[ExI] A science-religious experience

Fri Feb 21 05:44:21 UTC 2025

On Thu, Feb 20, 2025 at 8:35 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat
<extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Feb 20, 2025, 11:00 AM Keith Henson via extropy-chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>
>> The meta-level question is why humans have religions at all.
>
> Religions are just collections of ideas/beliefs.

Both are memes provided they make the jump from one mind to another.
An idea or belief that is not passed on fails to meet the definition
of a meme.  (A replicating information pattern.)

> One needs beliefs to operate rationally in the world. To decide and set goals for what one should try to optimize for in their life or for the greater world.

And what is the point of optimizing?  By the standards of evolutionary
psychology, it is to survive and pass on your genes but also see
Hamilton's inclusive fitness.

> To act, according to the belief, while not being able to prove, that other humans are conscious, or that unnecessary suffering is bad and should be avoided when possible. etc. Without beliefs such as these there is no rational basis for any goal.

A woman who has been violently captured from one tribe to another has
no conscious goals.  (See the account of Patty Hearst.)  Her behavior
is the result of low-level wired-in programming.  See
https://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Capture-bonding

> Note that science never offers beliefs, nor does it proscribe any goals. Beliefs must be acted upon with a presumption that they are true. Science can provide evidence, but never justifies the acceptance of a belief as true.

That's the ideal.  I was just today quoting a horror story about the
belief of "scientist" John Money.
https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/david-reimer-and-john-money-gender-reassignment-controversy-johnjoan-case

> The most rational person sees science as a tool to refine one's religion, as a never ending pursuit of truth.

My worldview was reorganized in the early 2000s to incorporate
evolutionary psychology.  In the view of that field, all human
behavior has either been directly selected or is a side effect of
something that was selected.  The human trait of being infected with
religion is not an exception.  I don't think it was directly selected
but is a side effect of selection for wars.  You may be able to find
an argument for the trait of religious susceptibility directly
improving genetic survival but the Children's Crusade shows the
opposite.

Keith

> As Einstein put it: "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."
>
> Jason
>
>>
>> I think I know, but it is almost impossible for most people to understand.
>>
>> Humans seem to have a bias against too much insight.
>>
>> Keith
>>
>> On Thu, Feb 20, 2025 at 7:43 AM efc--- via extropy-chat
>> <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On Wed, 19 Feb 2025, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote:
>> >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > On Wed, Feb 19, 2025 at 12:05 PM BillK via extropy-chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>> > >       On Wed, 19 Feb 2025 at 16:32, Darin Sunley via extropy-chat
>> > >       <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>> > >       >
>> > >       > " This offers a solution to the problem of evil. Infinite computational gods can't destroy or change what is out there
>> > >       already, but they can provide continuation paths (afterlives) for those beings after they cease to exist in their
>> > >       universe."
>> > >       >
>> > >       > This is the most elegant argument for deism I've ever heard.
>> > >       >
>> > >       > On Wed, Feb 19, 2025 at 6:10 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>> > >       >> Computational capacity provides only the power to explore and create (or rather, rediscover what already is in the
>> > >       infinite reality). Computational capacity doesn't enable one to destroy other universes which already are.
>> > >       >>
>> > >       >> This offers a solution to the problem of evil. Infinite computational gods can't destroy or change what is out there
>> > >       already, but they can provide continuation paths (afterlives) for those beings after they cease to exist in their
>> > >       universe.
>> > >       >>
>> > >       >> Jason
>> > >       >> _______________________________________________
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >       Yes, but it's a pity that Gods don't exist.
>> > >       It’s a divine evasion for the gods. ‘Don’t hold us accountable for
>> > >       engineering suffering in the first place! We’ll compensate by granting
>> > >       you paradise once you’re dead.’ What a generous bargain!
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > What can complicate these discussions is that there are two kinds of things here, each of which has variously been called "god" by
>> > > different religions in different contexts:
>> > >
>> > > 1. All of Reality (e.g. Nirguna Brahman, Divine Ground of Being, God the Father) - that which is responsible for the existence of all
>> > > universes (e.g., the set of all program executions existing in arithmetical truth)
>> > > 2. The Great Programmer(s) (e.g. Saguna Brahman, Demigods, Personal Gods, The Simulators, God the Son) - are omnipotent over their
>> > > creations (e.g. their computer simulations over which the programmer has complete access and control)
>> > >
>> > > It's been said that the material universe is where God has lost control:
>> > >
>> > > "Matter is the border of the universal mind of the universal person that the universal (Turing) machine can't avoid to bet on when
>> > > looking inward and intuiting the gap between proofs and truth.
>> > > This entails two processes: the emanation of God into Souls and Matter, and the conversion of the Souls, using Matter to come back to
>> > > God (which is a sort of universal soul attractor)."
>> > > -- Bruno Marchal
>> > >
>> > > So if you are looking for who to blame for evil, it would be the "type 1" God which you can equate with all of reality -- a reality
>> > > that is infinite and comprehensive, and necessitates that all possible universes exist. There is much evidence for this type of
>> > > reality, it can be proven constructively by anyone who presumes arithmetical truths like "2+2=4" exist independently of the minds who
>> > > think them or material particles that instantiate them.
>> > >
>> > > Type "type 2" personal gods have their own will and discretion regarding what universes to simulate, how to engineer afterlives,
>> > > which beings to save, etc. But they can no more override what exists in all of reality, any more than they could delete the fact that
>> > > 2+2=4.
>> > >
>> > > You could poetically say God's omnipotence doesn't override his omniscience. There is no power to forget for a mind that knows
>> > > everything, including the knowledge of what it is like to be any of the beings that suffer or experience evil. Moreover, for the type
>> > > 2 gods to find the beings to save, they must still simulate the universes where bad things happen. You, in your current state (as
>> > > well as everyone in our future lightcone) wouldn't exist if WW2 didn't happen, we either would never have been born or would have a
>> > > brain with different memories. So would it be better for WW2 to have never happened, if it meant the non-existence of everyone who
>> > > now lives, and and will live in the future of the history of life on earth? Remember the set of all universes contains all possible
>> > > histories of the multiverse, so the people in the WW2-happened-branch exist along with the WW2-never-happened-branch. The naive
>> > > approach to addressing the problem of evil is to prevent bad things from happening, but note that in so doing, requires wiping out
>> > > all the inhabitants of any universe-branch where something unfortunate happened. Does the goodness of all those people in that
>> > > universe outweigh that one unfortunate thing to be avoided? The question becomes more complicated under the light of the true cost of
>> > > correcting an evil.
>> > >
>> > > Jason
>> >
>> > Another way is to deny the existence of objective email, and affirm our
>> > opinion about events. Sometimes our opinions align, sometimes the opinions
>> > of the majority align, sometimes the opinion changes. At the end of the
>> > day, we have particles, which is not something you can read "evil" into._______________________________________________
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