tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post2313234552155080072..comments2024-03-29T04:06:37.402-07:00Comments on Had Enough Therapy?: Liberals Denying ScienceStuart Schneidermanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12784043736879991769noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-16085523974385011562014-11-01T21:02:01.235-07:002014-11-01T21:02:01.235-07:00I am not a credentialed Scientist, but I have been...I am not a credentialed Scientist, but I have been interested in science since before I knew a word for it.<br /><br />I don't think a thinking scientist uses the word "believe" in talking about science.Larry Sheldonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12653436584890594776noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-5547047104884476272014-11-01T16:07:21.648-07:002014-11-01T16:07:21.648-07:00This is an important demonstration and Jonathan Ha...This is an important demonstration and Jonathan Haidt is a good "neutral" voice to show the blind spots on both sides.<br /><br />This week I saw a video "debate" called "End of All Religions" with Sam Harris, and Martin Marty, and American Lutheran religious scholar.<br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpeRhxymqkI<br /><br />Harris is following the ideal of "pure reason", a place he feels comfortable, so it seems obvious to him, if everyone just followed his lead, abandoned organized religion we'd be incapable of doing all the crazy things people do to other people in the name of religion.<br /><br />Martin Marty noted Harris could recognize the excesses of religious fundamentalism without acknowledging his own fundamentalism in reason and science, and he didn't mention the Nazi's but their scientists did play "perfect objective observers", doing inhumane, involutary experiments on people, totally conscience free.<br /><br />In regards to Lindsay Harold's "antiscience" claims of prochoicers, again, it's valuable to notice this sort of rationalization exists, start with a conclusion of what you want to be true, and stack as many contradictory facts, opinions, and speculations together that justify the desired conclusion, antiscience from top to bottom.<br /><br />But its also pretty easy to see why they make such rationaliations. People have to make peace with their conscience, and when one group of people considers you a murder, you have to either except you are a murder, and repent and join their team, or categorically reject their judgments, and anything that they used to support their positions, science-based or not.<br /><br />So to me this shows one aspect of why we need religion, but the thing is religions will NEVER agree on their moral limits, so you've got the same problem, people will end up picking religions that match their beliefs, or like Catholics, perhaps seek to moderate some of the absolutes by direct disobedience. But anyway, there are lots of variations of Christianity will avoid calling its flock murders for abortion. <br /><br />It is interesting to see that some religions attract people because of the purity of their positions like prolife, while others attract people because they can handle some grays, and see the individual human conscience as something we can't develop in isolation, and can't develop well in projection of other people's behavior.<br /><br />But back to science, every scientist will tell you "being a scientist is hard", and for all their biases, you can say they're the only ones seriously trying to reduce biases. And like sociology, even if there is a HUGE bias, whether feminist insprired or whatever equality doctrine, there biases will have to be corrected within, by other sociologists, who have different biases, but can learn to speak the same language, and show the contradictions.<br /><br />So for the rest of us, Liberal or Conservative, I accept when we say "science" what we really mean is "authoritarian expert" who says what we want to hear, and we don't want questioned.<br /><br />If anyone can see that in themselves, maybe we'll be a stop closer to openning our minds to our own hypocrisy.<br /><br />Ares Olympushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09726811306826601686noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-86587401180174073822014-11-01T07:25:15.524-07:002014-11-01T07:25:15.524-07:00I have found several topics on which liberals are ...I have found several topics on which liberals are very anti-science. Probably the most notable of these is the science of pregnancy and birth. In their attempt to justify abortion, they make up the most ridiculous anti-science claims. <br /><br />I have had pro-choicers tell me that human embryos are part of their mother's bodies and are being built by the mother's womb as in a factory. I have been told that when the baby separates from the mother at birth, then it's a separate organism. Maybe aliens in science fiction grow an extra set of limbs and organs and then divide to become two individuals, but humans don't reproduce that way. <br /><br />I have had people tell me that unborn children are parasites. I have had them tell me that human embryos are not humans at all. I frequently hear that if killing an embryo is wrong, then masturbation is genocide (totally ignoring the scientific fact that sperm are not human individuals and human embryos are). <br /><br />One has to wonder at the level of sheer ignorance that allows them to make such claims that contradict well-established science.Lindsay Haroldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13094965953749825163noreply@blogger.com