From: Digestifier To: Subject: Dead-Flames Digest #308 Dead-Flames Digest #308, Volume #48 Fri, 16 Sep 05 23:00:01 PDT Contents: Re: The War On Science (NDC) (akalaniz@hotmail.com) Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson ("donz5") Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson (Danny Caccavo) Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson (Danny Caccavo) Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson (Danny Caccavo) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: akalaniz@hotmail.com Subject: Re: The War On Science (NDC) Date: 16 Sep 2005 22:06:53 -0700 1=2E Why I say religion should be discouraged 1=2E1 The pernicious tendencies of religion and the religion dividend Beyond the history of religion as a pernicious force (e.g., inquisitions, holy wars, etc.) and beyond its continuing ability to divide (e.g., President Bush's pandering for votes by calling for a constitutional ban on same sex marriage) religion exacts a costly tax on the development of our civilization that can be measured in lives lost due to wasted resources and effort. How much time, money and effort has gone into filling the coffers of the world's smarmy Jimmy Swaggerts, the popes, and other oily religious leaders? Could not the money for building new, ostentatious churches instead be donated to cure cancer? Science does work. Childhood leukemias are now highly (above 90%) curable, whereas just 50 years ago they were nearly always fatal. (Perhaps those who advocate that intelligent design should be taught alongside evolution might begin arguing that prayer has gotten 90% effective?) Now, in all fairness, I do realize that "some" nominal amount of church money does go into cancer research and other good causes, but what fraction of it? Half? I doubt it. So let's cut out the middle man and send 100% of the cash to the good causes. Say, how about putting some of that wasted money into bettering our schools and increasing abysmal teacher salaries? Such questions as these, as there are thousands of other worthy causes struggling for cash that is otherwise squandered on religious pomp and excess, demand answers. Perhaps someone should put up billboards correlating squandered religious monies to human deaths. Moreover, to this end, since time is money, people of faith, instead of fighting to keep their eyes open during church services, should instead spend their time helping with local community problems if not global problems. Again, I recognize that some nominal amount of church time is spent on improving communities, but what fraction? Half? I doubt it. So let's cut out the middle man, and while we're at it, cut out the hypocrisy as well. Why do good members of faith X, Y or Z do their good deeds in the first place? Out of the goodness of their own hearts, or for the reward of life after death for Christians and a harem for Islamic suicide bombers? The religious, it can be argued, do good to save their own skins and the skins of those they care about whether these others want to be saved or not, e.g., the Christianization of American natives by Spanish monks. Any claimed sincerity on their part is innately questionable. 2=2E What is wrong with morality based on religion? 2=2E1 NO DOUBT there is trouble with religion This, NO DOUBT, is what religion is predicated on. NO DOUBT equals faith and conversely, and this is pernicious. Time and again history has shown that under a moral philosophy of NO DOUBT entire hordes of religiously motivated people throughout the ages, by reason of their NO DOUBT faith, become (Teutonic) Nazis, KKK members, al Qaeda members, witch burners, lynchers, homophobes, misogynists, child molesters, and other numerous types of nefarious -obes, -ists and -ers in order to raze entire civilizations, pillage, plunder, murder, maim, destroy, burn books, imprison scholars, discriminate, rape, butcher, segregate, and slowly eviscerate other peoples. And these religiously motivated people committed, and continue to commit these crimes and atrocities against humanity without a doubt in their minds for they were and are following the will of their God, NO DOUBT. 2=2E2 Does lack of religion imply degeneracy? If there is no religion, no faith in God, then what? Can there be no morality as Immanuel Kant would insist? Why does religion have to equate to morality? How many millions of atheists are there out there following the same basic morals of the faithful? Don't kill, steal, cheat, help others, etc., these morals need not have anything to do with religion. These morals, which try to hem our wanton natures, make good sense if people want to enjoy the fruits of civilization. Does the lack of religion make the enforcement of such morals impossible? Ask the millions of atheists who aren't busy butchering peoples in the name of some god. These atheists know that morality is more about self-interested actions for the net gain of both self and civilization. 3=2E Can there be alternative, less dangerous moralities? 3=2E1 Morality based on the scientific method is less arrogant and thus less dangerous The scientific method is based on doubt up to reproducibility. Cold fusion ala Fleshman and Ponds turned out to be bunk. It could not be reproduced in other labs. But to follow a scientific based morality is more than to regularly test theories and hypotheses old and new. It is to doubt everything within context. Newton's law of (scalar) gravity works well within its context, weak gravity fields namely. Experiment (the orbit of Mercury with its exposure to a stronger region of the sun's gravity field) indicated there was something not completely correct with Newtonian gravity. Einstein's general theory of relativity took care of this discrepancy between theory and observation, and we know of no experimental violations of this "new" theory. Yet we doubt Einstein's theory is complete. We expect that someday, with sufficiently advanced technology, the experiment will come that shows cracks in Einstein's general relativity-witness the ongoing 2004-2006 Gravity B probe experiment. This innate doubt of the scientific method, if we adopt it as the basis of our personal belief systems, should humble us relative to belief systems based on NO DOUBT, the insuperable height of hubris. In a hypothetical world where people shunned NO DOUBT religious faith, and instead searched for demonstrable, defendable, repeatable facts both scientifically and logically, it seems likely there would be less risk of holy war and other such crimes against humanity. These more humble people would categorize scientific observations and theories according to their applicability, testability, utility, and probability over other competing models. They would realize there can be no ultimate theory of truth, just models with certain ranges of utility. They would, hopefully, be decent people in the conventional sense of not stealing, cheating, killing, etc., and would, recognizing that humans also have innate greedy, competitive and wanton tendencies, bind themselves to secular laws designed to prevent crime and corruption for the better good of their civilization. At the very least, such people would limit their hypocrisy to helping each other out because it benefits their society and hence themselves versus helping each other out to save their souls in the name of some dangerous faith in some god that all too often leads to holy war, murder and countless other crimes and atrocities. 4=2E Must we believe in God? 4=2E1 Can't prove existence or non-existence of God-must have faith Immanuel Kant proved that we humans can't prove the existence of God. Still, he thought faith (if not proof) of God's existence made sense. He used a design type argument. If a watch needs an intelligent watch maker, then our complex world too, it seems, needs an intelligent creator. He also thought that lack of faith would make it impossible for civilization to arise-we would all be killing each other off like godless savages, like the millions of today's atheists...errr like God fearing warmongers do all the time. Kant did not consider the possibility that we humans inhabit one of infinitely many universes, with this one universe allowing for the spontaneous evolution of life from a primordial soup of chemicals. Amino acids, which can be found in meteors, when mixed up in a simulated primitive Earth environment quickly form polypeptide chains after all. In this case (infinitely many universes), we don't need an intelligent creator. This is not to say, however, that a god cannot exist. One can no more prove such an existence than non-existence. 4=2E2 Occam's razor-it's not a close shave In its simplest form, Occam's razor states that explanations should never multiply causes without necessity. When two explanations are offered for a phenomenon, the simplest full explanation is preferable. I would hope that the people of the hypothetical, non-religious world would prefer, using Occam's razor, to think of their existence as having no explanation, and of having no special purpose other than what they made of their own existence while they lived. They would be godless, and they would, hopefully, be driven to help each other out, not for eternal life, but out of the goodness of their own hearts. At least, being more realistic, I would hope that these people would help each other out to help themselves through secular laws so that they could enjoy the fruits of civilization over dwelling in caves. This is both less hypocritical than and less dangerous than having people "helping" each other out to save their souls at the peril of holy war, mass murder and other crimes and atrocities. 4=2E3 But what about salvation? Tough-when you die to die Until we figure out how to cure aging and disease, and perhaps transform ourselves into more advanced types of indefinitely long lived beings, we die, and our lives will have had no meaning other than, perhaps, the quality of our children we raised and what we contributed to the better good of humanity while we lived. Eventually, though, as Marcus Aurelius noted, even this personal meaning to our lives would fade into time immemorial. 4=2E4 The other side The alternative to believing we are nothing special via Occam's razor, is to believe we are something special in the eyes of some higher being or beings, and this pretty much requires throwing logic out the window. If the higher being is simply a more scientifically and technologically developed being, then this is the least of the illogical alternatives to believing we are nothing special. Hey! Humanity is little BloGorg's 1st grade biology experiment. Maybe this is why, given little BloGorg's inexperience, that vast portions of humanity's history has and continues to suck. If, on the other hand, we choose to have faith in a perfect, eternal, omniscient, and omnipotent god, then our logic dies. Can an omnipotent god make a burrito so hot and spicy that even it can't eat it? In Judeo-Christian-Muslim type religions we are asked to believe that God, who knew an eternity before creating us exactly what would happen after he created us, namely, that we would screw things up, will punish the wicked and reward the good. Given his omniscience, I say the wicked were condemned an eternity before they ever saw the light of day-I believe this unoriginal idea falls under predetermination. We then must conclude that the supposedly perfect creator of ALL things is the screw up. How dare it punish (typically by roasting the wicked in hell) a single human being, and demand from the rest of us that we worship it lest we suffer the same fate as the wicked? Doesn't the buck stop with IT? If so, then IT is a masochist. Given just this first step into an infinite regression of illogical absurdities, how is one supposed to reconcile a perfect creator with an imperfect system that is predetermined by ITS omniscience without just giving up basic logic and selling our souls to some sham, faith-based scheme? Then I must ask myself just why would a perfect, omnipotent, omniscient, eternal being need the worship of lowly humans? To satisfy an infinitely weak ego? In fact, a perfect, omniscient, omnipotent, eternal being is a dead lump of nothing that would have zero motivation for doing anything. Create, or do anything-but what for? IT knows the outcome, hence IT would have zero motivation. (Have you seen the old TV commercial, "been there, done that"?) Someone, countering this line, once asked me, why should I procreate? You know what the kid will do he stated in his defense of his god. The kid will breath, drink water, learn to read, etc. I procreate because I am not perfect, eternal, omnipotent nor omniscient, because sex feels good, and because it is in my genes to procreate. Moreover, as opposed to a omniscient god, I simply don't know whether my kids will become mass murderers or land on Mars. Their world will constantly change. Science will reveal whole new domains for exploration. Lacking omniscience allows for the possibility, if not the guarantee of motivation. I know that some of you who read these arguments for dropping God will cite the "father analogy" when I will point out the misery of the human condition. When you were a kid, they will say to me, and your father denied you ice cream as a punishment, he was doing it for your own good, to protect you, to teach a lesson, and so forth. As a child, you could not have understood his logic, and you probably thought he was being a bad guy for no good reason they will droll on. "He is our Father and we are His children." In response to this sloppy logic, I reply that my own, human father was not a perfect, omniscient, omnipotent, eternal being. The god being foisted on me supposedly is. This is a FUNDAMENTAL distinction people never seem to realize. My father didn't go around, from time to time, killing off-the ultimate punishment-some of his children for straying from the "true way." And, counter to those who, using the "father analogy," claim we are too pea-brained to understand God, I claim that we humans are sufficiently intelligent to question God along the lines in the paragraph above. If you are perfect, eternal, omnipotent and omniscient, then why genocide, pestilence, natural disasters and so on? I'm not arrogantly claiming we have the ability to understand this kind of god's mastery of science and mathematics. I'm asking basic questions and pointing out self-evident contradictions-like how can you condemn Hitler when YOU created him? Finally, if I'm too pea-brained to ask God questions, wouldn't I be too pea-brained to properly worship Him? To those who defend some god along the line that without bad there can't be good, that we must have bad so that we learn and appreciate things, I ask what good comes of genocide? What lesson did the annihilated peoples, the children, mothers and fathers, learn? What benefit is conferred when a five year old dies of cancer? God had to create a child to teach his parents a lesson? Or to pay for an oncologist's shiny sports car? Or God, the omnipotent, as some say, needed the kid's help in heaven? Really? The variations of the illogical contradictions of an omnipotent, eternal, perfect, omniscient god of love are countless. 5=2E Why religion and faith in God should perish 5=2E1 Religion should end because of bullets 2 thru 3, and faith in God should die because of bullet number 4. 6=2E Does killing religion and God save humanity? 6=2E1 Watch out for that meteor A non-religious humanity following a doubt-based morality is not guaranteed survival. A humongous comet may yet squash us like the bugs we are-splat! We humans, because we are innately competitive, and have difficulties with basic morality (e.g., we kill, steal, cheat, often in the name of some god) may yet treat ourselves to nuclear winter or death by advanced viral weapons. Yet, given that a scientific method based morality can be equated with DOUBT, and that religious practice can be equated with NO DOUBT, it seems reasonable to believe that a non-religious world would be a bit more stable and likely to survive than a religious world. After all, a herd mentality requires a threshold number of similarly minded initiators, if there are less such initiators there is a reduced likelihood to herd. Who do you see as more likely to cause trouble, a group of like-minded fanatics with a NO DOUBT belief system, or a tough looking group of rowdy doubting Thomases? 7=2E Is science Lily white? 7=2E1 Since I seem to be advocating scientific, doubt based morality over religious based morality, I'm certain people will point out the dark ways of science. Does science bring us evil? A-bombs? H-bombs? Hey, when was the last time we had a full-blown world war? Nuclear weapons have, so far, brought stability to world with regard to world war. We are, however, constantly having religious conflicts-witness our war against Islamic nuts replete with beautiful beheadings in the name of Allah. But back to the A-bomb, was President Truman an agent of Satan set out to deliver the handiwork of demonic scientists? History will show that fifty-nine A-bomb scientists signed a petition to President Truman asking him to instead demonstrate the bomb's power to the Japanese on a remote island. In the end, given the stiffening Japanese resistance as American forces neared Japan, many American and Japanese lives were spared thanks to Fat Man and Little Boy. Are there and have there been evil scientists? Yes. Are there and have there been arrogant scientists? Yes. Have (and do) some scientists get tempted to play God? Yes. Are there and have there been evil priests? Yes. Are there and have there been arrogant popes? Yes. Have (and do) some people of religious faith get tempted to play God? Yes. These points, picking out individuals from a population, are not THE POINT. Scientists do not make the scientific method any more than religious leaders make up religion and its well documented malpractice. Our various societies as a whole can destroy humanity through scientific means: nuclear weapons, bio weapons, or with just plain stupidity en masse. We are actually doing a nice job of destroying our world already. Do we non-scientists drive economical cars? NO WAY! We want our bigger SUVs. We waste and pollute energy with no regard to our ecosystem beyond lip service. We're okay with kissing the rainforests good-bye to fill them methane farting cows so long as beef stays cheap. We as a whole, excepting a few deranged do-gooders, generally don't push for more reasonable uses or our resources, until we are hit in our pocket books. The bottom line is that if we're going to make it, it's going to take all of us. See my article on "Some thoughts concerning law...in a post-Darwinian world of conflict, crime, social inequality at: http://www.convergingtechnologies.org/forum/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=3D39 8=2E But modern religion is truly enlightened and tolerant Some might argue that modern religions are now more enlightened. Which religions? Those practiced in Bosnia? Africa? Iraq? Or by our own homophobic president? Did President Bush, while he was pandering to homophobic voters, conclude the American constitution needs to be modified via an intellectual path, or out of religious conviction, tantamount to NO DOUBT? I saw him claim on TV that the base of great civilizations has been the union of man and woman. If my history serves, America's government is modeled after Greek and Roman states. Does President Bush not know that those toga wearing peoples had no problem with homosexuality? Does President Bush not know that as much as 10% of humanity is genetically predisposed to homosexuality according to an increasingly growing body of scientific evidence? Apparently he does not. If we are to believe in President Bush's faith in God, and not his need to pander for political support and votes, President Bush has NO god given doubt that homosexuals, as aberrant people with sinning ways, do not deserve the same legal rights as heterosexuals-never mind the point that his all-creating, all-powerful, all-knowing god created those very sinning gays. Religion, even today in a so-called "enlightened" western power, is just as vile as it ever was, and still preaching holy war. How many times has President Bush stated it is America's duty to spread freedom, which is God's gift to humanity? 9=2E Putting logic aside, can religion ever really be expected to die? 9=2E1 Religion will die Should humanity survive to evolve into post-corporeal beings, then I do believe religion will die, but I don't expect it to do so in the near future. Not until humanity-should it survive-has transformed itself into beings with indefinitely long lives will the need for religion die. So long as we live but a handful of years, the need for religion and faith in some god or other will continue to exist. Moreover, there really could be a "god gene" which we will drop when we drop our carbon-based bodies. According to Dean H. Hamer, the "god gene" could be a real, built-in engine driving our religiosity. See the book review below summarizing Hammer's ideas. 10. A call for atheist preaching In the mean time, given that religion will be with us for some time to come, we godless people must accept and tolerate those religious people among us as they accept and tolerate us. I'm not being facetious. Throughout large chunks of the world, atheists and the faithful live their lives in peace, and just as religious people have a need and a duty to save the heathens so that all may enjoy some kind of holy paradise, we godless people too must do our best to "unsave" people so that we may all enjoy a more real (Occam's razor based) reality in a safer, more stable world. We have to preach unGod and unSaving logically, as I have tried to do in this document, as well as push to get rid of religious tax exemptions, especially when priests illegally meddle in vote pandering. 11. Conclusion If we want to improve the lot of humanity, religion must fade away. Some can point to all the humanitarian good religion has done and continues to do. Though I can't prove it, I suspect that the net harm done in the name of religion far outweighs the net good it has done. A body count of saved versus killed off in the name of human gods past and present could serve as one metric among others. But how would one count those who died of cancer because decades worth of charity and time has gone to building opulent churches, making rococo clothes for popes, etc. over funding basic research? I deal with the perils and promise of both religion and poorly regulated science in my new science fiction book, Beyond Future Shock (ISBN 1419609440). See: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1419609440/qid=3D1126933559/s= r=3D8-1/ref=3Dpd_bbs_1/103-5812146-8165456?v=3Dglance&s=3Dbooks&n=3D507846 HAMER'S BOOK REVIEW REVIEW: From Publishers Weekly This book's title is more rhetorical effect than factual accuracy: Hamer, who discovered the controversial "gay gene" in the 1990s, reports that he has now found a gene that may correlate in some people with their level of spirituality-not with belief in a being we would call God or with the performance of traditional religious practices, but with what psychiatrist Robert Cloninger called "self-transcendence." This trait is a capacity to feel at one with all life and with the universe as a whole, and Cloninger measured it with personality testing. The so-called "God gene" is a particular location in the human genome known as VMAT2, which affects the brain's neurotransmitters. Hamer admits that the gene probably accounts for less than 1% of the total variance in human spirituality. The book's later chapters become still more speculative, as Hamer, a molecular biologist at the National Cancer Institute, considers the scanty evidence of health benefits of spirituality, which would make faith an adaptive evolutionary trait. Hamer emphasizes that the existence of a "God gene" would neither prove nor disprove the reality of God. However, this gracefully written book may intrigue people of all faiths-or no faith-who wonder about the ultimate connection between science and religion. Copyright =A9 Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. ------------------------------ From: "donz5" Crossposted-To: rec.arts.movies.current-films,rec.music.beatles,rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1960s Subject: Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson Date: 16 Sep 2005 22:06:55 -0700 BlackMonk wrote: >If you read it, why are you so unfamiliar with what it said? You're reverting to bullyhood again. >It bothers me when a person is attacked for something he didn't do. Oh, the irony. >It bothers me when someone judges a person based on gossip. That Mike Love is a jackass? You'll die of stress being bothered by the so many who you alone determine are wrong. >maybe you're making excuses for him because he's >your friend. It doesn't change what he posted. None of which excuses your bullying tactics against him. ------------------------------ From: Danny Caccavo Crossposted-To: rec.arts.movies.current-films,rec.music.beatles,rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1960s Subject: Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson Date: Fri, 16 Sep 2005 22:09:13 -0700 In article , "The Thurston Howller" wrote: > "macca281F" wrote in message > news:1126846390.314700.98000@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > > < > structures? His production techniques? >>Donz > > > > I was excoriated on another board for saying I felt that BW was > > overrated. His talents are indeed immense, but his consistency is > > lacking, and he certainly didn't sustain his talent for very long > > > Yeah, 1963 till 2005 is pretty lame.;) > > I don't really see his talent sustaining for that long. It pretty much petered out in the late '60s. Watching him now, I get that "David Helfgott" feeling. Sure, he has a huge band playing every note of the old recordings perfectly, and I'm glad he came back from the brink (or from over the brink) of insanity, but I sort of wish he had never "finished" "Smile" dc ------------------------------ From: Danny Caccavo Crossposted-To: rec.arts.movies.current-films,rec.music.beatles,rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1960s Subject: Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson Date: Fri, 16 Sep 2005 22:12:40 -0700 In article <1126932402.068574.109040@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>, "Touched by His Noodly Appendage" wrote: > > Mike Love is widely known to be an asshole. > > > Seconded. Regardez: > > > "The Beach Boys have continued to do, about, we did about 180 > performances last year. I'd like to see the Mop-Tops match that! I'd > like to see Mick Jagger get out on this stage and do I Get Around > versus Jumpin' Jack Flash, any day now. And I'd like to see some people > > kick out the jams, and I challenge the Boss to get up on stage and > jam." > "I wanna see Billy Joel, see if he can still tickle ivories, lemmee > see. I know Mick Jagger won't be here tonight, he's gonna have to stay > in England. But I'd like to see us in the Coliseum and he at Wembley > Stadium because he's always been chickenshit to get on stage with the > Beach Boys." ---Mike Love, HOF induction, 1988 > Sounds like John Lennon at the Troubodour Club... dc ------------------------------ From: Danny Caccavo Crossposted-To: rec.arts.movies.current-films,rec.music.beatles,rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1960s Subject: Re: NYRB on Smile by brian wilson Date: Fri, 16 Sep 2005 22:13:39 -0700 In article <1126882867.499680.322430@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, "donz5" wrote: > macca281F wrote: > > > >God Only Knows is very early though, isn't it? > > > That's an interesting point, your "very early" description. Within the > span of Brian's full career, yeah, it is very early. But it's within > the period of his greatest and most substantial musical achievements. > Which could be easily said about John and Paul as well. None of which > negates Brian's (or John and Paul's) extraordinary talent during an era > of extraordinary musical output. And it's that era that most folk > recognize over subsequent periods of their careers. > Well, that's the think. To me, that's "mid-period" Brian. "Surfs Up" and the fragments of "Smile" that ended up there is "late-period" to me. dc ------------------------------ ** FOR YOUR REFERENCE ** The service addresses, to which questions about the list itself and requests to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, are as follows: Internet: dead-flames-request@gdead.berkeley.edu Bitnet: dead-flames-request%gdead.berkeley.edu@ucbcmsa Uucp: ...!{ucbvax,uunet}!gdead.berkeley.edu!dead-flames-request You can send mail to the entire list (and rec.music.gdead) via one of these addresses: Internet: dead-flames@gdead.berkeley.edu Bitnet: dead-flames%gdead.berkeley.edu@ucbcmsa Uucp: ...!{ucbvax,uunet}!gdead.berkeley.edu!dead-flames End of Dead-Flames Digest ****************************** .