Forum Home | Login

CS Guy

Join Date 06/2004

Faith in the Game

A synopsis of an article by Chris Wenham

Recently someone on JoeUser asked me to explain how I adopted my personal belief system. That is not a tale I wish to tell, primarily because religious debate bores the hell out of me. I don’t like trying to change other people’s beliefs, and I appreciate the same respect. I especially resent such attempts by people who came to their beliefs through inertia rather than consideration.

That being said, let me tell you that I am a mechanist, a type of atheist. That’s not an easy thing to admit in America. Especially growing up in the South. Southern Baptists are some of the most rabid soul-savers I’ve ever seen, and the idea of an atheist just seems to get their blood up.

Anyway, in an attempt to cool anyone’s blood out there I would like to present an article written by one of my favorite online writers, Chris Wenham at Disenchanted. Chris has written some of the most interesting, intelligent, and insightful articles that I have ever read. This particular one is an attempt to describe science as, hopefully, something non-confrontational.

Chris opens with an interesting discussion of the difference between knowing something and knowing the name of something. The example used is inertia. We know that "things have a tendancy to want to keep moving when they're moving, or want to stand still when they're not. This is called 'inertia', but nobody knows why it is." So often, when we are aware of something we give it a name, even if we do not understand that thing.

Chris goes on to point out that, “scientists do not wake up in the morning and say to themselves ‘how are we going to make creationists look like fools today?’” Science isn’t about that. Science is about moving towards a greater understanding, with respect towards all ideas that can be supported by certain rules. Chris imagines those rules as part of a game.

The rules of this game are straightforward, and go as follows.

1. The object of the game is to get to the other side of the game board.
2. The game board is divided into squares, but you're not told how many squares wide or long it is.
3. You can only step on a square if it has a tile on it. You can step on any tile, even if it was made by another player.
4. If you step on an empty square, or the tile you're standing on breaks, then you "fall in" and have to swim back to the nearest tile.
5. Each empty square that either borders a tile or the starting edge of the game board has a question visible on it. The questions are very simple and have single answers, such as "why does water flow downhill?" or "why can light pass through glass?" or "what is heat?"
6. The only way to make new tiles is by making-up an answer to the question.
7. A tile will only float if you can verify the answer with a reproducible test.
8. A tile can only be broken by proving the answer is wrong with a reproducible test.
9. A test can't break a tile if its results can't be reproduced, a tile can't float if the verifying test's results can't be reproduced.
10. If a tile is broken, then all tiles ahead of it that cannot be connected back to the starting edge by another continuous series of tiles will be broken as well.
11. A player is defined as someone who obeys the rules. If you stop obeying the rules you cease to be a player until you start obeying the rules again.

Chris points out that creationists want to use Faith to move to the other side of the board, without having to obey any of the rules of the game. That they fail to see that though the object of the game may be to reach the other side, but “this is not the reason for playing any more than the reason for playing Chess is to get your opponent in checkmate.” Here we see the old proverb, “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.”

In the end, Chris hypothesizes that science may eventually lead us to discover the secrets of God. And that at that time we may know something in addition to knowing it’s name.

philosophy

Locked Post

Advanced Search

Watch this post

Do not email me updates for this post Email me updates for this post

Successfully updated karma reason!

Great article CS guy....

I can only imagine what it would be like to live in the deep south of the USA... in Australia, we are pretty lucky here... no one really gives a rats hoot what kind of faith we have... as long as we are good people...

If we didn't have faith debates though, imagine how boring and peaceful the earth would be! it's almost farcical

BAM!!!

Successfully updated karma reason!

Thanks for the input Muggaz.

If we didn't have faith debates though, imagine how boring and peaceful the earth would be!

Faith debates like the Crusades or Islamic Jihad?

Successfully updated karma reason!

Interesting article CS Guy.

Do you know whether the religious followers in the South get as worked up over the idea of an agnostic or a believer in a different religion? I'm interested to understand whether (generally speaking) they are intolerant towards other beliefs or whether they have a warped belief of atheists (e.g. all atheists are satan worshippers).

I hadn't come across the term mechanist before so please correct me if my understanding is wrong. The mechanist philosophy states that the universe behaves like a giant machine, according to physical laws of cause and effect. As a result, a mechanist believes in science, logic and of things that have been proved to be true. This is obviously in contrast to a belief in a religion which requires the believers to have 'faith' because the believers don't have any proof of their beliefs; they only have feelings and experiences which confirm their belief to them. Since we have neither proof of the existance of a god nor proof of the non-existance of a god, it is isn't possible in my humble opinion to say with any certainty that a god doesn't exist.

I am therefore curious to understand why a mechanist is a type of atheist. My understanding of the word atheist is someone who denies the existence of god. Is it not possible for a mechanist to be an agnostic also - i.e. someone who believes that, at our present level of knowledge, we cannot know whether or not a God exists. As you mention at the end of your blog, Chris hypothesises that science may eventually lead us to discover the secrets of God.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Do you know whether the religious followers in the South get as worked up over the idea of an agnostic or a believer in a different religion?

My bad experiences were not with regligious followers in the South in general. I do not believe that this attitude was a characteristic of southerners. It was a specific church, the Southern Baptists, that time and time again showed intollerance. My home city, Memphis, was the seat of the Southern Baptist royalty, and I got a lot of exposure to their hypocricy and, in some cases, brain washing.

I hadn't come across the term mechanist before so please correct me if my understanding is wrong.

Steven DenBeste has, I think, the best explanation of a mechanist. For years I had held my personal beliefs, but it was only after reading several articles by Steven that I was able to give a name to them, other than athiesm. As Steven points out, grouping all athiest beliefs together is like grouping all non-whites together. There are a multitude of athiestic belief systems.

A mechanist thinks that the universe is a big machine, operating without outside interference, and that everything which happens in it is (or eventually will be) explainable entirely on the basis of the characteristics of matter and energy and the laws that describe how they behave. As such, deities are superfluous.

A mechanist doesn't claim that our knowledge is complete, and recognizes that there remain things which are unexplained. A mechanist believes that these things will be worked out in time; and that's why this is a belief and not a "fact". It isn't possible (yet) to prove that mechanism is true, and it may never be. But the evidence continues to pile up, and nothing has been found yet which seems inexplicable.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Great article! My two fave quotes from this are.....

I don’t like trying to change other people’s beliefs, and I appreciate the same respect.

“It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.”

Ahh both SO true! I'm the ame as you, I have mt beliefs and though I may respect other peoples beliefs that does not mean i want them to be pushed down my throat. If I can show them respect and understanding for believeing something I don't the leastthey can do is the same, with things like this there is no right or wrong, it's just personal choice! So many people forget to enjoy the journey, and concentrate to hard on the destination, I say enjoy the ride!

Successfully updated karma reason!

If I can show them respect and understanding for believeing something I don't the leastthey can do is the same, with things like this there is no right or wrong, it's just personal choice!

So true. I remember reading an article a while back that showed percentages of populations (I think in America) that subscribed to various belief systems. The author pointed out that athiests belonged to the majority when these percentages were taken individually. It wasn't really a valid statistical analysis, but it was kinda humorous. For example, if 14% of Americans are Catholic, that means that 86% are not. So Athiests fall in that 86%... Woo! We are in the majority for once!

While I get a chuckle out of that, it makes an important point. No matter what your personal belief system, MOST people in the world disagree with you. I think it is pure arrogance to think that your system is any more valid than those others.

Successfully updated karma reason!

No matter what your personal belief system, MOST people in the world disagree with you. I think it is pure arrogance to think that your system is any more valid than those others.

Totally agreed. It's the whole I know best attitude! really annoys me! People seem to think if you're lacking in beliefs (in their opinion) you automatically need to be educated on the subject, not the case, you just think differently, that's all!

Woo! We are in the majority for once!

Ahh, we rule, hehe!

Successfully updated karma reason!

Faith debates like the Crusades or Islamic Jihad?

Yeah - they are all much of a muchness... Ethnic/Religious cleansing in The former Yogoslavia, Russia and the Halocaust also comes to mind...

I wonder if anyone can put a number on faith related deaths throughout the history of the world... I wouldn't like to see that number... I would like to win the lottery with the equivalent amount of dollars though... I imagine it would make me very rich indeed...

I would then start a religion based on me, then we would go around killing anyone who didn't agree with the religion of Muggaz, and we would nuke Jerusalem, because it is irrelavent.

BAM!!!

Successfully updated karma reason!

I wonder if anyone can put a number on faith related deaths throughout the history of the world...

If you just consider the faith-based killings of Hitler and Stalin you are looking at a pretty gruesome number.

Successfully updated karma reason!

hmmm thats is a very insightful article...

Successfully updated karma reason!

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.

There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting and posting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!

View all recent posts

Mark all posts as read Delete cookies created by the forum Return to Top

Stardock Forums v Server Load Time: Page Render Time: