-ve correlation found between literacy & religiosity

[Kimmo]

Sweet. Note how the level of seriousness is proportional to literacy for atheists and agnostics, but mostly reversed for everyone else ; )

I like how dabbling in Buddhism is particularly favoured by those with the smarts to master English... (from some angles Buddhism is purely agnostic philosophy).

And get a load of those pesky Jews, eh? I guess you need a decent education to become a doctor, lawyer, or banker...

[TurboZ.Dude]

Well, this is natural: the more you know about your surroundings and the universe, the less you need religion to explain it. Put it another way; religion fills those gaps that we can't fill. And as the human race evolves and learns new things about the universe, religion must move ahead and fill the gaps; things we cannot yet understand.

But on the other hand, there is also another factor to consider: the higher education you have, the more likely will you be busy at doing work, even at free time. That's because higher education often means you need to utilize your brain more for the work you do. And thus; you have less time to think about the universe and such. So there is always a trade-off, I'd say.

Personally I'm an agnostic theist, if anybody wonders.

[Kimmo]

But on the other hand, there is also another factor to consider: the higher education you have, the more likely will you be busy at doing work, even at free time. That's because higher education often means you need to utilize your brain more for the work you do. And thus; you have less time to think about the universe and such. So there is always a trade-off, I'd say.

That's probably a factor, but I'd say you're making too much of it... for a start, consider the number of folks like myself, who precisely because of their smarts have opted out of the rat race as much as they can, and spend as much of their time as possible doing what they figure is life's most important job, philosophy. I for one do a lot of sitting on my arse, feeding my brain and pondering, the occasional trip thrown in for good measure to crystallise new insights and wrap my head around reality in fresh and subtler ways.

Then consider how much more thinking a genius can get done than an idiot in any given moment. Any quick-witted person already knows there's a massive difference from their own experiences of when their brain isn't firing on all cylinders... and if you've done hallucinogens, you can probably testify to experiencing 'overclocked' powers of thought, which can be very impressive indeed - say, a nice hefty article's worth of depth and insight in a moment's apprehension. In my experience, we're talking several degrees of magnitude here... in other words, it doesn't have to take much dedicated time; say a few minutes to put together the pieces gathered by the subconscious churning away in the background, parallel processing all kinds of stuff in the long term.

I'm not saying Maslow's hierarchy of needs doesn't apply, but I'd say there's a bit of room for most people to philosophise, at least until population growth inevitably causes global food shortages and other shitstorms.

Personally I'm an agnostic theist, if anybody wonders.

Does that mean you believe in some sort of higher power, but aren't prepared to make any guesses as to its nature?

Sounds like Buddhism.

I sort of came from an athiest position to somewhere about there via tripping, but I'd prefer to describe it as science-based mysticism or something... I have a feeling a lot of scientists share a similar view... to my mind, the Universe looks like some sort of mind-bogglingly groovy multidimensional fractal... the sheer terrifying scale of which can smash your mind if you look at it too hard... careful on those drugs.

This might seem like a bit of a tangent, but what's your position on utilitarian ethics?

[TurboZ.Dude]

But on the other hand, there is also another factor to consider: the higher education you have, the more likely will you be busy at doing work, even at free time. That's because higher education often means you need to utilize your brain more for the work you do. And thus; you have less time to think about the universe and such. So there is always a trade-off, I'd say.

That's probably a factor, but I'd say you're making too much of it...

Yeah, you're right. It was just a brain-fart, that's all.

consider the number of folks like myself, who precisely because of their smarts have opted out of the rat race as much as they can, and spend as much of their time as possible doing what they figure is life's most important job, philosophy. I for one do a lot of sitting on my arse, feeding my brain and pondering, the occasional trip thrown in for good measure to crystallise new insights and wrap my head around reality in fresh and subtler ways.

You're much like me then!

Personally I'm an agnostic theist, if anybody wonders.

Does that mean you believe in some sort of higher power, but aren't prepared to make any guesses as to its nature?

Sounds like Buddhism.

Not exactly, but something like that. I come from a Christian type of view, but I don't consider the Bible an absolute truth. I also accept the views (and writings) of other religions as well, but I consider none of them absolute truths either. Together, those books do provide a greater picture, and thus, they still do bring some value to me. However, I don't consider myself to be part of any of these particular religions (including Christianity), they all have too narrow borders and would need to move forward to accommodate for the new things we've learned, as I said in my earlier comment. I do believe in a higher power (that some of us, myself included, would call God), and am prepared to make some guesses as to Its/His nature, but I don't believe I can get a complete picture of this higher power because of the limited nature of the human mind.

For me, science is the way of understanding the nature of the universe, and ourselves. Religion enriches my life, it fills the gaps that are left over after science (those things science can't prove or explain). In my opinion, there are always things we cannot smell, touch, see, measure, or prove, but still do exist, but we should still thrive to learn more, because some of these things (though not all of them) may be possible to prove in the future! And there is always more to learn about everything!

I sort of came from an athiest position to somewhere about there via tripping, but I'd prefer to describe it as science-based mysticism or something... I have a feeling a lot of scientists share a similar view... to my mind, the Universe looks like some sort of mind-bogglingly groovy multidimensional fractal... the sheer terrifying scale of which can smash your mind if you look at it too hard... careful on those drugs.

That sounds very much like my own view, apart from the atheist position of course. Interesting!

This might seem like a bit of a tangent, but what's your position on utilitarian ethics?

Well, it's not that far off. My position is this; I support utilitarian ethics, but when it comes to lying, I don't. That is my limit.

[Ash]

to me most common religions represent backwards thinking and pure fear of the unknown. followed by greed and power in the top end levels. i don't dislike religious followers but do dislike the business end.

I am 100% athiest but do admire Buddhist ways and beliefs on self discovery and self improvement.

[tassuperkart]

I went to Sunday school as a kid.................................

[TurboZ.Dude]

to me most common religions represent backwards thinking and pure fear of the unknown.

I agree, that's what religion becomes, if it doesn't follow its time. Which is the case with religions today.

I went to Sunday school as a kid.................................

I did too!

[Kimmo]

My position is this; I support utilitarian ethics, but when it comes to lying, I don't. That is my limit.

Utilitarianism is virtually unassailable IMO... there's preference utilitarianism; Unlike classical utilitarianism, which defines right actions as those that maximize pleasure and minimize pain, preference utilitarianism promotes actions that fulfill the interests (preferences) of those beings involved.

This philosophy is pretty much guaranteed to be the best one in any given circumstance, as it's formulated as simply as possible around the very notion of what's best for all involved. Now, classical utilitarianism would have it that given the choice between saving the lives of two strangers or the life of one family member, it'd be better to save the strangers, but perhaps the preference variant can get around it to some extent. At any rate, such a conundrum is pretty tough for any philosophy.

Bestiality is another example where things get a bit sticky... according to utilitarians, if interspecies sex is consensual, have at it. Which could seem pretty wrong to lots of folks, of course... but I think the philosophy's that strong, I had another look at it... and yeah, I cant come up with too many logical reasons why it's necessarily bad. And if you're hung up on the issue of determining consent, don't say a word unless you're a vegetarian... Cause really, why should anyone who's prepared to subject animals to the horrors of factory farming have anything to say about it? Not that I'm a vegetarian (only in principle), or a chook-fucker, but it's an illuminating example to test a stance with...

Utilitarianism just takes an unflinching look at the facts, and makes judgements based on nothing else but facts. So, it's bad to eat meat cause of all the suffering and ecological destruction it causes. So that's not wisdom bestowed from on high, but wisdom generated by anyone, drawing on the work of tens of thousands of scientists, each doing their bit to comprehensively illuminate reality, one tiny facet at a time. We know animals suffer, we know rivers of pig shit aren't good, ipso facto we shouldn't treat animals the way we do.

It all seems to line up pretty well with an aspect of Buddhism (specifically this angle), not to mention good old agnostic humanism. I think the key thing about such a stance is the emphasis on figuring out WTF you're dealing with first before acting, rather than trying to fit everything to a simplistic black/white template and making over-confident, hypocritical, and often damaging judgements, followed by stupid and hasty actions.

So in order to make more valid judgements about reality, I've endeavoured to get a handle on what science has to say about it, and used this scientific understanding to filter any received wisdom that came my way. I've been following my nose a while now, and it seems to me that reality, and life in particular, is a queer thing indeed, of astounding depth and subtlety... and having read arseloads of scifi, I'm aware of the trap of assuming that we know most of the picture.

We know the bare bones, and we've started to flesh it out, but really, we know dick. There is so much more yet to be found out... and I'm highly interested in possible unusual ways of doing that; cheats, or hacks, if you will... that's how I regard tripping - maybe.

Consider ayahuasca: A notable and puzzling property of ayahuasca is that neither of the ingredients cause any significant psychedelic effects when imbibed alone; they must be consumed together in order to have the desired effect. How indigenous peoples discovered the psychedelic properties of the ayahuasca brew remains unknown.[1]
When asked, the Indians say the plants told them.

Sounds a bit odd, yeah? Like, 'fuck off, mate' odd. But get a load of this... I read a book by this guy Jeremy Narby a while back; in it he forks out this little theory that blew my mind. According to Narby, DNA molecules emit photons in the visible spectrum as they go about their business; apparently this is well-documented. And supposedly it turns out that 'junk' DNA, which has repeated sections, over and over for a bit, is actually an aerial for such photons, the repeating sections' wavelengths matching the photons' frequencies.

The possible implications of which... pow! Blown mind. This could be a mechanism by which one could enter certain states of mind and obtain info from without... which could be a really big deal, if proven. Certainly ayahuasca's tantalising in that regard; the indians had 20,000 plant species to choose from... that was pretty nice work. Maybe it's possible to cheat at biotech while tripping...

And/or...

The entire biosphere could actually be a massive supercomputer of EPIC scale, just like Douglas Adams said.

Awesome.

Also, in the vein of following my nose, I regard the Mandelbrot set as 'god's thumbprint' alright (pan and zoom around that fucker for a few hours - FFS), and I find the work of Alex Grey quite expressive of a perspective that tripping can make available... you'll know what I mean if this pic has any resonance for you, I guess...

[TurboZ.Dude]

Bestiality is another example where things get a bit sticky... according to utilitarians, if interspecies sex is consensual, have at it. Which could seem pretty wrong to lots of folks, of course... but I think the philosophy's that strong, I had another look at it... and yeah, I cant come up with too many logical reasons why it's necessarily bad. And if you're hung up on the issue of determining consent, don't say a word unless you're a vegetarian... Cause really, why should anyone who's prepared to subject animals to the horrors of factory farming have anything to say about it? Not that I'm a vegetarian (only in principle), or a chook-fucker, but it's an illuminating example to test a stance with...

Didn't know that was directly related to utilitarianism, I definitely don't support bestiality in any form. It seems I haven't done my homework about utilitarianism.

So in order to make more valid judgements about reality, I've endeavoured to get a handle on what science has to say about it, and used this scientific understanding to filter any received wisdom that came my way. I've been following my nose a while now, and it seems to me that reality, and life in particular, is a queer thing indeed, of astounding depth and subtlety... and having read arseloads of scifi, I'm aware of the trap of assuming that we know most of the picture.

I agree with all of this.

We know the bare bones, and we've started to flesh it out, but really, we know dick. There is so much more yet to be found out.

That's an integral part of my life philosophy.