue of the origin of scripture: Is it Man or God? (Man is known to exist)".

Fortunately there is an amusing song-explanation of man creating gods here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9bMi4s_yOE

Which also rather fits your comments here:

"Herein, I thought, Jesus is the kid's rocket (an outline) and, Paul and Nicaea filled in Christianity's details (human doctrine and institutionalised creed)."

george, i'm a fan of wikipedia, but the quoted definition of religious knowledge is nonetheless pretty meaningless. and, google hits are hardly impressive: i can google "astrological knowledge" and get a few million hits. (sellick: my deleted comment was that all your excellent universities used to have professors of astrology. similarly, the current existence of professors of theology proves nothing).

let's take another example. in your terms, i can reasonably define "geological food" as "food derived from rocks". what it doesn't do is prove that the definition is actually fulfilled by anything.

>> but the question “why did God allow human suffering”. I do not think there is a satisfying answer to this ...

well, one satisfying answer is there is no thinking god. or no loving god. or no omnipotent god. take your pick.

i don't really mind your mathematical metaphors. some of them previously i've appreciated. but i don't think russell's paradox works very well here. it's not so much a question of building concepts carefully to avoid contradictions. it seems much more a question of clear inconsistency. i'd suggest inverse of zero is a better metaphor: trying to solve 0 x A = 1, you don't conclude that the definition needs care, you conclude that A does not exist.

finally, i would be careful of referencing chris mooney on anything right now. he has a definite axe to grind, and has done a woeful job of defending his recent book against clear and pointed criticism.

Oliver,
>>a non-theist formerly raised a Catholic can be a professional anthropologist<<
And a Catholic formerly raised an atheist can become the Pope. Nevertheless, this does not answer my question, whether you think being e.g. a Christian disqualifies somebody from practising anthropology (or other disciplines). The Communists came close enough to this (I was lucky to have won a mathematical competition where the prize was University admittance without political scrutiny) but even they did not dare to make it a rule. Do you really think that an “insider knowledge” of the subject is an academic handicap? Is a native speaker of, say, Russian unable to become a professional Slavist?

>> I try to "indwell" in belief systems<<
Yes, I believe you do, but religion is more than just a “belief system”: the closest you can get is to admit that people have their reasons for believing this or that, but that I do not think what Polanyi meant by indwelling. My favourite joke is that I can speak French but the French don’t understand me, neither do I understand them. It is not up to me to decide whether I can speak French. Perhaps something similar is true about a “tacit knowledge” of other people’s world-views, religious or not.

You are right about your (and everybody else’s) “tacit baggage”, which should make us more modest and not base our judgement (or ridicule, though I don’t think that is your case) of other world-views on a superficial, verbatim, reading of an ancient text, e.g. the bible.

>> I doubt whether Sells would read Dawkins trying to "indwell", as best he can, as I might in the domain of the Bible.<<
I do not think Dawkins would like you comparing his book to a book written thousands of years ago, addressing simple shepherds and farmers that today needs to be reinterpreted, although many - of course, not Sellick - read Dawkins as their “bible”.

What you call “the penchant of societies to produce religions” is described also by evolutionary biologists and David Sloan Wilson (c.f. http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/07-07-04) is one who disagrees with Dawkins.

bushbasher,
I don’t know why you would be interested in "astrological knowledge" but if you are, I cannot see a better place than Wikipedia to find out what other people think about it.

Also, you are right that existence in mathematics is very different from existence in the metaphysical (including religious) meaning of the word. Like space means different things in mathematics than in physics or when you want to park your car.

Inconsistent means being self-contradictory. So might be some “definitions” of God, or “the set of all sets that are not members of themselves” or “the Cretan barber who shaves every Cretan who does not shave himself”. Nevertheless, we do not doubt that sets or Cretan barbers make sense, and some of us don’t doubt the Christian concept (model) of God makes sense. One just has to be more careful about self-referential statements (or explanations).

George,

Being a Christian does not prevent one from being an anthropologist. However, I wonder if such a Christian anthropologist would apply the rigour of the discipline to their personal belief system. Maybe, some would. I can’t go inside their minds. But few, I suspect, would take their religion (Christian, Jewish, Muslim or other) and place their religion’s elements (if you like) under headings like “Creation Story”, “Virgin Birth” and “Has Trinity”, with yes and no designators, under in scheme with other religions. To do so, could create forces working against their belief system.

Tacit knowledge is personal and is not fully shared. Tacit knowledge acts on explicit knowledge to qualify it with bias, for the theist or non-theist. Thus, it is co-efficient (Polanyi). As mentioned maybe a year back, a Frenchman and an Englishwomen could watch the film “Waterloo” and see not see the same movie, even if they sat side-by-side in the theatre.

Likewise, I cannot truly “indwell” in Sells’ experience. Yet, I can try to replicate situations and try on his shoes, which means “crossing the floor”.

I suspect Sells never “crosses the floor”, whereas people like Murray-Gell Mann, Richard Dawkins and the Late Carl Sagan have probably have closely studied the Bible: Moreso, I suspect, than Sells’ study of “the God Delusion” or “A Daemon Haunted World”, chapter and verse.

Both the OT and the NT have several writers and several versions spread over time and place. Some stories are about simple shepherds, yet often seem to place ordinary characters against historical figures (David against Pharaoh, Jesus against Pilate) or exaggerate the historical significance of the character, e.g., David of the House of David was likely to not have been as contemporaneously important as the OT states. That said, the stories have purpose and the exaggerations are probably mnemonics to memory and agents to foster nationalism and theism. There is more to it than simple stories about shepherds.

I will visit the David Sloan Wilson link. Thanks.

The Blue Cross,

Thanks for your link too. Catchy little tune. Hope the theists can smile too.