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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   33523 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 24, 2023

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Do you think? Modelling ideology as religion without the supernatural, the difference imo is elements the believer takes on faith - those things believed despite evidence to the contrary. Scientology has thetans etc, heaven's gate had ascension etc, Catholics have transubstantiation etc. I see the supernatural as an important distinction between religion and ideology, because it is faith in something that appears absurd to others which defines the religious believer, and in my mind the only rational justification for an absurd belief is supernatural in origin. The supernatural is inexplicable to science, and therefore it looks crazy to the non believer, but the believer has been exposed to the religion's truth, which from a natural perspective induces a folie a deux that unites the followers, or from a supernatural perspective unites them around the revealed truth. Or at least that's how I see it.

I think the problem is giving a precise and self contained definition of 'supernatural™', that anyone acting in good faith can apply objectively and determine whether a belief is supernatural or not. I think this is what you are saying, that it doesn't matter if scientologists believe that thetans are natural, if they apply your definition in good faith they will find out that they are indeed supernatural™.

You don't really give this definition of supernatural™ but you make a few examples:

  1. faith in something that appears absurd to others

  2. an absurd belief

  3. The supernatural is inexplicable to science

  4. looks crazy to the non believer

Examples (1), (2) and (4) are obviously not objective, belief in HBD appears absurd to some and vice versa and etc. Number (3) is more compelling however I have a few questions: are all unproven physical theories religion? Was relativity a religion before it was proven? In other words is the supernatural time dependent (things that were supernatural beliefs today will not be supernatural tomorrow and vice versa in light of new evidence) or is it time invariant and a lot of scientific "knowledge" is just religion?

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