Reading "The Social contract" again

"When someone is brought up to command others, everything conspires to rob him of justice and reason. Great pains are taken, we are told, to teach young princes the art of ruling; but it does not appear that this eudcation does them any good. It would be better to begin by teaching them the art of obeying."

"But if, according to Plato, a born king is a very rare being- how often do Nature and Fortune combine to enthrone such a man? And if a royal education necessarily corrupts those who receive it, what must be expected of a succession of men brought up to rule?"

"...to assume in his own favour the tacit consent of those whose mouth are closed by fear and to punish those who dare to speak. It was thus that the decemvirs. having been first elected for one year, and then continued for another, tried to retain thier power in perpetuity, by no longer allowing the comitia to assemble."

"In proportion as the enlargement of the state means offering the holders of public authority more temptations and more opportunities to abuse thier power, it follows that the more power the government needs to control the people, the more power the sovereign needs, in its turn, to control the government."

RESPECT

This is another installment of reality from your friendly neighborhood critical thinker. Nathaniel was asking me about RESPECT and I realized that this is a topic that I have always wanted to write about as a humanist. Time to get started….
As with many things in life, most of us would have trouble defining respect poignantly. And yet we use it quite commonly. One of the most common confusions lies in mixing up ‘respect’ with ‘being impressed’. We often do this is our daily lives. ‘Wah…he run 2.4km so fast…respect sia.’ This cheapens the meaning of respect. You are merely impressed with his speed. You can however respect the work that he puts in to achieve that speed. The work which he would have put in to achieve that speed is worthy of respect because it speaks of nobility in action, namely discipline and mental fortitude.
When I deconstruct the concept of respect, I find that it comes in two main forms of which I will discuss below- inter-personal respect and humanist respect.

Inter-personal respect is not a given nor can it be forced. Anybody who demands respect from you and/or uses a position of authority to make you conform to respecting them often are motivated by vanity, egotism and insecurity. Respect should only be earned through noble actions in particular fields and/or character and this happens through social intercourse. Thus inter-personal respect is subjective and not all-encompassing of an individual. The reality is that an individual may be worthy of respect in one field of life but not others.

The above however does not reduce in any way humanist rights [which are universally given and an increasingly institutionalized form/s of respect] that we accord to each other as fellow equal members of the human family. We should also accord this respect to animals as humanists given that we are equal living creatures with no biological or moral superiority.
Institutionalized ‘respect’ is another facet of ‘respect’ that is a reality in everyday life. It is put in place by institutions and enforced with sanctions. Therefore it is not genuine respect. It is merely a façade and an act of submission/subjugation of one’s will in the presence and knowledge of an unequal power nexus. Therefore I did not place institutionalized respect in my conceptual understanding of ‘respect’.
In summary, we accord humanist respect to all because we acknowledge our equality. Interpersonal respect however is earned through demonstrating nobility in action and/or character. And everyday heroes who are indeed worthy of our respect are everywhere if only we carefully looked.

Critical analysis of Hamza Andrea Tzortis' lecture- Islam or Atheism. Which one makes more sense

I apologise. My shift keys are busted. Therefore I could not key in question marks in the title.

This is not a post on Islam. Hamza asks “Islam or atheism: which makes more sense?” Therefore this is a post on fallacies in critical thought. I am a proponent of critical thought and will be intellectually honest. I am not an atheist. I am a proponent of critical thought, a humanist and a naturalist. Please do not take the position of a creed against me. I have written multiple posts on multiple subjects of illogical and uncritical thought. Read my critical analysis of his talk and judge for yourself if I have wronged him by identifying the fallacies in critical thought below that he had committed. (Question everything and everyone and that includes me.)

Hamza does not understand philosophy as he so claims. Since he clearly states that he is using rationality and philosophy to prove his case, he deserves to be judged on that basis.
He states that his position is one of a rationalist. Then he should know that an asserted casual chain with no proven premise (“God exists” is an unfalsifiable claim) only shows the effect. We cannot affirm the consequent from the effect.

His argument that he is of a rationalist stand and that atheists are of an empirical stand are in ‘opposite camps’ is a terrible crime of ‘false dichotomy’. Rationalism and empiricism are mutually supportive tools of critical thought. And by delineating that empiricism is not ‘rational’ in nature is pure intellectual dishonesty.
He then attacks Dawkins personally- ad hominem- thereby emotionally getting the audience on his side before attacking Dawkin’s argument. Dawkins has done this to others before too. We should do well to always remember to avoid this human failing.

He then goes on to try to argue for immateriality of the cause which is unfalsifiable and thereby inconclusive. Once he has taken this step, he can insert any answer that he wants without any proof.

He tries to prove the logic of asking for the regression of cause to be illogical.“ The very question denies the existence of the universe.” Thereby should we not ask the question? Did this line of rational thought not give us many answers to questions in life?

'The cause must have a will.' Yet again, this is unfalsifiable and also not consistent with reality. Not all causes have wills.

"This is so in line with the Quran’s answer.' What he does not educate his audience on is that many other religions also hold this view. Therefore he is engaging in a fallacy of critical thought that is “cherry picking”.
Then he goes on to defend miracles. He states that natural laws are inductive generalisations of patterns in the universe. This is equivocation. Contrary to what he says, Natural laws are overwhelmingly consistent inductive observations of patterns in the universe.

He states that consciousness is immaterial and therefore does not have its roots in matter. This is yet again unfalsifiable. Consciousness is a complex cognitive state that we are still discovering about. Should we not be intellectually cautious and hold our judgments first before we set a cast-in-stone explanation? He says that ‘Dawkins says that he does not know.’ This is a perfectly acceptable position for a critical thinker to admit that you do not know all yet. Why does he fault Dawkins for this?

He then goes on to talk about the Quran as a linguistic miracle. But he fails to educate his audience about other religious text such as the Rig Vedas which are linguistic miracles as claimed by their believers as well. Yet again, this is ‘cherry picking’.

And his argument about the massive following of his faith thereby proving its validity is one of ad populum.

He then goes on an “Atheists have no moral basis” attack. This is the fallacy in critical thought known as “mudslinging”. He reduces the atheistic goal in life to “procreation of DNA” and commits the “straw man” fallacy in critical thought.

In conclusion, Hamza's whole premise for his argument is based on a generalisation that the position of atheists is that of empiricism thereby reducing the two camps into a falsely dichotomous state and his oppon...ent to a 'straw man' [another fallacy in critical thought] which he then proceeds to knock down. In the process, he commits many other fallacies in critical thought. Therefore his entire argument is not sound nor maximally reasonable.

Tom Harpur- Horus and Jesus

Horus preceded Jesus as a historic record by roughly 2000 years. There were 180 exact parallels between these two man-Gods. Below are some of these similarities.

Both

- were conceived by virgins
- were fathered by Gods.
- foster fathers were of royal descent.
- their births were heralded by a star, announced by angels and witnessed by shepherds.
- survived death threats when they were young.
- had missing life histories from age 12-30 and were later baptized at 30.
- their baptizers were beheaded.
- were tempted in the desert by their rivals and resisted.
- walked on water, healed the sick, revived the dead and restored sight to the blind
- were executed and resurrected.

What Jonestown can teach us

The truly honest will never shy from questions.


The truly rich (in character) will rarely speak of money.

The truly helpful will never speak of the help they give to others.

The truly powerful (in character) will have no need nor desire to ask for your loyalty.

The truly loving will never ask for your love.

I will list out below the strategies with which Rev. Jones manipulated and eventually murdered his followers. Maintain a rational level of skepticism and apply critical thought to every facet of your life.

Jim Jones started with promising beginnings and was the champion of multiculturalism in a racist era.

Upon his church’s growing popularity, he targeted the recruitment of the dispossessed, the young and impressionable, the old and the needy.

Followers gave their earnings to the church and began working for the church to support the many functions of the church. With no financial independence of their own, they became locked into the church.

He carried out psychic healing scams to earn the trust of his followers.

He transferred the moral authority/ focus of faith upon himself soon after.

Next, he put forth tests of loyalty in order to hone their confidence in their faith (in him) and weed out possible dissenters.

The church held entire families in and familial bonds prevented followers from leaving.

He isolated them geographically. Mentally, he engineered the removal of external influences and achieved monopoly of influence by bombarding them with his narrative (which his followers had to accept without question).

He had a team of loyal lieutenants who had a hidden cache of weapons. These people then went on to murder congressman Leo Ryan and forced the followers to ingest poison.

Be responsible in the public sphere as a critical thinker

 When in doubt, critically examine.

This is an external process which should be open to criticism from rational counter-agruments and draws in more sources of information for you to make a more rational decision thereafter.

I highly advocate against praying to alleviate or doubt which is internal and therefore devoid of other rational counter-arguments which would serve as test of validity for one's stand. It also does not draw upon any new sources of information. Thus these two limitations would hinder the progression towards making a more rational decision.

 

And I was quite appalled by this. You can call me an intellectual prune if you want but my logic is that since his 'personal' view which now is the public sphere, it should be presented without at least some degree of evidential support. Al...most all the claims that he makes are entirely unsupported and therefore presenting it in a schematically logical pattern gives it the false image of critical thought. And if his personal views are shared in the public sphere and if he is highly aware of the fact that he has a 'following' and an ability to influence, then it is his academic responsibility as a critical thinker to provide at least some degree of evidential support as to why he reached his personal view. So that anyone who may be influenced by his personal view has the equal academic responsibility as a critical thinker to examine the logic which culminated in his view and decide whether or not to be influenced. This will reduce the probability that anyone take his public 'private' view to inform their own position without first critically examining it.

Warm and fuzzy but Oxymoronic

Though the logic on this quote is warm and fuzzy on a first read, it fails in critical logic and theological grounding on subsequent readings. The God in question is the Christian God and it is omnibenevolent. It wants the best for mankind. It is also omnipotent. All that happens to anyone is within its control. An omnibenevolent being would never visit any physical or psychological pain on us (his creation out of love) for the sake of us knowing it as a healer, comforter and ultimately just as proof of its existence. Why does it need us to know its existence if it is omipotent? Why inflict pain upon us if it ultimate wish for us is love? Being omnibenevolent, it should possess selfless love and want what is best for us regardless of its own being. So the above line of logic is oxymoronic.

Secondly, if we interpreted the pain, sadness and imperfection in life as a test, then it makes more sense. But still,the logic fails given that an omnibenevolent being would never cause any pain....test or not. 

 

So the applicable logic then stands is that the God in question may be omnipotent and may be using the sadness, pain and imperfection in life as a test for us to hone our physical, emotional and mental strength by applying a utilitarian system of benevolence.