New Book on the “Psychology of Freedom”
Judith Kleinfeld, Professor of Psychology at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, emailed to tell me about her new book, The Frontier Romance: Environment, Culture, and Alaska Identity. I thought given the theme of the book, it might be of interest to my readers:
Many scholars focus on the institutions and legal systems important to freedom. The Frontier Romance explores a new dimension— the psychology of freedom. American master narratives, such as the narrative of immigration or of going to the frontier to create a new and better life, creates a psychology that valorizes such virtues as self-reliance, independence, and the courage to start over. “The frontier romance,” create a mindset that enables people to embrace freedom rather than fear it.
Only in America does the word “frontier” mean freedom, open space and opportunity. In every other language, the word “frontier” means the opposite– border, boundary, and fear of the dangers that lurk in in the strange and the new. Many dictionaries define the use of the word “frontier” to connote freedom and opportunity as an “Americanism.” Americans seek out frontiers, not only in geography but in science, the arts, and commerce.
The book sounds fascinating, I look forward to reading it.
“A few minutes ago every tree was excited, bowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship. But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease.”
John Muir
(I notice Friday and Saturday temp 45degrees F when I had revelation the sun wants to worship me it exploded in pure joy from my revelation and with nice pictures for everyone to see and I get nice sun tan using my Olive oil . This is good she did not get too frisky take away someone’s freedoms)
There’s another interesting book. It’s titled The History of Knitting, and it’s about frontier women.
The modern American girl thinks she has it hard now? Does she have to knit clothes for her entire family? Does she have to wash those clothes in a creek? Does she have to cook wild game every night?
Frontier women were tough. I know because my grandmother was one. I have her autobiography. It was self-pulblished, and there are only six copies. It’s quite a fascinating read. I lent it to one of my professors in graduate school. She was doing research on frontier women. I said, I’ve got a book for you.
The modern American girl is a bad commercial. No way any of them could survive on the frontier. They too pampered and spoiled.
Hannah Duston.
Americans seek out frontiers, not only in geography but in science, the arts, and commerce.
Well, American used to do that. I’m not so sure that we do anymore. And the less said about the arts in America since, say, 1955, the better.
Don’t expect it to be a widely read book. When you can’t separate romance from your sexuality, like most of western culture, you will never understand the ‘Frontier’ concept.
“[We've] got the right dynamic for the new fronte-e-e-e-er” -Donald Fagen
Kleinfield is correct that America is the only country that has the pioneering spirit as a part of its worldview. The Australians have some of this. The rest of the world (including Latin America) has no concept of the pioneering spirit.
There was an organization called the L-5 Society when I was a kid. The L-5 Society advocated the construction of large city-sized space colonies which were to be financed by the selling and beaming of space-based solar energy to Earth-based customers. They heavily promoted space colonization as the next frontier, with the book describing the concept title “The High Frontier”. Almost all of the L-5 chapters were located in the U.S., with a few in Australia. There were essentially no chapters anywhere else in the world.
This was the first tip-off to me that pioneering in an exclusively American attitude. Later, as young adult, I lived in Japan for 10 years and travelled extensively through out Asia. I knew many people (both Asian and Caucasian) and occasionally talked about concepts such as pioneering, space colonization, and radical life extension with these people. The vast majority of these people told me that they considered pioneering (and associated ideas such as space colonization and even life extension) to be an “American thing”. Interestingly, all of the Australian women I met were totally into life extension and cryonics. They thought it was a good idea. Most of the Australian guys were not into this stuff for the same reason the Europeans and Japanese were not (limits to growth and other such clap trap).
I am convinced as ever that pioneering, openness, and freedom (in this context) are exclusively American cultural concepts. The rest of the world simply is not interested in these ideas.
My experiences in Asia helped form my attitude towards the U.S. itself, and made me quite hostile towards certain elements of non-libertarian conservatism. You see, America is special BECAUSE it is the pioneering oriented country where people should be free to pursue whatever personal dreams and goals they may have for themselves. Everywhere else in the world (i.e. Japan, U.K. etc.) features a “set Culture” where everyone is expected to fit in and play their role. There is no place for the dreamer or the mis-fit. America, in contrast, is supposed to be the land of openness and freedom where the dreamers and misfits are not required to fit into any kind of “set culture”. America is not supposed to have a culture. We are meant to be the “anti-culture”.
My problem with non-libertarian conservatives is that they actually want to create a “set culture” for America that would be analogous to the rest of the world. These people, usually identifying themselves with labels such as reactionaries, paleo-conservatives, traditionalists, etc, want to turn America into an analogy of the rest of the world. They think this will preserve American “exceptionalism”. Of course, their proposal would do precisely the opposite. It would completely destroy American exceptionalism.
I think the problem with this people is that very few of them have lived internationally and I am absolutely convinced that it is not possible to understand one’s country until you have lived outside of it for a period of time.
“Most people are on the world, not in it. – have no conscious sympathy or relationship to anything about them – undiffused, separate, and rigidly alone like marbles of polished stone, touching but separate”
thoughts from John Muir from the book John of the Mountains
Yesterday , I enter the forest to my fresh rebuilt stone wood burning stove in my shire like hut and add the clay mud from my holy river to the cracks and it was getting dark and there I see the moon rise coming full and the moon speak to me how she wants to worship me
Those who want to go to moon on space ship should know the Moon loves you to and once you are there and you no longer have the power to flee she will destroy your flesh body and give you a body worthy of her love. All Atheist become dead man’s bones so freedom has it’s limits
Yet even though the Moon is moving away from this earth an inch a year , I believe one day the Moon will crash down to the earth and have love feast so the sun can worship the moon and the earth as one
But for now as some perfect uppity bodies say the earth is stuck with human stink . This is why nice to see the Moon worship me from distance as sign our human stink will remain on the earth for at least another 1000 years I pray
During my time internationally, I came to understand that America is a concept. It is not a nation in the traditional sense. Japan, being composed of Japanese people, is a traditional nation. Nor is the U.S. an empire like Rome or the British Empire. Rather, America was founded as a concept. That is, its supposed to be a place of openness and freedom where the people with the biggest dreams and visions can pursue such free from the constraints of entrenched entities and institutions that inhibit innovation and productive accomplishment. Viewed in the proper context of world history, America, and indeed Western civilization itself, is inherently revolutionary. Free-market capitalism and technological innovation are inherently revolutionary. Why? Because they are inherently dynamic and dynamism is the very definition of revolutionary. I believe in these concepts 100% and consider the Renaissance/Enlightenment to be the only real revolution in human history. I consider the Renaissance/Enlightenment to be an evolutionary advance fully comparable to the neolithic revolution or the emergence of sentience from non-sentience.
This is the reason, even though I have always voted republican or libertarian and always described myself as “right wing”, why I have always utterly despised the label of “conservative”. Conservative, as something separate and distinct from free-market capitalism and individualism, is absolutely meaningless. It is a null concept, unworthy of America and the Renaissance/Enlightenment that gave birth to it.
I also believe that all ideologies, religions, and philosophies are nothing more than clever sophistry, used to justify the rent-seeking parasitism of whatever institution or entity that created it in the first place. There is no underlying reality in any of these worldviews. There is only the power game that gave birth to all of these worldviews.
In high school, I came to the correct conclusion that there is no conceptual differences between a secular ideology like socialism or communism and religious ideologies such as Christianity or Islam. They are all collectivist ideologies that envision the hierarchical pyramid. The only difference is the entity that sits at the top of the pyramid. In socialism/communism, it is the state. In the Abrahamic religion, it is the god entity. In none of these ideologies is there respect for liberty and autonomy of the individual. I feel even more strongly about this conclusion today than I did 30 years ago when I was in high school.
The ultimate battle is between liberty and tyranny. Anyone who claims otherwise is a liar and charlatan. Do not be deceived by such people.
Actually, and few people know this, the first person in recorded history to advocate against slavery was St. Patrick. Yeah, he was a slave in Ireland, he escaped and became a priest, then went back to abolish slavery and convert the Irish people to Catholicism. There is some truth to the legend that he drove the snakes out of Ireland.
In 1098, the Pope issued a decree that outlawed slavery throughout Chistendom, which then was Europe, the Mediterrean and northern Africa. There was no slavery in Christendom for almost 500 years, until the Renaissance. Then the rediscovery on ancient Greek and Roman texts brought back slavery, the idea of women as chattel, subservient to their husbands, and a whole host of other pagan ideas.
The Renaissance is not what it’s all worked out to be. Nor is the Enlightment. The Romantic revolution, which only lasted about 20 years, is another story.
Ironically, the first slaves sent to America were the Irish.
Once again, your clueless bullshit combined with your groundless over-confidence is just stunning.
Ashoka (first Buddhist leader of India) advocated against slavery six or seven hundred years before St. Patrick. And I’m not even saying he was the first to do so; I doubt it.
Let me ask you this. How do you reconcile Christianity, with its concept of an anthropomorphic god, with the concept of individual self-ownership as elucidated by Murray Rothbard and Ayn Rand?
I have thought about this many times over the years.
I find the very concept of a anthropomorphic (personal) god incompatible with that of self-ownership and individual autonomy. So did both Rothbard and Rand.
Max More, the creator of extropy, insists that there is no “room” for an anthropomorphic god because such a thing represents a set limit on the potential of our future selves. I find that I agree with him on this.
An expansive, open positive future does not require belief in anything external to our dreams and aspirations. It only requires that we dream big and that we put forth persistent effort to realize those aspirations.
Success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.
Political tags – such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth – are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.
Robert Heinlein
Not only was Christianity responsible for ending slavery, America (and all the pioneering spirit that you rightly praise) was founded as a Christian nation. I find it ironic that you then somehow lump all belief systems together as some sort of social control ideology. That is a mighty bold statement, and considering that western notions of liberty and free speech derived from a Christian culture, I would love to hear your evidence for your boldly asserted claim.
You have yet to answer my question. How you reconcile the concept of an anthropomorphic god with the Rothbard/Randian notion of individual self-ownership?
The non-aggression principle is the ONLY concept of morality that is compatible with individual liberty and self-ownership. This means that ONLY the causing of intentional harm to others can be considered immoral. There is NO other definition of “immorality”.
I said that ANY belief system that refuses to recognize individual autonomy and self-ownership in the Rothbard/Randing context is nothing more than a social control ideology. I stand by this point and challenge you or anyone else to refute it. The only way you can refute it is by claiming that Christianity does, in fact, recognize and affirms the Rothbard/Randian concept of individual autonomy and self-ownership. Are you prepared to make this argument?
I actually was responding to your post #7 (that was the one I hit ‘reply to).
Anyway, all I was pointing out is that you made several assertions (“I believe that all religions….” And “there is no conceptual difference…”, “there is no underlying reality…”) –in a row and did not defend any of them. That is no way to get people to take you seriously. You also state that religion is incompatible with liberty, and the example of slavery that I gave was to provide a counterexample to that claim. It wasn’t atheists who put an end to slavery; it was Christians 100% of the way. As I mentioned before the whole of Western civilization that you rightly laud and appear to use as a springboard for your own beliefs also came out of Christianity – further demonstrating how your claim that religion is incompatible with freedom is without merit. What pre-Christian (or atheist) culture had our Western notions of liberty, free speech, and the worth of the individual?
Correct me if I wrong but you appear to paint all ideologies in which there is any form of hierarchy as collectivist – as if there are no shades of gray – you state that they are either simply collectivist or not. Rather naïve and inexact, to say the least. Yes – Christianity has rules, and yes, it has a hierarchy (any functioning society or group has one – can you name an exception?) but some restrictions on freedom are necessary for liberty. You assert that the only valid morality is to restrain only that which directly hurts others (i.e. nonaggression)…but as with all secular morality you hit one *huge* problem – who determines authoritatively what constitutes harm to others, and where is the authority and universal standard by which you proclaim that harm to others is the gold standard for morality in the first place? If someone disagrees with you, on what basis do you counter them?
Your posts here have enough logical holes to drive a truck through. You basically just kept stating your beliefs, mantra-like, without actually defending them.
As to your question about reconciling Christianity with Rothbard, my response would be – who cares? On what basis do you claim that Rothbard’s ideas are so important that they are some metric by which other beliefs must be justified? How does the existence of God or the truth of Christianity somehow correlate with how well it happens to match the writings of this one man? On what basis is he *that* authoritative? Can you give any examples where total self-ownership sans any notion of obedience to higher authority has actually turned out well? Historically, when man has turned away from God, claiming that it for freedom, he instead turns to a truly collectivist and brutal social arrangement instead. Do you really think your proposed hyper-individualism is compatible with human nature?
In the end, this entire issue rests on a much large point too large to address here – either one of those religions that you so shallowly dismiss is in fact true (in which case Rothbard’s ideas are the ones that need to measured against *that*) or it is not, in which Rothbard’s ideas are one of many, with no overarching authority that somehow makes his ideas more valid than anyone else’s.
Two very interesting bits of writing (from the same author) that directly tie into the need for some restrictions on liberty and the futility of a secular philosophy (such as Rothbard’s) would be
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2012/11/wnd-column_26.html
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-half-life-of-secular-utopia.html
You assert that the only valid morality is to restrain only that which directly hurts others (i.e. nonaggression)…but as with all secular morality you hit one *huge* problem – who determines authoritatively what constitutes harm to others,
Actual harm to others, either physical or financial, can be easily be objectively defined without recourse to any religion. People who attempt to involve religion in such do so because they seek to regulate private acts or acts between consenting competent adults that, in no way, constitute actual harm to anyone. Needless to say, this flagrantly violates individual autonomy and privacy and cannot be accepted by free people.
Can you give any examples where total self-ownership sans any notion of obedience to higher authority has actually turned out well?
No. Because, contrary to myth, it has never been tried. Ours (the ocean city state) will be the first. Any, yes, I do believe it will be a smashing success.
Historically, when man has turned away from God, claiming that it for freedom, he instead turns to a truly collectivist and brutal social arrangement instead.
This is a delusional statement in several ways. First, the anthropomorphic god does not exist. So, “turning away” from it is a null concept. Second, you are suggesting that the rejection of one monopoly-authoritarian entity and replacing it with another implies that it is impossible to reject monopoly-authoritarianism in all forms. Of course, this is possible. The ideologies of Nazism and Soviet Communism were explicitly totalitarian and collectivists. The ideas of Rothbard and Rand are not. It is irrational and logically inconsistent to suggests the embrace of the latter two ideas will necessarily produce the same result as the former two.
Do you really think your proposed hyper-individualism is compatible with human nature?
Yes I do. And I think it more compatible with human nature than the Abrahamic religions.
If you assume that people are fundamentally good, then any form of social structure ought to work. Everything is peachy-keen. If you assume people are fundamentally flawed (an assumption made by most religious people), then there is no sense in placing one person or group of persons in charge of all others. There is a saying that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The best defense against this is the radical decentralization of social institutions and the minimalization (if not outright elimination) of any monopoly authority.
Think of centralized authority as a form of systemic risk. Any centralized authority can be hijacked by bad people. Those bad people create problems for everyone else. The only way to reduce this systemic risk is to decentralize authority as much as possible. That way, there are NO centralized institutions for these people to hijack. They can create problems only for the people in close proximity around them, not for the rest of us.
Indeed, I consider the Abrahamic religions to be much less compatible with human nature. For one, like socialism and communism, they represent centralized authority and are, therefor, fundamentally flawed. Secondly, they place all kinds of restrictions on personal private activities that are incompatible with the choices that people would make in the absence of such restrictions. Organized religion, especially the Abrahamic one (the ones that came from the middle-east), represent forced social engineering schemes that are conceptually no different than those advocated by mid-20th century ideologies such as Socialism/Communism or Nazism. They are “inauthentic” impositions on natural human behavior and thus cannot be considered consistent with human nature.
On what basis do you claim that Rothbard’s ideas are so important that they are some metric by which other beliefs must be justified?
The ideas of Rothbard and Rand are the best presentations of individual liberty and autonomy that I have encountered. They are FAR superior in this respect to anything like Christianity. Thus, they represent a “gold standard” definition of individual autonomy by which all other worldviews are to be compared with.
I think Voxday is very good on economic issues. There is much I agree with him on these. However, his religious views are complete lunacy. Any religious arguments he makes for the restriction of individual liberty cannot be seriously considered.
I stand by my previous point that a commitment to true liberty requires the complete repudiation of the very concept of authority.
Actual harm to others, either physical or financial, can be easily be objectively defined without recourse to any religion. People who attempt to involve religion in such do so because they seek to regulate private acts or acts between consenting competent adults that, in no way, constitute actual harm to anyone. Needless to say, this flagrantly violates individual autonomy and privacy and cannot be accepted by free people.
Can I see your objective definition of harm? Can you prove where there will be no conflict between one person’s right to be free from harm and another’s? What about psychological or mental harm? Before I answer that part more thoroughly I would need to see your definition. In any event, you avoided the 2nd half of my question – “where is the authority and universal standard by which you proclaim that harm to others is the gold standard for morality in the first place?” You simply take your ‘morality’ as self-evident without proof. If we are just a collection of atoms with no transcendent purpose, why do we have rights at all? Who gives them to us, and by whose authority do you say that your definition of rights is superior to any other? I would love to see you succeed on this task, where the world’s most brilliant philosophers, from Thomas Aquinas and Augustine on the theist side to Voltaire, Sartre, and Nietzsche on the non-theist side, were unable to. This could be quite amusing. (Hint – avoid failing into utilitarianism – that is where non-theist moralities tend to end up!)
In addition, you keep claiming that personal freedom (which Christianity does not violate anyway) is the highest value…but just think for a sec – if God does exist, wouldn’t he perhaps have certain authority and rights to tell us how to behave? If He made the universes and our ability to even think or reason or have freedom, then on what basis do you deny that He has the right to provide guidelines and expect us to follow Him? Your ‘freedom’ is pointless – no matter how many of your aspirations you reach, no matter how freedom you have, one day you will die and cease to exist and nothing you did will matter at all. All of your efforts will one day crumble to dust. So what’s the point?
No. Because, contrary to myth, it has never been tried. Ours (the ocean city state) will be the first. Any, yes, I do believe it will be a smashing success.
Hmm…Ocean city state – I will need to hear more about this before I say anything about that.
This is a delusional statement in several ways. First, the anthropomorphic god does not exist. So, “turning away” from it is a null concept.
Once again – you make bold assertions without a shred of proof or argument. It may be beyond the scope of this thread, but your entire argument relies on sweeping philosophical statements that are totally irrational and taking things that are not self-evident as simply being true. But that is for another time.
Second, you are suggesting that the rejection of one monopoly-authoritarian entity and replacing it with another implies that it is impossible to reject monopoly-authoritarianism in all forms. Of course, this is possible. The ideologies of Nazism and Soviet Communism were explicitly totalitarian and collectivists. The ideas of Rothbard and Rand are not. It is irrational and logically inconsistent to suggests the embrace of the latter two ideas will necessarily produce the same result as the former two.
One of the major issues with your entire analysis has been the conflation of any form of authority *of any type* with some form of totalitarian/authoritarian state.
First off, you are conflating a political ideology and the involuntarily-complied with actions of a political entity with religion and voluntary obedience. A state that violates your prescriptions (aka no rules except do no harm) is going to enforce it’s morality on you, correct? In contrast, God permits people to believe or not and does not dictate/force their actions. He set the rules of how we should live, and we are *free to disregard them* at will, suffering the natural consequences of our actions, and the eternal repercussions beyond this world. Christianity preaches both free will and individual responsibility – and absolutely prefers an individual’s one self-regulation of their moral adherence to the Faith’s doctrines as opposed to some form of external physical force compelling obedience.
So right there – your argument falls flat. You can’t take a voluntarily held religious belief that contains a code of morality and equate it to a political philosophy dictating what the government is permitted to compel people to do.
Secondly I did not say the rejection of one belief (falsely labeled by you as authoritarian) required it being replaced by another authoritarian belief – I observed that *historically* this is what has happened. History has shown that if your morality does not come from God, it will come from those who have the power to force their will upon you. That is why I suspect your little ‘ocean state’ won’t end well – as per human nature, once some people get a leg up on others, there will be a grasping for power – with nothing to constrain them and guided by their own will to power, things will go as they always have. Care to give counterexamples from any culture in human history where this did not end up happening in fairly short order?
Yes I do. And I think it more compatible with human nature than the Abrahamic religions.
If you assume that people are fundamentally good, then any form of social structure ought to work. Everything is peachy-keen. If you assume people are fundamentally flawed (an assumption made by most religious people), then there is no sense in placing one person or group of persons in charge of all others. There is a saying that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The best defense against this is the radical decentralization of social institutions and the minimalization (if not outright elimination) of any monopoly authority.
Again – minimalizing *human* authority != the authority of God, who is not subject to human weakness and corruption. What is interesting here is on a political level I almost totally agree with you – the government should interfere as little as absolutely possible in the lives of others…where we disagree with is if there are forms of authority that are not often corrupted, and perhaps better deserving (and far better utilizing) of authority. Obviously, this part of the discussion is really based on the whether or not God exists…and that is a far larger question that a few posts on an unrelated thread can address. So in the end I think this issue would have to be settled as an impasse based on differing core beliefs.
Think of centralized authority as a form of systemic risk. Any centralized authority can be hijacked by bad people. Those bad people create problems for everyone else. The only way to reduce this systemic risk is to decentralize authority as much as possible. That way, there are NO centralized institutions for these people to hijack. They can create problems only for the people in close proximity around them, not for the rest of us.
Indeed, I consider the Abrahamic religions to be much less compatible with human nature. For one, like socialism and communism, they represent centralized authority and are, therefor, fundamentally flawed.
There you go again – just stating ‘any authority = flawed’ – just repeating this mantra again and again does not make it true. Plus, as discussed above, the type of authority in Christianity is very different from the (usually quite secular) collectivist political systems that you correctly decry.
Secondly, they place all kinds of restrictions on personal private activities that are incompatible with the choices that people would make in the absence of such restrictions.
Maybe those moral restrictions are for a person’s own good? Recall that they are free to disobey them – God is not pointing a gun to anyone’s head…and (a bit beyond the scope of this post) it can be shown readily that adherence to traditional moral restrictions increases real freedom, and that (as we see happening around us) atheism, multiculturalism, and all the other products of falling away from traditional faith and morality are leading us leftward further down the path of enslavement. As an example look at the EU, and especially the UK.
Organized religion, especially the Abrahamic one (the ones that came from the middle-east), represent forced social engineering schemes that are conceptually no different than those advocated by mid-20th century ideologies such as Socialism/Communism or Nazism. They are “inauthentic” impositions on natural human behavior and thus cannot be considered consistent with human nature.
The ideas of Rothbard and Rand are the best presentations of individual liberty and autonomy that I have encountered. They are FAR superior in this respect to anything like Christianity. Thus, they represent a “gold standard” definition of individual autonomy by which all other worldviews are to be compared with.
So basically – it’s just your personal opinion. How do you objectively define best – some way that doesn’t boil down to your own subjectivity?
I think Voxday is very good on economic issues. There is much I agree with him on these. However, his religious views are complete lunacy. Any religious arguments he makes for the restriction of individual liberty cannot be seriously considered.
Vox can defend himself so this part I will just ignore, except to say that maybe you could drop by his blog one day and try to air your viewpoint…if you are so confident in your superiority. An interesting debate would likely be had by all.
I stand by my previous point that a commitment to true liberty requires the complete repudiation of the very concept of authority.
Once again, you keep stating this but don’t show it. Assertions != proof. History has shown that without any guidelines people degenerate quickly into chaos, brutality, and murder – leading to misery, poverty, social collapse, and enslavement.
Although I disagree with your beliefs, they are nonetheless interesting…if running afoul of all observed human history and totally predicated on atheism.
I will be interested to hear what else you have to say.
Well, there’s no reason to get insulting, just because you don’t know history. I was referring to recorded history in Europe. India is on another continent. Ashoka may have advocated banishing slavery, but how much good did that do? Did he free any slaves in India? Are there any holidays named after him? Does anyone know or care about some obscure Buddhist monk that had no effect on history?
St. Patrick actually ended slavery in Ireland. The Pope did issue a decree banishing slavery from Christendom and it was in effect for almost 500 years. Slavery returned to Europe in the late 1500s, a long with a lot of other pagan ideas, during the Renaissance. And the first slaves shipped to America were Irish, sent over by King James (he of bible fame, just in case you’re as illiterate as you are ignorant and rude).
It was the shipping of the Irish to America that established the slave trade routes. African slaves soon followed, but the vast majority of them were shipped to the Carribean and Latin America. And they were sold mostly by African and Arab slave traders.
The Irish endured tremendous discrimination for decades in America. “Irish Need Not Apply” was a prominent sign on businesses throughout the north, or did you miss that in the history class you slept through in high school?
Strange how America didn’t fight a Civil War to free them. Was that because they were white? No civil rights movement to end decades of discrimination against them, no grievance mongering, no demand for reparations, no affirmative action, why do you think that is?
The Irish were the first slaves in America. They were discriminated against for decades, perhaps hundreds of years. But they seem to have gotten over it and assimilated into American culture. They have a holiday and a parade to celebrate their patron saint.
And all you can do is refer to some obscure Buddhist like it makes you sound intelligent. I’m not the one who is clueless here. You are.
I don’t know, Bunky, <<>>, doesn’t sound like you’re just limiting it to Europe.
And being the head honcho of India isn’t really all that obscure, Buddhist or not.
You probably could use some work on increasing your accuracy and lowering your absolute assuredness.
On the other hand, overly confident people with nothing to really back it up are all the rage today in reality shows. Kim Kardashian just signed a contract for 80 million or so. I’m sure that soon you won’t even need to brag about all the money you’re going to inherit from Mom. Just get The Gawain’s Ghost Show and talk about how you killed a 12-foot Bengalese Tiger with your bare hands and stuff.
Sorry, the part between the <> marks was “… … the first person in recorded history to advocate against slavery was St. Patrick …”, but it didn’t come out due to HTML issues.
The point was that Gawain’s Ghost said he had limited it to Europe, but he hadn’t. Of course.
“Another glorious Sierra day in which one seems to be dissolved and absorbed and sent pulsing onward we know not where. Life seems neither long nor short, and we take no more heed to save time or make haste than do the trees and stars. This is true freedom, a good practical sort of immortality”
john Muir
Waxwing and John Muir seem to have found their own reality, beyond the frustrating restrictions of reason and sanity, where only feeling counts.
You make two statements that are logically contradictory.
As I mentioned before the whole of Western civilization that you rightly laud and appear to use as a springboard for your own beliefs also came out of Christianity – further demonstrating how your claim that religion is incompatible with freedom is without merit. What pre-Christian (or atheist) culture had our Western notions of liberty, free speech, and the worth of the individual?
Can you give any examples where total self-ownership sans any notion of obedience to higher authority has actually turned out well? Historically, when man has turned away from God, claiming that it for freedom, he instead turns to a truly collectivist and brutal social arrangement instead. Do you really think your proposed hyper-individualism is compatible with human nature?
You say that Christianity is indeed compatible with individual liberty in the first statement. Yet, you say that it is not in the second statement. So which one is it? You need to get off the fence and clarify whether Christianity is or is not compatible with individual liberty.
You say that Christianity is indeed compatible with individual liberty in the first statement. Yet, you say that it is not in the second statement. So which one is it? You need to get off the fence and clarify whether Christianity is or is not compatible with individual liberty.
I answered this in my response to your longer post.
Once again – you make bold assertions without a shred of proof or argument.
I’m not arguing for the existence of an unseen entity, you are. The burden of proof is on you, not me.
History has shown that if your morality does not come from God, it will come from those who have the power to force their will upon you. That is why I suspect your little ‘ocean state’ won’t end well – as per human nature, once some people get a leg up on others, there will be a grasping for power – with nothing to constrain them and guided by their own will to power, things will go as they always have. Care to give counterexamples from any culture in human history where this did not end up happening in fairly short order?
This argument applies only to those of external locus of control. People like myself are of internal locus of control. This argument is irrelevent to us.
if God does exist, wouldn’t he perhaps have certain authority and rights to tell us how to behave? If He made the universes and our ability to even think or reason or have freedom, then on what basis do you deny that He has the right to provide guidelines and expect us to follow Him? Your ‘freedom’ is pointless – no matter how many of your aspirations you reach, no matter how freedom you have, one day you will die and cease to exist and nothing you did will matter at all. All of your efforts will one day crumble to dust. So what’s the point?
This is rubbish because autonomy is not rights based. It is an intrisic property of sentience. This is also why even if your god exists, it has no jurisdiction over me. I don’t grant it any.
This is actually a issue we used to talk about some years ago in the context of creating sentient A.I. We came to the conclusion that it is immoral to create an A.I. and not allow it complete autonomy. We consider the creation of sentience without autonomy to be the ultimate act of evil. This is why I consider the Abrahamic religions to be as evil as secular ideologies such as Soviet Communism or Nazism. They are all a denial of individual autonomy.
The notion that a sentient being does not own itself is an insult to sentience itself.
Maybe those moral restrictions are for a person’s own good?
I am referring exclusively to consentual acts between competent adults, not criminal or anti-social acts.
There you go again – just stating ‘any authority = flawed’ – just repeating this mantra again and again does not make it true. Plus, as discussed above, the type of authority in Christianity is very different from the (usually quite secular) collectivist political systems that you correctly decry.
All authority is identical. The very concept of authority is inherently corrupt.
So basically – it’s just your personal opinion. How do you objectively define best – some way that doesn’t boil down to your own subjectivity?
The ideas of Rothbard and Rand are more logically consistent with individual autonomy than the Abrahamic religions. This is objectively true, not just a subjective statement on my part.
History has shown that without any guidelines people degenerate quickly into chaos, brutality, and murder – leading to misery, poverty, social collapse, and enslavement.
Actually, I can cite an example that disagrees with this. The Pacific Northwest part of the U.S. We have less religion than the rest of the country. Yet, our crime and violence rate is not any higher than the rest of the U.S.
Criminality, drug addiction, and teen pregnancy are well accepted metric of social decay. Yet, all of these have declined significantly in the U.S. over the last 20 years, despite the decline of organized religious belief over the same time period. Thus, the U.S. is not headed for some “Mad Max” scenario with the decline in religious belief in the U.S.
Same for Europe. Even though they are essentially atheist, they also have relatively low levels of crime, drug addiction, and teen pregnancy as well. Hence, your argument that a rejection of religion automatically leads to social dysfunction and collapse does not hold water in all cases.
So yes, I can argue that a successful, prosperous society can be maintained entirely on secular principles.
Vox can defend himself so this part I will just ignore, except to say that maybe you could drop by his blog one day and try to air your viewpoint…if you are so confident in your superiority. An interesting debate would likely be had by all.
Vox’s discussion of religion literally makes no sense to me. I am of internal locus of control. This is the reason why religious thought is so alien to me. I believe very strongly that religion was created specifically and exclusively for those of external locus of control.
I actually think that religious belief is a vestigial remnent of the bicameral mind (Julien Jayes concept of the bicameral mind and the origin of consciousness) although, like some of things you have said, is a subject for another day.
I’m not arguing for the existence of an unseen entity, you are. The burden of proof is on you, not me.
Anytime anyone makes a claim, the burden of proof is on them – the theist claims God exists, the non-theist says He does not and the universe somehow came into existence via natural causes (ignoring how those came about without resorting to infinite causation, but I digress since this is actually really off-topic) …both are claims, and both need to argued for on equal footing. You can try to sneakily shift the burden of proof, but it simply doesn’t work that way.
This argument applies only to those of external locus of control. People like myself are of internal locus of control. This argument is irrelevent to us.
You tried to circumvent my question – I did not ask how *you* personally decide to follow a particular morality, I asked how you could possibly objectively state that is better/superior to some other morality, and the basis by which your repeated moral assertions over the past few posts could be justified as anything else other than your own personal belief, without any universal basis. How does having an internal locus of control somehow make your belief system more valid than any of it’s competitors? The fact that you personally believe in and hold to what you do is totally irrelevant to this…if your ‘internal locus of control’ decided that a passionate belief is unicorns was the only basis of human rights…then that would make sense to you…but wouldn’t somehow make it *actually/objectively true*. Numerous philosophers have tried to get around this serious problem for the secularist, and none of them have succeeded yet. Just ask Nietzsche. I doubt you have. Your naïve beliefs fly in the face of history and philosophy, and no amount of stating over and over again that personal autonomy is the highest and most important thing in the universe will make it so. On a tangential note, how does a bunch of chemical reactions (which is, from a purely materialist perspective, all we are) have intrinsic rights in the first place? How do you even know we really have personal autonomy – how can you have any assurance that your autonomy is an actual, existing concept and not simply an illusion generated by your biochemistry?
This is rubbish because autonomy is not rights based. It is an intrisic property of sentience. This is also why even if your god exists, it has no jurisdiction over me. I don’t grant it any.
You start out with a naked assertion and transition into a quite amusing bit of bravado there – If He exists, then given that He is all powerful you can no more deny him jurisdiction that you could gravity or thermodynamics. No matter how much you refuse to grant gravity jurisdiction over you, a 100 foot fall is still going to hurt. Of all the things that you written thus far, that was the one that most made me glad I wasn’t drinking anything when I read it.
This is actually a issue we used to talk about some years ago in the context of creating sentient A.I. We came to the conclusion that it is immoral to create an A.I. and not allow it complete autonomy. We consider the creation of sentience without autonomy to be the ultimate act of evil. This is why I consider the Abrahamic religions to be as evil as secular ideologies such as Soviet Communism or Nazism. They are all a denial of individual autonomy.
The notion that a sentient being does not own itself is an insult to sentience itself.
Again…how the heck are you determining good and evil beyond your own personal opinions? You have all this talk or morality and immorality…but moral or immoral according to what standard?
I am referring exclusively to consentual acts between competent adults, not criminal or anti-social acts.
How do you objectively define criminal or anti-social acts?
All authority is identical. The very concept of authority is inherently corrupt.
Again with the wild, sweeping assertions dressed up as facts…you never did respond to my simple explanation of how God’s Authority differed from human authority…simply ignoring my argument and restating your case sans defense tells me that you may be aware on some level that you can’t actually defend your argument. For fun though I would like to see how you could pull that off.
The ideas of Rothbard and Rand are more logically consistent with individual autonomy than the Abrahamic religions. This is objectively true, not just a subjective statement on my part.
Instead of just going all broken record and repeating that over and over…how about you actually demonstrate this? Why do you seem to keep insisting that asserting something makes it true? Also – you keep assuming that consistency with individual autonomy is the highest good in existence – but you don’t (and can’t) prove it.
Actually, I can cite an example that disagrees with this. The Pacific Northwest part of the U.S. We have less religion than the rest of the country. Yet, our crime and violence rate is not any higher than the rest of the U.S.
Criminality, drug addiction, and teen pregnancy are well accepted metric of social decay. Yet, all of these have declined significantly in the U.S. over the last 20 years, despite the decline of organized religious belief over the same time period. Thus, the U.S. is not headed for some “Mad Max” scenario with the decline in religious belief in the U.S.
Same for Europe. Even though they are essentially atheist, they also have relatively low levels of crime, drug addiction, and teen pregnancy as well. Hence, your argument that a rejection of religion automatically leads to social dysfunction and collapse does not hold water in all cases.
So yes, I can argue that a successful, prosperous society can be maintained entirely on secular principles.
I note with amusement that you 1.) Can only attempt very recent examples of formerly very religious societies that have only very recently reduced their levels of religious commitment, yet still have some of the cultural residue and social capital accumulated by centuries of strong Christian commitment – social functions and changes happen over longer periods – it takes time for social changes to completely play out. For example, our unsustainable and very harmful debt/financial system has survived since 1913 – that does not mean that is somehow viable, correct, and sustainable. The Soviet Union lasted for 69 years even though it was based on lies, cruelty, and delusions. Feminism will last a little while longer than that, and it is no more rooted in reality than anything that came out of the former USSR. Incorrect ideologies and beliefs at first cause slow degeneration, which picks up steam rapidly until it ends in collapse. We are seeing that phase starting now in these irreligious societies that you praise so much…note that the NW U.S is still a fairly religious place by most standards, and is part of a much larger nation that still adheres to Christianity. (Although less so with each passing day, and note how quickly the country is declining.)
In case you haven’t noticed – Europe has declined very severely in the past few decades, and right now is experiencing a huge surge in crime and degeneration. Birth rates have fallen to well below sustainability, and (especially the U.K.) have major problems with ‘yobs’ and other sources of serious violence. Also as a relevant side note – we see that secularists simply do not have the courage and conviction to stand up to the theist Muslims (not that I believe in Islam mind you) in their own countries – it should seem that secularists are on the whole quite cowardly and easily dominated. Your vision of some sort of Randian secular utopia will never come to fruition as people sans faith lose courage, lose honor, lose any objective source of moral guidance, and lose their very reason d’etre – believe me, modern day Europe is not exactly a model of how you want a society to run and function. Demographic realities alone, stemming from their secularism, have doomed it. How many Europeans do you actually know, and how much of what is actually going on are you aware of? I have lived there and know people who do now and it is not the secular utopia you seem to think that it is. Some fun (not really that much fun I guess) examples a little bit ago as random examples: (one recent, one a year back – this has been going on much longer though)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2237170/Why-Amsterdams-legal-brothels-lesson-Britain-telling-truth-sex-gangs-race.html
And
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1377780/London-Taliban-targeting-women-gays-bid-impose-sharia-law.html
Can you name a society that has survived any *historically meaningful* (= 250 years) amount of time sans religion? Every society that has lost it’s faith has gone the way of the dodo bird…try to name a single exception in human history. (As mentioned above, the modern examples above actually serve to prove my point – they are still in existence due to the sheer strength of the very Christian heritage of their past but they are burning that capital and are declining rapidly, heading in all the wrong directions.
Vox’s discussion of religion literally makes no sense to me. I am of internal locus of control. This is the reason why religious thought is so alien to me. I believe very strongly that religion was created specifically and exclusively for those of external locus of control.
I actually think that religious belief is a vestigial remnent of the bicameral mind (Julien Jayes concept of the bicameral mind and the origin of consciousness) although, like some of things you have said, is a subject for another day.
You keep repeating that locus of control stuff like a mantra…that you personally are able to hold yourself to a set of convictions for whatever reason is totally irrelevant as to whether those convictions have any basis in reality. The dictionary definition of internal locus of control that I found was “ A theoretical construct designed to assess a person’s perceived control over his or her own behavior. The classification internal locus indicates that the person feels in control of events; external locus indicatesthat others are perceived to have that control.” Your self-control is admirable but has zero effect on the truth of your convictions. How can you organize society around your own internal locus of control? Do you really think that other people will all simply accept your belief system and form your Randian utopia? That is not how the world or human nature works.
Regarding Jaynes – Hmm…so you base your beliefs here on a one particular psychologist whose theories are not accepted in the neuroscience community and the evidence he gives for his arguments is really damn funny. To put it mildly, this guy’s theories are not even remotely settled science (they are not scientific anyway since they are untestable). How (according to him) human consciousness came about over the last 10 thousand years or so is quite the tall tale, and totally without evidence (and considerable evidence that would suggest against it.)
Again I think that you would have a blast debating over at VD’s place – there are several secularists/agnostics over there so you would not be alone facing the firing squad…it would be amusing to watch you try to defend your arguments. I am one person and simply do not have the time (nor the space on this now very outdated thread) to go beyond scratching the surface as to why your statements above are totally ridiculous.)
Ok I think that is enough for now…I really wish you would do more than keep asserting stuff and *actually make arguments*!
I don’t care about your religious beliefs. What you believe is your personal business. What I believe is my personal business. I don’t believe in any organized religion and never will.
You say that my arguments are ridiculous. I say the same thing about yours. Religion is nothing more than a delusion, a mental disorder. Arguing with mentally ill people is a waste of time.
Religious belief is nothing more that a psychiatric condition.
I am going to stand by my previous comments here on the following two basis:
First, obsession over the private acts of other individuals, particularly total strangers, as though it is appropriate to have control over their actions is defined in psychology as inappropriate boundaries, which is considered an indicator of mental illness. Hence, any world view that obsesses over the private acts of individuals has to be considered a mental illness.
Second, the DSMIV defines mass delusion, then specifically excludes recognized religions, because they otherwise do actually fit the definition.
Be that as it may, let say for arguments sake that I do accept your premise that religion is necessary for sustainable civilization. History shows that Christianity is not the only religion that can sustain a civilization. China has 3,000 years and Japan 1,500 years of continuous civilization. Yet, neither has ever had Christianity. Hence, any religion that promotes self-discipline and productive accomplishment, not limited to Christianity, is sufficient for the purpose of sustaining a technological civilization.
People like me can never accept Christianity, mainly because of its lack of respect for privacy and individual autonomy. A replacement is necessary.
Ideally, the religion should respect individual autonomy and privacy, yet promote character values such as self-discipline, work ethic, and productive accomplishment that are generally recognized as the foundation of Western civilization. I propose creating a new religion based on transhumanist and libertarian ideals that would include the character values often found in Heinlein’s writings. I believe such a religion would be superior to Christianity as far as sustaining Western civilization and can be an effective competitor to Christianity (and Islam as well). Being created by individuals in Western civilization, my new religion is more compatible with Western civilization than Christianity, which I need to remind you, is an alien Oriental import to the West. I have seriously considered the creation of such a religion over the years and might actually get around to doing it, if you people succeed in convincing me on the need for religion.
Belief in the need for religion implies the need for a long-term endeavor to maintain the economic and psychological vigor of humanity. I propose the large-scale settlement of the solar system, as described by O’neill’s “High Frontier” concept, followed by interstellar migration on a massive scale. This is suitable long-term endeavor that can occupy the attention and talents of mankind for many centuries, perhaps thousands of years. I can think of no other long-term endeavor that is suitable for this purpose.
Once our finances are in order, radical life extension (SENS) has been developed, and we have our city-state, we can then create our new religion and make our city-state the new Mecca for a new age of Western civilization. Its time to consign these middle-east, desert origin religions into the junk heap of history where they rightfully belong.
One other benefit of the new religion is that, as it is based on transhumanism, one of its foundational values is the use of biotech and nanotech for self-improvement. We believe in using these technologies to make ourselves stronger and smarter as well as to adapt our physiologies so that we can live in environments (aquatic, space) that are inhospitable to current human physiology. This is a key aspect of our religion that offers superiority to Christianity as benefit to Western civilization.
A resilient civilization requires resilient people. Transhumanism is better at promoting the creation of resilience in people than existing religions such as Christianity. This makes my religion more compatible with the values of Western civilization than Christianity (that alien Oriental import from the deserts of the middle-east).
Since it had taken you so long to respond, I had assumed that you had given up and stopped checking this thread. Digging through my post history, it’s a good thing I came back only to stumble on more of your ridiculous rantings.
I don’t care about your religious beliefs. What you believe is your personal business. What I believe is my personal business. I don’t believe in any organized religion and never will.
At least you admit that you are an atheistic fundamentalist…anyway moving on.
You say that my arguments are ridiculous. I say the same thing about yours. Religion is nothing more than a delusion, a mental disorder. Arguing with mentally ill people is a waste of time.
Funny you say that since you *never* did address mine – your entire argument structure is basically this
1.) Total freedom to do anything anywhere (except that which harms others according to my own personal definition) is the most important thing.
2.) Christianity has rules that reign in destructive behavior.
3.) I don’t like that…it makes me mad.
4.) Therefore Christianity is false
I keep asking you on what basis 1.) is objectively true…and you keep evading that question – your entire argument rises or falls on this one point…your entire rant is derived from that one statement…but you have totally failed to even attempt to demonstrate it.
I am going to stand by my previous comments here on the following two basis:
First, obsession over the private acts of other individuals, particularly total strangers, as though it is appropriate to have control over their actions is defined in psychology as inappropriate boundaries, which is considered an indicator of mental illness. Hence, any world view that obsesses over the private acts of individuals has to be considered a mental illness.
Second, the DSMIV defines mass delusion, then specifically excludes recognized religions, because they otherwise do actually fit the definition.
How cute that you are trying to use the ridiculous pseudoscience of psychology to refute me –
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/witness/201111/psychology-rife-inaccurate-research-findings
Modern Psychology is a fraud, rife with errors and non-scientific claims, filled with wannabe philosophers dressing up their personal biases in the garb of science. Note that what is defined as being ‘mentally ill’ has changed to suit the times. The Soviets defined it as anything that countered their doctrine, modern psychologists took homosexuality off the list to please the gay lobby…mental illness is whatever those in power say that it is. In any event, the DSMIV requires that the ‘delusion’ actually be, well delusional – aka false. Something isn’t delusion if it is true, and there is abundant evidence for Christianity. You have not attempted to actually refute Christianity at all. (You just keep ranting about how it violates your personal opinions that have no objective basis in reality.) You could only state that faith in Christianity was delusional if you could prove it to be false. (Not saying that you should try this since you already look pretty dumb with your inept logic and philosophizing so far).
Be that as it may, let say for arguments sake that I do accept your premise that religion is necessary for sustainable civilization. History shows that Christianity is not the only religion that can sustain a civilization. China has 3,000 years and Japan 1,500 years of continuous civilization. Yet, neither has ever had Christianity. Hence, any religion that promotes self-discipline and productive accomplishment, not limited to Christianity, is sufficient for the purpose of sustaining a technological civilization.
Note that I said ‘religion’, not explicitly Christianity. So great job knocking down that straw man!
People like me can never accept Christianity, mainly because of its lack of respect for privacy and individual autonomy. A replacement is necessary.
Again – 90% of what you say is simply repeating the same ‘my own personal thoughts on what I should be able to do is the most important crap in the universe’ schtick. This is just a repeat performance…for like the 5,000th time.
Ideally, the religion should respect individual autonomy and privacy, yet promote character values such as self-discipline, work ethic, and productive accomplishment that are generally recognized as the foundation of Western civilization.
Yet again we see the same question – who defines ‘ideally’ – who defines what all those values really mean, and what basis do we objectively state that we should adhere to them?
I propose creating a new religion based on transhumanist and libertarian ideals that would include the character values often found in Heinlein’s writings. I believe such a religion would be superior to Christianity as far as sustaining Western civilization and can be an effective competitor to Christianity (and Islam as well). Being created by individuals in Western civilization, my new religion is more compatible with Western civilization than Christianity, which I need to remind you, is an alien Oriental import to the West. I have seriously considered the creation of such a religion over the years and might actually get around to doing it, if you people succeed in convincing me on the need for religion.
Belief in the need for religion implies the need for a long-term endeavor to maintain the economic and psychological vigor of humanity. I propose the large-scale settlement of the solar system, as described by O’neill’s “High Frontier” concept, followed by interstellar migration on a massive scale. This is suitable long-term endeavor that can occupy the attention and talents of mankind for many centuries, perhaps thousands of years. I can think of no other long-term endeavor that is suitable for this purpose.
Once our finances are in order, radical life extension (SENS) has been developed, and we have our city-state, we can then create our new religion and make our city-state the new Mecca for a new age of Western civilization. Its time to consign these middle-east, desert origin religions into the junk heap of history where they rightfully belong.
Sounds like the plot to a bad sci-fi novel. Definitely let me know when your shiny secular society ever happens. Somehow I imagine, based on all observable history and current events that things will turn out quite a bit different than you are imagining.
The fact that you think of Christianity as alien to western culture as opposed to it’s very foundation marks you as breathtakingly historically ignorant. Have you actually read anything from any of the major historical documents of our culture or know anything at all about it’s history? How could you possibly justify that statement? Even the most hardcore atheists admit the dependence of western culture on Christianity – even folks like Dawkins! You are the one who is genuinely and terribly deluded. Please do some real reading and analysis before you try to respond.
One other benefit of the new religion is that, as it is based on transhumanism, one of its foundational values is the use of biotech and nanotech for self-improvement. We believe in using these technologies to make ourselves stronger and smarter as well as to adapt our physiologies so that we can live in environments (aquatic, space) that are inhospitable to current human physiology. This is a key aspect of our religion that offers superiority to Christianity as benefit to Western civilization.
A resilient civilization requires resilient people. Transhumanism is better at promoting the creation of resilience in people than existing religions such as Christianity. This makes my religion more compatible with the values of Western civilization than Christianity (that alien Oriental import from the deserts of the middle-east).
You just keep on going with the masturbatory nerd fantasies don’t you…well as I stated above, based on human history and actual science I suspect things will turn out differently then you state. But time will tell, won’t it?