Posted by anon_wyly 16 hours ago
I also think it is important to read about rescent science with respect to the brain and consciousness. I also think about the books by Frans de Waal, that make you realize we are not that apart as a species from other animals.
To quickly reflect on two items.
(2,3,4) speak to me and I can say my father was a great model of it
Plaudits to OP. Never seen it so well engaged and summarized.
> Drop the atheism and take transcendental faith seriously as a subject matter.
Not even self-consistent then.
Funny how when you know that the cost of generating slop is almost zero, it becomes your default assumption.
In the second one the article is talking about rationalists rejecting thought that comes from a faith-based perspective. That’s entirely orthogonal to the prior point but I get that the two seem in conflict in that many systems of faith promise life after death etc. I am personally an atheist, but I find it really sad how it has become intellectually fashionable in certain circles to sneer at people who have faith. Certainly if you are serious about philosophy and ethics it seems to me to be ridiculous to reject the scholarship of people who approach those topics from the point of view of religious faith.
TFA doesn’t approach the main problem that I have with the rationalist movement, which is that they seem to have become exactly what they are supposed to be against: an unthinking, unquestioning “in-group” almost like an intellectual cult. The very name is offensive because it is one of those where the negative connotation is implicit. Like “non-violent communication” implying other styles of communication are violent, people in the in-crowd are “rationalist” (implying everyone else is not rational), they go to the website “lesswrong.org” (because everyone else is more wrong) etc. That seems way too smug by half.
[1] eg https://www.harpercollins.com/products/why-we-die-venki-rama...