[ExI] A science-religious experience

[Ben Zaiboc]

On 24/02/2025 10:49, Jason Resch wrote:
> On Sun, Feb 23, 2025, 1:52 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat 
> <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>
>     A long time ago, I came up with an idea called 'relativity of
>     importance', which has basically shaped my values ever since. Simple
>     idea, I'm sure many others have had it too. Ask yourself "what's the
>     most important thing you can think of?", then "Is there anything more
>     important to you than that?", and keep asking that question until you
>     come to a stop.
>     Then you have a list, in order, of the things that are important
>     to you.
>     Then behave in accordance with it.
>
>
> That's a nice idea!
>
> Do you think it is possible to rationally justify an ordering? E.g., 
> would you expect two superintelligences to arrive at a roughly the 
> same ordering?

Well, I'd expect each individual to come up with their own list, and 
their own ordering. It doesn't matter if they are a village idiot, an 
average human or a superintelligence. The point is to come up with your 
own list, and your own ordering. This is in keeping with the (or rather, 
my) answer to the meaning of life: You Decide.


> Einstein had a lot of insightful things to say about religion. But you 
> may not be receptive to it because of the word "religion". I share 
> this with the hope that you might consider the value in what Einstein 
> has to say here:
>
> <snip>
While I'm sure Einstein was sincere, what he says is very blinkered, and 
just reinforces my opinion that he should have stuck to physics.

The issue of competition in human societies is interesting enough, but 
this thread isn't the place to talk about it.
>
>
>     If he even really did say this. Lots of 'Einstein quotes' are
>     apocryphal.
>
>
> That's true. I checked the validity of this quote many times to be sure.
>
> It comes from his 1954 article Science and religion.
>
> https://einsteinandreligion.com/scienceandreligion.html
>
> Here is the full context:
>
> "Now, even though the realms of religion and science in themselves are 
> clearly marked off from each other, nevertheless there exist between 
> the two strong reciprocal relationships and dependencies. Though 
> religion may be that which determines the goal, it has, nevertheless, 
> learned from science, in the broadest sense, what means will 
> contribute to the attainment of the goals it has set up. But science 
> can only be created by those who are thoroughly imbued with the 
> aspiration toward truth and understanding. This source of feeling, 
> however, springs from the sphere of religion. To this there also 
> belongs the faith in the possibility that the regulations valid for 
> the world of existence are rational, that is, comprehensible to reason.
>
> I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without that profound faith. 
> The situation may be expressed by an image: science without religion 
> is lame, religion without science is blind."
>
>
> What, specifically, do you think is wrong in what he said?

All of the above. It's written from the pespective of someone brought up 
in a society where the local religion is taken seriously, as if it had 
some essential wisdom and wasn't a pack of lies designed to make people 
do what they're told by a group of other people who were originally 
clever enough and unprincipled enough to trick everyone into being 
afraid of some stuff they just made up.

It's just fundamentally wrong.

"I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without that profound faith" 
says it all. For someone who came up with two theories of relativity, it 
shows a disappointing lack of imagination.
>
>     And for me, religion is pretty much the worst way of deciding
>     on our goals. That's basically just letting some priests tell you
>     what
>     you should be doing. And we're all familiar with the tragic
>     consequences
>     of that.
>
>
> Not all religions are those told to us by priests. The belief that 
> science is the best (or only) tool for finding the truth is a belief 
> (one some might call a religion (scientism)). I think you just have an 
> impoverished conception of what religion can be.

I have a realistic conception of what religion is, in practice, in the 
main. I'm sure there are some religions which can be fairly inoffensive, 
but they are by far in the minority.

> What are your guiding principles, what is your personal ethos and 
> philosophy, what are your values, and core beliefs? These constitute 
> your own personal religion.

Philosophy, not religion. I have a personal philosophy, which I'm not 
going into here, but it's definitely not a religion. Religions, on the 
whole, are based on superstition, and are a tool for controlling people. 
I'm not going to confuse things more than they already are by calling my 
philosophy a religion.

>
>     It also implies that there are only those two options, science and
>     religion, which is far from true.
>
>
> He didn't frame it as either or, he thought both had interdependent 
> relationships.

He is only presenting those two, and not mentioning anything else, 
implying there is nothing else.

>     In my opinion, religion doesn't even belong in the realm of
>     philosophy,
>     but rather psychology (or even psychiatry). Including religion in
>     discussions about philosophy, ethics, etc., is basically
>     equivalent to
>     including homoeopathy in discussions about medicine, astrology in
>     discussions about astronomy, alchemy in discussions about
>     chemisty, etc.
>     Religion is probably the biggest con trick in all of history.
>
>
>
> Are you an escapee from an organized religion?

No.
I just actually read the bible. Then later a few other 'holy' books, 
like the Koran (vile), the book of Mormon (hilarious), and a few others.
I say "I read" as if I had actually read them all the way through, but 
that's not true. Let's say that I read enough.

> I find that tends to leave a particularly strong distaste for anything 
> religious
Then you may view me as though I was an escapee from an organised religion.

> , and a specific view of what a religion must be.

I have collected several views from examining several religions. They do 
say that atheists tend to know more about religion than most of the 
faithful. That seems to be right, from my experience.

> Based on the philosophers you referenced, I presume you believe in 
> mind uploading.
Absolutely not.

I think it's theoretically possible, and the only realistic long-term 
alternative to extinction for the human race.
I don't know if we will actually figure it out, and be able to make it 
available to large numbers of people.
I think it is desirable, and would be The Coolest Thing Ever.

But I don't 'believe in' it.

> Mind uploading is based on the idea that the continuation of 
> consciousness (i.e., survival) requires only a continuation of the 
> mind-pattern, not the survival of a particular body or brain.
>
> Therefore death of a body or brain is not death, if at any future time 
> or place that same mind pattern is brought into existence.
>
> Agree so far?

Of course.
> Now consider:
Eternal inflation, 'reincarnation', Jupiter brains, all of reality.

No, sorry.
Some of the things you say may or may not be feasible/realistic/true, 
but they are not worth my time thinking about.
Like the simulation argument, it doesn't matter to me, here, now.


>
>     Yes, I do think there 'is no god', or more accurately, 'aren't any
>     gods'. (I find that there's a rather obnoxious short-sightedness
>     (to be
>     polite, and avoiding calling it arrogance), among very many people in
>     the western world, using the word 'god', as if there haven't been
>     thousands of gods throughout human history).
>
>
> How do you know what exists (or doesn't) in an infinite cosmos, when 
> there are infinite conceptions of god, and possibly infinite universes?
I don't. I didn't say I did. I said "I think". I'm not going to base my 
behaviour on the theoretical maybe-possibility of something relating to 
possibly-infinite universes. I'm basing it on whether or not I think 
what the priests tell us is likely to be true or not. And my conclusion 
is overwhelmingly not. I'm thinking on the level of the refutation of 
Pascal's Wager and "Why doesn't god heal amputees?", not the level of 
multiverses and the omega point.

>     This is a more tricky question, because you have to define what
>     'god/gods' means. But in the traditional religious sense of the word,
>     gods simply cannot exist, unless we have our understanding of how the
>     world works totally wrong (which is unlikely, because our bridges and
>     buildings tend to not fall down, we have put people on the moon, and
>     millions of other things that depend on our scientific understanding,
>     work fine).
>
>
> There is a conception of god (in Hinduism, Sikhism, and Islam) as 
> infinite truth. Most mathematicians are platonists and therefore would 
> acknowledge the existence of such a god.
>
> There is a conception of god (in Hinduism) as all of reality. Anyone 
> who believes in a reality of any kind, necessarily believes in such a 
> notion of god.
>
> There is a conception of god (in Hinduism and in Buddhism) as all of 
> conscious. Those who believe in the existence of consciousness also 
> implicitly believe in such a god.
>
>
> It's only when one artificially restricts notions of god to bearded 
> men in the sky, who care about what people do in their bedrooms, or 
> storm gods that shoot bolts of lightning in anger, that we can so easy 
> dismiss them as silly.

I'm fine with people believing in those more abstract 'gods', if they 
want to. It's not my thing, but as long as they leave me alone, I'll 
leave them alone.

It's precisely the beardy-in-the-sky gods that most people who are 
believers, believe in, that are the problem. Those are the gods who want 
to tell you who you can have relationships with, what you can eat and 
wear, who you should be trying to kill, and which version of hell you 
should be so afraid of that you'll do anything the priests tell you to 
do to avoid it.

And it's the worshippers of those gods that will do all they can to 
infiltrate your government, your schools, your systems of justice, 
subvert your news, corrupt and terrify (not to mention rape and 
otherwise abuse) your children, steal your money, stifle progress and 
dissent, and control your life.

Yes, I know that not all religions are like that.

But consider this: Which person do you think you should be more 
concerned about, the slightly batty old lady who thinks fairies are 
real, or the raving lunatic who has an automatic rifle and thinks that 
anybody who even looks slightly gay needs to be 'taught a lesson' 
(meaning: killed)?

> Here are words of another thinker you like:
>
> "Evolution moves towards greater complexity, greater elegance,..

Well, nobody is right all the time, and in this, Kurzweil is flat-out 
wrong. He's not a biologist, so we can perhaps cut him some slack, but 
evolution emphatically does not 'move towards greater complexity' etc. 
Evolution is completely blind to whether it results in more, or less 
complexity (otherwise we wouldn't have cave fish or viruses, for 
example). The other things he mentions are of a different kind (apart 
from intelligence, I think), in that they are not objective, they are 
concepts in human minds, and only tangentially related to evolution.

> ...greater knowledge, greater intelligence, greater beauty, greater 
> creativity, and greater levels of subtle attributes such as love. In 
> every monotheistic tradition God is likewise described as all of these 
> qualities, only without limitation: infinite knowledge, infinite 
> intelligence, infinite beauty, infinite creativity, infinite love, and 
> so on.

Which completely removes it from reality as we know it, therefore it 
becomes irrelevant, and more importantly, not real.

> Of course, even the accelerating growth of evolution never achieves an 
> infinite level, but as it explodes exponentially it certainly moves 
> rapidly in that direction. So evolution moves inexorably towards this 
> conception of God, although never quite reaching this ideal."
> -- Ray Kurzweil in “The Singularity is Near” (2005)

Ok, so he's using the concept of god as a metaphor. Fine.

> Here are words of the physicist who invented the quantum computers:
>
> "In the final anthropic principle or if anything like an infinite 
> amount of computation taking place is going to be true, which I think 
> is highly plausible one way or another, then the universe is heading 
> towards something that might be called omniscience."
> -- David Deutsch in “The anthropic universe” (2006)

Again, fine. Something that might be called omniscience. In the far far 
distant future. If you want to define that as a 'god', ok, none of my 
business. As long as it doesn't want to roast me for 'an eternity' for 
not taking seriously the idea that somehow I'm responsible for something 
my great-great grandfather did, and need to not only apologise for it, 
but give up eating peanut butter sandwiches for the rest of my life.

>
>     I simply don't know if there are universes beyond this one.
>
>
> The evidence is really overwhelming.
Ok, if you say so. I'm probably not qualified enough, or intelligent 
enough, to evaluate the evidence. Not to mention not really that interested.
>
>     I don't even
>     know how to properly define this universe. 
>
>
> I would define it as a a connected domain of causal interaction. But 
> you're right it gets complicated when we consider the various kinds of 
> horizons, and even moreso when we consider the ability for universes 
> to simulate one another.
Ok then.

>     I don't know why you say these are all in the realm of religious
>     ideas.
>
>
> They're all ideas related to fundamental philosophical assumptions 
> (i.e. beliefs) which further can't be empirically proven or disproven.

philosophical assumptions which can't be empirically proven or disproven 
are not the same thing as beliefs. Try asking any christian (or better 
still, muslim) about their 'assumptions' about their god, or their prophet.


>
>
>     Only the first two relate to religion, in that without it the
>     questions
>     wouldn't even exist, but they are still amenable to thinking
>     logically
>     about them, and coming to reasonable conclusions.
>
>
> I believe all these ideas are amenable to logical thinking.

So do I. Ergo: not religion. Do you think that transubstantiation, the 
holy trinity, original sin, immortal souls, the infallibility of the 
pope, just to pick some examples from the most familiar religion in the 
west, are amenable to logical thinking?

-- 
Ben
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