Postmodernity and christianity

[vimothy]

I'm just describing religion as I understand it. I think it is the case that in some religions, and/or schools thereof, ideas about Deity and other tenets are intended to be regarded as essentially metaphorical. That isn't to say that they're not taken seriously or based on strong traditions of spiritual enquiry. And I think that these can address some aspects of existence and being more successfully and pragmatically than science can in it's present state.

Out of time for today, but just want to say that it's only possible to say this (IMHO) if you've gone beyond religion into atheism and come out at the other side aware that reality is constructed, and constructed by 'man', not God.

 

[noel emits]

Out of time for today, but just want to say that it's only possible to say this (IMHO) if you've gone beyond religion into atheism and come out at the other side aware that reality is constructed, and constructed by 'man', not God.

Or, if you understand the truth about 'ultimate reality' or god(s) to be either fundamentally 'unknowable' or at least not transmittable by words, which isn't necessarily quite the same thing as saying that 'reality' is entirely constructed by 'man'. But yeah, I think those ancient sages, priests, philosophers and shamans probably did see things that way, it's only later appropriations and corruptions that get bogged down in rigid dogmatism.

And so we are back to Postmodernism I suppose. And Dawkins, in his zeal, being beaten at that particular game by representatives of the modern clergy who have managed, to some extent, to come to terms with their place and function in a post-modern world.

Looking through some Youtube clips recently, I saw right-wing US TV pundit Bill O Reilly interview rent-an-atheist Richard Dawkins. At one point in an argument on the existence of God, Bill says "Well, that's my truth, maybe not yours..." Dawkins replying that both viewpoints can't be true, so O' Reilly schools him in relativism by explaining that his Catholism is a "personal truth". (Bizarre to hear him talk like this) Also in his book "The God Delusion" Dawkins recalls an occasion where a vicar and theologian accused him of being "a 19th century thinker" implying that we had all moved on from the convictions and absolute truths (or search for them) that motivated the early modernists.

 

[Mr. Tea]

For the record, noel, I think you're right that religions (some more than others, perhaps) contain a certain amount of worthwhile philosophy that has, by necessity, been 'encoded' in the form of myths, fables and prophecies for the benefit of a generally illiterate laiety. If we can the 'baby' of thousands of years of accumulated wisdom while throwing out the 'bathwater' of theism and superstition...well, yeah, that'd be great.

 

[vimothy]

For the record, noel, I think you're right that religions (some more than others, perhaps) contain a certain amount of worthwhile philosophy that has, by necessity, been 'encoded' in the form of myths, fables and prophecies for the benefit of a generally illiterate laiety. If we can the 'baby' of thousands of years of accumulated wisdom while throwing out the 'bathwater' of theism and superstition...well, yeah, that'd be great.

But that presupposes that the 'baby' is the wisdom and the 'bathwater' is superstition. I'm not sure that it is. Where are all the Foucault reading social theorists -- don't you have something to say about all this?

 

[Mr. Tea]

But that presupposes that the 'baby' is the wisdom and the 'bathwater' is superstition. I'm not sure that it is. Where are all the Foucault reading social theorists -- don't you have something to say about all this?

Oh, ignore me, I had an uncharacteristic hippy moment.

 

[noel emits]

Well the bathwater in this case is presumably the dogmatism and socially proscriptive stuff etc. The baby being the concepts that we can use to understand the universe and how we operate in it.

I wonder if Dawkins has read Eric Davis?

 

[vimothy]

Well the bathwater in this case is presumably the dogmatism and socially proscriptive stuff etc. The baby being the concepts that we can use to understand the universe and how we operate in it.

Well, that's obviously how you read it, but why? What about the 'Foucauldian' view-point, how do you factor that in?

 

[noel emits]

Well, that's obviously how you read it

Not necessarily, that's just in this context of someone like RD misunderstanding religious viewpoints as being necessarily useless and/or overly dogmatic while himself providing a good example of mono thinking. So the reason I state it that way is that it applies equally to both sides. That's what he seems to miss sometimes - that's the topic here, not me defending religion as such. My opinion on that is separate from this discussion.

 

[vimothy]

Not necessarily, that's just in this context of someone like RD misunderstanding religious viewpoints as being necessarily useless and/or overly dogmatic while himself providing a good example of mono thinking. So the reason I state it that way is that it applies equally to both sides. That's what he seems to miss sometimes - that's the topic here, not me defending religion as such. My opinion on that is separate from this discussion.

It does seem like you have an unrealistically utopian or idealistic view of religion -- Eastern religion, to be sure (more RAW influence?), but still...

Religion has always been about taboo, proscription, control, discipline, describing what is permitted, what is forbidden. Maybe all the 'mystical' stuff is just bumph to keep you suckers busy while we keep running the world?

 

[noel emits]

It does seem like you have an unrealistically utopian or idealistic view of religion -- Eastern religion, to be sure (more RAW influence?), but still...

Not at all - stay on topic - this is about religious types understanding postmodernism better than a scientist. Although I think swears read that as them being unreasonable because in other ways they want to be less tolerant. Maybe he'd like to chime in and get the thread back to what it was supposed to be about?

I don't have a utopian view of religion at all - but that's not the issue here. We can discuss the value or otherwise of religion on another thread perhaps. Still...

Religion has always been about taboo, proscription, control, discipline, describing what is permitted, what is forbidden.

I don't think Taoism, Sufism and some schools of Buddhism are about these things really, for instance.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Not at all - stay on topic - this is about religious types understanding postmodernism better than a scientist.

That's because neither religion nor postmodernism has any truck with rationality and empiricism: the former predates such concepts by thousands of years and fears them because they form the basis of a demonstrably better way to understand the world, while the latter sneers at them as outdated, nerdy and 'square', frequently slandering them as "racist", "sexist" ad nauseam for good measure.

I don't think Taoism, Sufism and some schools of Buddhism are about these things really, for instance.

Fair enough, but those religions are followed by pretty small numbers of people compared to Christianity, mainstream Islam, 'other' schools of Buddhism, Hinduism...
Edit: and, as Vimothy says below, they are still religions, they are still concerned primarily with man's relationship to something that fundamentally doesn't exit, rather than to his fellow man.

 

[vimothy]

Not at all - stay on topic - this is about religious types understanding postmodernism better than a scientist. Although I think swears read that as them being unreasonable because in other ways they want to be less tolerant. Maybe he'd like to chime in and get the thread back to what it was supposed to be about?

I think RD has a pretty good understanding of religion -- it's the people you quote who don't, or rather, they have in my reading shorn themselves of religion except in a secular, post-religious sense, where 'all religions are equal' and religions are a 'subjective truth', i.e. these people are starting from a point that most religious people throughout history wouldn't recognise or accept. These people are already secular atheists in the most important sense -- the socio-politcal one.

This,

Well the bathwater in this case is presumably the dogmatism and socially proscriptive stuff etc. The baby being the concepts that we can use to understand the universe and how we operate in it.

Is pretty New Age, or PoMo at least -- it doesn't describe religion as a historical object, as an abstract machine, as an archiecture of social construction. Yes, yes -- religion can have a subjective value relevant to you personally, but what do we see when we examine it as a social phenomenon?

I don't have a utopian view of religion at all - but that's not the issue here. We can discuss the value or otherwise of religion on another thread perhaps. Still...

They both get it, it's just that they disagree! Simply understanding the the 'meaning' of postmodernism isn't necessarily here nor there. The Bible isn't the literal word of God, regardless of the age we live in. You can choose to believe it -- as you can choose to believe anything, if you desire -- but it doesn't make it true in any objective sense. People are going to hedge and claim that 'they know' but that it doesn't matter, because religion fulfills certain functions for them (most of them social, as far as I can see), and they aren't willing to give them up.

I don't think Taoism, Sufism and some schools of Buddhism are about these things really, for instance.

No, I think those religions are of the same type as all the others actually. All major religions have their esoteric little side alleys for them what are that way inclined. So take Sufism -- its still a set of codes and rules, *which mediate social relationships, with which sits some metaphysical teachings.

* EDIT

 

[noel emits]

It comes down to this though:

At one point in an argument on the existence of God, Bill says "Well, that's my truth, maybe not yours..." Dawkins replying that both viewpoints can't be true, so O' Reilly schools him in relativism by explaining that his Catholism is a "personal truth". (Bizarre to hear him talk like this) Also in his book "The God Delusion" Dawkins recalls an occasion where a vicar and theologian accused him of being "a 19th century thinker" implying that we had all moved on from the convictions and absolute truths (or search for them) that motivated the early modernists.

That's because neither religion nor postmodernism has any truck with rationality and empiricism: the former predates such concepts by thousands of years and fears them because they form the basis of a demonstrably better way to understand the world, while the latter sneers at them as outdated, nerdy and 'square', frequently slandering them as "racist", "sexist" ad nauseam for good measure.

Well it was just in this one isolated case as illustrated above really. But I think there's quite a bit of bias in your statements here as well, no?

That rationality and empiricism are 'demonstrably' 'better'. They have their uses and limitations I think. Compulsive rationality and empiricism isn't the be all and end all is it? I guess that's one of the 'lessons' of postmodernism. Where's nomadologist to say there's no such thing as a postmodern viewpoint?

Actually if we understand postmodernism as being a resistance to the idea of meta-narratives then it can probably be said to pre-date religion in a way.

 

[IdleRich]

"Where's nomadologist to say there's no such thing as a postmodern viewpoint?"

I was just about to say that actually - I mean that there is no such thing as a postmodern viewpoint, not the whole sentence.

"Fair enough, but those religions are followed by pretty small numbers of people compared to Christianity, mainstream Islam, 'other' schools of Buddhism, Hinduism...
Edit: and, as Vimothy says below, they are still religions, they are still concerned primarily with man's relationship to something that fundamentally doesn't exit, rather than to his fellow man."

Is that last bit true of Buddhism?

 

[Mr. Tea]

Without rationality and empiricism we'd be living in mud huts and dying at 30 (yes, zhao, we would). These concepts allowed incremental steps towards civilisation - fire, agriculture, the wheel, writing - but they didn't offer a firm challenge to the religious (which is to say, mystical) mindset as the dominant way to view the world until a couple of hundred years ago. Now many people like to point things like modern warfare, environmental degradation and massive economic inequality as evidence of the failure of Enlightenment values. But I see them instead as examples of technologies and other systems enabled by Enlightenment discoveries being pressed into the serviced of irrational, or simply old-fashioned selfish - purposes. Was it 'rational' for Hitler to blame Jews for Germany's defeat in WWI? Was it 'rational' for early-20th-century scientists to pervert their fields of study to 'prove' the evolutionary superiority of white people? Most of these horrors, including the ones still plaguing the planet to this day, are the results of very atavistic urges, clothed (and magnified) as they may be in the guise of industrialism, trade, geopolitics or whatever.

 

[Slothrop]

That rationality and empiricism are 'demonstrably' 'better'.

Isn't empiricism 'demonstrably better' more or less by definition?

 

[vimothy]

Is that last bit true of Buddhism?

I'd say so, yeah, though again that's understanding Buddhism as a social/historical phenomenon rather than an idealised product of the 'Buddha'. Think of, e.g., the role of Buddhism in fuedal Japan and not Buddhism as practiced in your local Buddhist centre...

EDIT: Sorry, I mean that Buddhism still fundamentally the same in that religion is about regulation of the social body...

 

[vimothy]

isn't empiricism 'demonstrably better' more or less by definition?

 

[Mr. Tea]

Is that last bit true of Buddhism?

I was about to write something about reincarnation and souls, but I think Buddhism doesn't really have a concept of a 'soul' like most other religions do. I think Buddhism is a bit like postmodernity/ism in that whatever you have to say about it, someone who's read more about it than you will pop up and say "Actually, that's wrong".

 

[Mr. Tea]

Isn't empiricism 'demonstrably better' more or less by definition?

Haha, yes, I hadn't spotted that.