After forcing myself to write "My Book" parts 1 through 3, I find that I do not like the way it is going, I do not like the whole tone of the thing. So I fret a bit, feel worthless, than decide to change it to a way I prefer.
I shall no longer provide links to previous posts of this series. They will be titled "My Book Part x"
and will be labelled "my book", so anyone wishing to follow this will just have to search on the label. Otherwise it takes too much of my time.
I must say that at this point, it is my time that is important. I need to get it right. Nobody comments on my posts anymore (not complaining... observing) so I have to write, edit, and so on, and I can't spend time printing out links.
First, I hate the term "belief system" and always thought it to be a pseudo-science term and formed on some misbegotten analogy with computer expert-systems. I am going to drop it like a hot potato.
As I have mentioned, the only time I deal with anything remotely resembling a "belief system" is when I am personally intimately involved with some investigation upon which I am focused and am trying to find an answer to some puzzle.
Other than that, I do not have any "Belief System" (capitalized or uncapitalize).
I do not really "believe" in the Theory of Evolution. I am not a student of the natural sciences. If I were in a bar and the discussion were to turn to "Evolution or Genesis?", I would probably choose the pro-evolution side 50% of the time and the pro-Genesis side 50% of the time. If one of the sides had a preponderance of the ladies present as supporters, that fact would skew the probabilities somewhat.
As I have mentioned, I do not "believe in" God.
I expect God.
Does any atheist wish to argue about my expectations? That would indeed be a fruitless argument, and I would ignore any attempt to argue the basis of my expectations, for I do not do apologetics.
"Belief system" tends to ignore the individual believer, which again is an attempt to simplify a complex situation, making an intelligent person's history a reduction to reams and reams of statements about beliefs.
It is a lousy concept.
Second, my emphasis on science versus other disciplines as having a robust process of verification seems to me to be very ill-conceived.
Most of the world's major religions have lasted quite a long time and they do have their dogmas and credos and these winnow the wheat from the chaff, thank you very much, and have been succesful at it.
Living at the times we do, we tend to focus on science because of its achievements. Within a little more than 100 years humanity has gone from a small planet in a small galaxy to a small planet in an astoundingly large universe... if not multi-verse.
Most of our immediate impressions and concepts tend to be sciencey.
It is only since 2008 that many people have begun to understand the place of the irrational in economics, for example; that we stand not in the stasis of supreme rationality, but upon the edges of chaos.
Science has a verification procedure that depends upon a set of physical properties that are subject to experiment.
This fact makes it different from other knowledge, which have their own verifications based on different things. Just as Science is superior in building spaceships, Religion is superior is superior in the spiritual realm of humanity.
However, remember that right now there is considerable concern and discussion in science circles about theories which do not seem capable of experimentation. There is a discussion about the very nature of Science.
I do believe that Experiment - the scientific verification process - provides the dynamo which has fueled scientific progress, which is then part of a loop that re-enforces itself.
All knowledge has feedback loops. There is action followed by result; if the result is "good", it re-enforces the whole process, whether we talk about science or religion or politics. However, the inputs that energize the process are different. Science has experimental inputs. Other knowledge has other inputs.
And it is the Inputs that are interesting, the sources of energy.
What is the input into a group of people who read
Heaven Is For Real (HIFR) and makes them accept it as true?
Southern Baptists have spoken against these heavenly jaunts and discountenance them. So does the Catholic Church and I feel that if I were to bring it up in a classroom in Qum it would be frowned upon.
The propositions of HIFR are being subjected to verification procedures.
Some accept it, some don't.
What are the energy inputs of the accepting group that makes them differ from their parent group in accepting the truth of propositions as are in HIFR? To make this "break" - although it may not be a radical break - there has to be some impulsive energy.
What is it?
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