Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.


Sunday, June 29, 2014

Believers Say the Darndest Things: The Argument from Definition


Elsewhere I’ve written about the tendency of religious believers, such as occultists, to mistake the idea of absolute knowledge for actual, tentative knowledge (read all about this subject here).

We can see this tendency clearly when religious believers turn to the argument from definition to defend their stupid beliefs. In this argument, they confuse their idea of a word’s definition (or, rather, what they think a word’s definition should be) with the way that the word is actually used.

It is useful to recall that dictionaries don’t create meaning. They record usage. Language is a living thing, evolving over time. As an obvious example, the word “gay” no longer means what it did a hundred years ago. In fact, the word “gay” often does not have the same meaning that it had even twenty years ago: in some idioms, “gay” has become a pejorative largely disconnected from literal homosexuality (a point amusingly illustrated on The Simpsons when Nelson’s friends declare, upon seeing him kiss Lisa, “Dude, you just kissed a girl! That’s so gay!”).

Let’s use the distinction between the current usage of this word and its denotation. Let's say a religious believer’s child tells him, “Dad, I’m gay. I’m attracted to members of the same sex.” I can pretty much guarantee that nobody in that situation would respond, “No, you’re not! It says in the dictionary that ‘gay’ means ‘happy,’ so therefore you can’t be attracted to members of the same sex!”

Obviously, no one is stupid enough to say that. Yet strangely, when the word in question is “atheism” or “materialism,” the same people who would never dream of making the above dumb response make even dumber responses.

This post looks at the stupidity created by the argument from definition and how believers use it in their quest to pay attention to their ideas about reality instead of reality itself.


 

It’s no secret that atheists are in the extreme minority and have been throughout history. That means that pretty much all dictionaries were written by believers, who got to define the word “atheism” as they saw fit.

Most dictionaries define atheism something along the lines of “The belief that there is no God.” Some dictionaries even phrase it something like “The denial of God” (a definition that, obviously, assumes that there is such a being). An older, archaic meaning, included in some dictionaries still, is “immorality.”

Yet a point that I have made again and again on this blog is that atheism is not a belief. It is the lack of a belief in gods. In the same way, materialism is the lack of a belief in worlds other than the material.

This is how practically all atheists and materialists, with whom I am acquainted, use those words. It’s irrelevant whether some dictionary or another defines these words as beliefs. Most people who call themselves atheists or materialists don’t use the word to signify a belief. They use it to signify the lack of a belief.

This isn’t just some semantic game, either. There’s a huge practical difference between “I believe there are no gods” and “I lack belief in gods.”

As an example that might be easier to grasp, consider a coin flip. If you flip a coin and conceal the result from me and then ask me if I think it’s heads, there’s a huge difference between “I believe it’s not heads” and “I lack the belief that it’s heads.” The former statement is a declaration that I am convinced, somehow, that the coin is not heads up and is therefore tails. The latter statement simply affirms that I have not been convinced that it’s heads, and it tells us nothing about what I think of the claim that the coin is tails. I might equally lack belief that the coin is tails (which, in that situation, I would).

But very often, in discussions with religious people, they try to tell me what I *must* believe as an atheist. They make arguments like the following:

An atheist is someone who says he KNOWS FOR SURE that there is no god! So if you’re an atheist, then you must have absolute knowledge of the universe! Do you know everything about the universe? Of course you don’t! So your position is dumb! Checkmate, atheists!

This is a common believer script: the believer uses one particular definition of a word to tell the non-believer what the non-believer *must* believe, and then the believer argues against the definition instead of what the non-believer actually says.

Over on the Thelemic Fruitcake Factory (also known as The Temple of Thelema Forums) a poster who calls himself “Aion” gives us a striking example of this stupid argument [Note: this is the guy who used to call himself “Bereshith” and then “Legis” for a while. I'm kind of hoping his next name will be "Dumbass Formerly Known as Bereshith"]

On a discussion thread about materialism, he said the following:

I admit the weaknesses of my own argument and point to the unadmitted (or unknown) weaknesses of [Los’] own [argument]. Both perspectives have weaknesses. This is nothing new to me.

Although I readily agree that Aion’s stupid arguments have weaknesses, I correctly pointed out in the thread that he never “point[s] to” any weaknesses in my arguments. He just baldly asserts that such weaknesses exist without ever even naming them.

In response, Aion says to me that “it is worthless to attempt to suggest your axioms to you” because “you are either unfamiliar with the logical foundation of your own position, or you are refusing to own it and say it yourself as the result of a defensive posture.”

He further states that “I have far more respect for real, actual Materialists than I have for your partially understood, almost entirely rhetorical jumble of an argument.” And he follows this up by saying “you have not studied the philosophical grounding of your epistemology at all.”

In other words, this “Aion” character defines materialism as involving the acceptance of certain axioms, and instead of actually dialoguing with me about what my position actually is, he simply insists that I must accept whatever axioms he’s talking about if I’m a materialist. If I don’t accept those axioms, then I therefore am no true materialist.

As we can clearly see, this buffoon is paying attention to his ideas about what words must mean and what a “materialist” must believe – his attention is on his ideas about definition, not on reality.

Of course, I don’t know what “axioms” he has in mind because he refused to state clearly what he thought the “logical foundation of [my] own position” actually is. Probably he was just talking out of his ass, as usual, and knew that I would humiliate him once again if he tried to clarify his gibberings.

The kicker, though, is this post, where he posts an actual *script* for how he wants our conversation to go:

This is how the conversation you are attempting to avoid goes:

 

"Only that which is detectable may be said to be real."

"Can things that are not matter or energy be detected?"

"No. There is insufficient evidence for anything that is not detectable as matter or energy."

"So, only matter and/or energy are able to be detected?"

"Yes."

"So only matter and/or energy may be said to be 'real.'"

"Yes."

"But only matter and/or energy are detectable by that standard."

"Yes."

"So only that which is detectable (matter and/or energy) may be said to be real (matter and/or energy)."

 

= "Only matter and energy may be said to be matter and energy."

 

= "Only the material is material."

 

 

Closed logical loop.

 

 

And there we have it, folks. A literal believer script, delivered from the mouth of a believer. This kid has in his head an idea of how the conversation is supposed to go, based on his definition.

I’ve noticed that most religious believers have scripts that they follow, but never until this post has one actually done me the courtesy of spelling out what the script is. Who needs to go through the trouble of demonstrating a flaw in your opponent's thought process when you can just use your definition of his position to reason out what his thought process must be and then craft that thought process as a circular argument?
Good ol' argument from definition. It sure beats critical thinking, eh?
Another example of the argument from definition appeared on some blog where a guy who calls himself “Acratophorus” (Jesus Christ, what is it with these weirdos and their bombastic names?) insisted that materialism is a belief.

I objected that I’m a materialist, that I use the word to signify that I *lack* belief in worlds other than the material, that the material world obviously does exist, and that the burden of proof lies with the one who claims that something *more* than the material world exists.

For my patient troubles to educate him, this “Acratophorus” dingbat repays me by telling me that “most modern materialists don’t really understand the genealogy of their own belief system” (echoing Aion above), that the people I know who use “materialist” in the way that I do must not be very smart, and that I’m “stinking up his blog” with my ideas.

You notice, of course, that he never responds to the point that he has a burden of proof that he has not met.

If he wanted to, he could give an argument for why he doesn’t have a burden of proof in this case. Or he could accept that he has a burden of proof and provide evidence. He doesn’t do any of that – he just shuts down the conversation on the grounds that I’m not using his preferred definition.

Could it be that…he’s incapable of responding to the points that I raised? If so, finding the flimsiest excuse for dismissing my points does seem like a pretty strategic move on his part.

You’ll notice that in these examples, the believers are not interested in engaging with the actual arguments. They’re content to remain in a meta-argument, arguing about the process of arguing – and trying to make things fit their preconceived definitions – in the hope that we’ll all forget about the actual argument and their inability to address it.

One final example. This one comes from a blog post I stumbled across the other day, one about science, religion, and Thelema (an intersection of topics that is right up my alley). It was posted by an "Izi Ningishizidda," and I have no idea who that is.

Unfortunately, the post is literally insane. She ends up arguing that “Homo sapiens sapiens is getting very close to extinction. […]  We have a few years, at the most, before human life ends,” and that in the present “Aeon” what is “actually going to happen” is not “that far off” from the future depicted in the Terminator films, complete with “Killer robots, dystopian patriarchy and motorcycle gangs” (and here I thought Skynet wasn’t going to become self-aware for a while yet….). Luckily, Ningishizidda assures us that this grim future “could be a good thing for Homo sapiens sidus (the term I coined to refer to the emerging subspecies of star humans who don’t quite have all of their genes together yet)”

Ah, yes, the star humans. Hooray for them, I suppose.

So anyway, the article is completely loopy, and spending much time addressing it would just be dignifying it way beyond the level that it deserves. But it takes an interesting twist on the argument from definition, one that is worth mentioning here.

Ningishizidda disingenuously quotes Carl Sagan, making sure to put these words in large letters:

“An atheist has to know a lot more than I know. An atheist is someone who knows there is no god. By some definitions atheism is very stupid.” – Carl Sagan

Then Ningishizidda says this: “at least Carl Sagan declared atheism as “stupid””

And, of course, Ningishizidda has totally and completely missed the point. In that quote, the famous atheist Carl Sagan is discussing one particular definition of “atheism.” To take that and to try to spin it as some assault upon not-believing-in-gods as a whole is to miss the substance and to focus  instead on the words.

Sagan is precisely right in that quote. There are “some definitions” of atheism that are stupid. For example, to define atheism as "Absolute knowledge that there are no gods whatsoever" is absurd, for the simple fact that nobody can have absolute knowledge of anything.

Luckily, practically no atheists define the word this way.

Sagan, of course, famously did not believe in any gods or the supernatural. Ann Druyan's discussion of her life with Sagan – and how their rejection of supernatural claims like the existence of an afterlife enriched their appreciation of their relationship – is authentically moving:

When my husband died, because he was so famous and known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me-it still sometimes happens-and ask me if Carl changed at the end and converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage and never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don't ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But, the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief and precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive and we were together was miraculous-not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance. . . . That pure chance could be so generous and so kind. . . . That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space and the immensity of time. . . . That we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me and it’s much more meaningful. . . . The way he treated me and the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other and our family, while he lived. That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday. I don't think I'll ever see Carl again. But I saw him. We saw each other. We found each other in the cosmos, and that was wonderful.

This is a beautiful sentiment, and the way that supernaturalists try to co-opt Sagan's words to make it sound like he's criticizing non-belief in the supernatural is absolutely disgusting. People who use Sagan's quote in this way should be ashamed of themselves.

Like a lot of people, Sagan simply wasn’t comfortable with the word “atheist” as a label for himself, mistakenly thinking – perhaps encouraged by those dictionaries I mentioned earlier – that atheism is some absolute belief.

It’s not. Sagan was an atheist, just like everyone else who doesn’t believe in gods. Atheism, as I’m using it, is not a claim to absolute knowledge but a statement that one is unconvinced of god claims.

As we step back from the examples I’ve given – three loons in the loony-toon conference that is the world – we can see that all of them are more interested in words – in their ideas about what words must mean – than in engaging with actual arguments.

And this, of course, should be expected. If they made a sincere attempt to engage with the arguments and if they employed a shred of intellectual honesty, they wouldn’t be able to hold onto their delusive beliefs for long. But for the time being their delusions are safe, guarded from critical analysis by their focus on ideas about reality instead of reality itself, manifesting in this case in the ever-popular believer script called the argument from definition.
So the next time you're having a discussion with someone, ask them what they mean and respond to what they say, not what you think they have to say in order to accord with your preconceived ideas. Pay attention to what they're saying -- to what is -- and not to the world that only exists between your ears.

25 comments:

  1. Wait... you're citing a blog post that you pre-qualify as bat-shit insane as your example of how "supernaturalists" mis-quote Sagan in order to mis-define "atheism"? Talk about reaching for the low-hanging fruit. If you want to make a solid case against the argument from definition, you might want to make sure you're not guilty of it yourself regarding the term "supernaturalist".

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    1. Wait... you're citing a blog post that you pre-qualify as bat-shit insane as your example

      Yep. To be fair, though, I would probably classify nearly all religious people I quote as varying degrees of insane.

      Talk about reaching for the low-hanging fruit.

      It is indeed easy to refute the arguments of the religious. But someone’s got to do it, and since I find it fun – and since there’s no end of bad arguments being made in public – I do.

      Incidentally, being entertaining about refuting their arguments isn't easy, though I might make it look easy, for all I know.

      If you want to make a solid case against the argument from definition, you might want to make sure you're not guilty of it yourself regarding the term "supernaturalist".

      If you think I’ve made the argument from definition, feel free to demonstrate it with a specific example.

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    2. In the discussion thread about materialism from which you above quote Aion/Legis, his first post in that thread elaborates on two different uses of the word "materialism", how they compare and contrast, and why he finds one to be more useful and applicable to his own thinking while he finds the other to be limiting and detrimental.

      In that post, he labels himself a materialist.

      Your response was to post a link to your introductory post on this blog which defines the term in one way only (the second), and then proceed to ignore anything that conflicts with or contradicts your own usage.

      By painting Aion as a "supernaturalist believer" because his understanding and application of materialism doesn't match your own is textbook argument by definition. Just because it comes from your own writing and not a dictionary does not change that fact.

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    3. By painting Aion as a "supernaturalist believer" because his understanding and application of materialism doesn't match your own is textbook argument by definition.

      Setting aside any objections I might have to the way you characterize the conversation on that discussion thread, there’s a much bigger problem: you don’t seem to be grasping what the argument from definition is. The argument from definition is not the act of labeling someone in a given way. The argument from definition is the act of attributing assumptions or arguments to a person, which the person did not make, based on some definition rather than based on what the person says.

      If I called that poster a “supernaturalist” somewhere – I don’t recall if I called him that on the thread – that’s an act of labeling, not an argument from definition.

      If you can find a specific post where I attribute an assumption to him because he’s a “supernaturalist” and because supernaturalists must hold that assumption, then that would be an argument from definition.

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    4. Fair enough. Your encyclopedic knowledge of logical fallacies has caught me out. You are not guilty of argument from definition. You are guilty of casual mis-labeling.

      Better?

      The search has, however, caused me to read through the full thread you reference above. Wow. You really do have a blind spot the size of Jupiter. I wish you luck in seeing that some day.

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    5. Fair enough. Your encyclopedic knowledge of logical fallacies has caught me out. You are not guilty of argument from definition. You are guilty of casual mis-labeling.

      Better?


      Yes, that is better. It’s productive of you to concede this point because it makes it clear that you don’t think I’m incorrectly attributing assumptions. It tells us that what you take issue with instead is whether a label that I use is the most appropriate one in this context.

      As I said, I don’t recall whether I called Bereshith a “supernaturalist” in that thread, but I’ll be happy to call him one now. I think it’s a useful label because the guy is on record as saying that he thinks that the universe itself is “conscious” in some unspecified way and as saying that he thinks someone he knows was possessed by a demon. There’s another thread where, if I’m remembering correctly, he defends the existence of disembodied “Secret Chiefs.”

      I say that “supernaturalist” is a useful label for someone who espouses ideas like these and that “materialist” would be an extremely misleading label to apply to a person who expresses these ideas. What he chooses to call himself is irrelevant because what we’re talking about is which label is most useful to call him based on what he actually says.

      Now you could, if you want to, try to present a cogent case for “supernaturalist” not being a good label in this context, and we could have a back-and-forth about that and maybe come to an agreement. But what we’d be discussing is labels, not the assumptions that underlie his arguments.

      The search has, however, caused me to read through the full thread you reference above. Wow. You really do have a blind spot the size of Jupiter. I wish you luck in seeing that some day.

      You’re continuing the fine, empty tradition of claiming that there are flaws in my position without ever bothering to identify what those flaws are.

      If what you say is correct, then you should be able to point out this “blind spot,” make a cogent case for it, and defend your case against objections.

      I strongly suspect you will not do this, but I would (as always, in any subject) be delighted to be proven wrong.

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    1. What makes you call me a New Age religionist, Ian? Or is this blog post some sort of internet safe-zone for tossing around unsubstantiated labels in hopes that their targets won't bother to respond?

      "I strongly suspect you [have no evidence of this claim], but I would (as always, in any subject) be delighted to be proven wrong."

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    1. kas, I could go through what you wrote above point-by-point to show how each and every bit of it is either a conscious or subconscious misreading of what I wrote due to your preconceived notion of me as some sort of "New Age religionist" but what's the point, really? Your writing demonstrates that you're not interested in thinking deeply about any of this and thinking deeply is the only thing I am interested in.

      I do, however, take issue with the statement: "in your writings there are very strong overtones of wanting to believe in fairies and elves…" I take great pains in coming at these issues with a sense of detachment, analyzing what is in front of me as it is presented and I'm frankly tired of being painted with this libelous brush under the assumption that these baseless accusations will just continue to float out there in the aether, subtly coloring others' opinions of me.

      So I'm calling you out this time. Show your cards. Everything you've written above is horses*#t but this is the one with which I take offence. Present your evidence that my writing shows strong overtones of wanting to believe in fairies or elves (I'll give you the option) or retract it as the utterly baseless slander that it is.

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  5. @GE,
    I deleted that post off the internet for your convenience. I want to be clear I am not attacking you but just trying to challenge your views as part of a discussion. I see that you desire to be taken as a sceptic and I applaud you for this. When I use the term, "New Age religionist"(the sort of person who unquestionably believes in fairies and elves) I am referring to the lack of scepticism that such folk hold, so now that you have distanced yourself from such folk this has cleared that up for me.

    With that said I totally retract my statement about you, " writing with strong overtones of New Age religionism and believing in fairies and elves". By the way I wasn't offended by anything in your post. Why would I have been?

    Can we start anew then?

    To sum up. You then, are, in fact a sceptic. I will therefore assume that you only accept propositions that are demonstrated by evidence to be likely to be true? Ok, hope we agree because that is the definition I'm using.

    What I would like you to help me understand is shedding light on a very important issue. It concerns your OP here http://www.heruraha.net/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13662

    Do you or do you not imply, in that OP, that one of , if not the main factor, in Los becoming the, "slave of illusion, was the limited time factor in which he engaged upon those magickal practices which subsequently led him to his outlook on Thelema and scepticism?

    That, for now is the only question I ask of you.

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    1. "To sum up. You then, are, in fact a sceptic. I will therefore assume that you only accept propositions that are demonstrated by evidence to be likely to be true? Ok, hope we agree because that is the definition I'm using."

      This would not be the definition I use. To me, that sounds like a decent definition of empiricism, certainly not a bad thing in my opinion, but not actually skepticism. For me, a skeptic is a person inclined to question or doubt all accepted opinions. All of them. Whether they are "likely to be true" or not. It is only by questioning all traditionally accepted views that we are able to break convention and foster innovation.

      "Do you or do you not imply, in that OP, that one of , if not the main factor, in Los becoming the, "slave of illusion, was the limited time factor in which he engaged upon those magickal practices which subsequently led him to his outlook on Thelema and scepticism?"

      I do not. I don't know what caused Los to become a "slave of illusion". I only note that his record shows that, while he was attempting magical practice, he was one. He "believed" that the angels in his head were real. I also note that a regimented practice like that of the A.'.A.'. would not have allowed him to "believe" in any of the results he was achieving that early in his practice.

      What I imply, if anything, is that Los does not have the experiential credentials to berate others for believing or not believing in the objective reality and philosophic validity of these things on a forum dedicated to the methods of the A.'.A.'. because he did not actually go through the practice that that phrase in Liber O initiates. His practice was something else entirely and should not be taken as evidence one way or the other on the efficacy of A.'.A.'. magick.

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    2. I do not. I don't know what caused Los to become a "slave of illusion". I only note that his record shows that, while he was attempting magical practice, he was one. He "believed" that the angels in his head were real. I also note that a regimented practice like that of the A.'.A.'. would not have allowed him to "believe" in any of the results he was achieving that early in his practice.

      How are you using the term "slave of illusion" here?

      Do you mean that *anybody* who believes in angels is a slave to illusion?

      Evidently not, since you're careful to say that I was wrong to believe in results "that early in [my] practice," implying that there's a point in the practice where it becomes acceptable to believe in angels.

      Furthermore, we might point to how you treat the claims of the head of the order you're talking about. You don't call Jim Eshelman a "slave of illusion," yet he's on record as saying, among other ridiculous and undemonstrated things, that a goblin appointed him head of a magical order, that doing the middle pillar ritual once broke his car, that Temple of Thelema rituals mutate people's DNA, and that he works for women's rights because he hasn't had enough incarnations as a woman and wants to come back to life as one.

      Ah, but you don't consider him a "slave of illusion." So clearly, you're defining "slave of illusion" as something other than "someone who believes in undemonstrated claims" (which might be a reasonable definition). Instead, you seem to be defining "slave of illusion" as something along the lines of, "A person who believes undemonstrated claims and who hasn't undergone the practices of this particular group properly." Someone who *has* gone through the practices of this particular group properly and then believes undemonstrated things...that person is not a slave of illusion.

      The underlying assumption is that going through the practices properly of this particular group you're talking about makes the belief in certain undemonstrated claims valid.

      First of all, that assumption goes *way* beyond your implication (on the other thread on this blog) that your "hypothesis" just involves generating experiences.

      Clearly, your "hypothesis" is something along the lines of the idea that this group has practices that make it possible for a person to verify claims that nobody else (or very few others) can demonstrate.

      How did you arrive at this hypothesis?

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    3. "How are you using the term "slave of illusion" here?"

      Pretty much the way you defined it:
      "My practices were certainly fun and weren’t hurting anybody, and I think I had kinda talked myself into a murky position of saying, “Gee, physics says everything’s made of energy, so who’s to say that my vibrations of these mystical words aren’t subtly influencing that energy and “nudging” manifestations of reality in the direction I want?” You know, the kind of dafto nonsense that I would laugh at today... In other words, I told myself all kinds of silly lies and platitudes to keep up the fun game playing."


      "Furthermore, we might point to how you treat the claims of the head of the order you're talking about."

      Actually, I've never treated Eshelman's claims one way or the other. I've never found a need to. He's pretty consistent in reminding everyone that personal experiences are just that: personal. He has never (to my knowledge) tried to coerce anyone else into believing that his experiences are objectively true or that they should have any philosophical validity to anyone but himself. He regularly reiterates that recounting them may be useful as guideposts to others but nobody should assume objective validity in anything without testing it out for themselves.

      Note I am speaking here of him as an individual. As administrator of the public forum of Temple of Thelema, his policy to moderate comments to keep them in line with the stated purpose and foundational axioms of that body seems perfectly natural. This is not necessarily motivated by personal belief but rather by the foundations of the institution. This would be not unlike the moderator of a forum dedicated to binary mathematics moderating any comment that relied solely on hexadecimal and which refused to reframe its terms in ones and zeros.


      "The underlying assumption is that going through the practices properly of this particular group you're talking about makes the belief in certain undemonstrated claims valid."

      I wouldn't go that far. I would say that one of the purported results of practicing Crowleyan Magick as laid out in his and George Cecil Jones' system of Scientific Illuminism (the A.'.A.'.) is a development of the self-analyzing capabilities to a point where one can distinguish between results that are objectively true and philosophically valid and those which are not. I do not personally claim to have reached this stage of development yet so I cannot vouch for its validity. However, having studied the documents of the A.'.A.'. along with many other sources, some of which are mentioned in the other thread, I have found enough of a consistency across systems and ages to convince me that it is worth my while to give it a go. I don't personally think that "belief" is a useful thing to be aiming for so its not a word I would use but, perhaps that will change along the way. Neither am I as hung up on the concept of "undemonstrated claims" as you seem to be. For the rest of the "assumptions" and "implications" you think you see in the other thread, please check over there for my response.

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    4. Actually, I've never treated Eshelman's claims one way or the other. I've never found a need to. He's pretty consistent in reminding everyone that personal experiences are just that: personal. He has never (to my knowledge) tried to coerce anyone else into believing that his experiences are objectively true or that they should have any philosophical validity to anyone but himself.

      So what? The claims that he makes are factual claims about the world, and this remains the case regardless of how often he tries to pretend they're just "true for him."

      Take, as an example, his claim that doing the Middle Pillar ritual with the wrong colors once caused his car to break down. If that's true, then that's not just "true for him," no matter whether he says that it's just true for him or not. If that actually happened, then that's a verifiable claim about the world.

      Similarly, his claim that Temple of Thelema rituals mutate the practitioner's DNA is not a claim that is just "true for him." If that actually happens, it would be detectable.

      I realize that *you* evidently give people a free pass just because they make sure to claim, in public, that their claims are just "true for them," but not everyone is so complacent.

      one of the purported results of practicing Crowleyan Magick [...] is a development of the self-analyzing capabilities to a point where one can distinguish between results that are objectively true and philosophically valid and those which are not.

      See the other thread (under the post "Between the brain and the mouth...there was no interlocutor") for my response to this claim.

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  6. Ok maybe I should have elaborated, yes we as sceptics desire to accept as many true claims as possible and at the same time we want to reject as many false claims as possible. We are working to create an accurate world map as possible thereby. I'm sure we both agree on that added to my original assertion is a fine definition of scepticism.

    Ok so you clarified that for me in that the time factor was irrelevant. Now if we look at the following claim you make, < "What I imply, if anything, is that Los does not have the experiential credentials to berate others for believing or not believing in the objective reality and philosophic validity of these things on a forum dedicated to the methods of the A.'.A.'. because he did not actually go through the practice that that phrase in Liber O initiates. His practice was something else entirely and should not be taken as evidence one way or the other on the efficacy of A.'.A.'. magick".>

    Ok so would it not be accurate to say that you are proposing that there are two distinct groups of people in this case, those who are not in the A.'.A.'. who can practice A.'.A.'. magick and those who are members of the A.'.A.'. who can practice A.'.A.'. magick?

    Furthermore in terms of experiential validity, one group (members) produce genuine results but the other group's (non members) produce results that are not genuine and furthermore can be invalidated by the members?

    If that is the case couldn't we take the claim down to it's base constituents in that you are therefore stating that with regards to A.'.A.'. magick the two groups you are discussing, one of them are doing it right and the other group are not doing it right?

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    1. I honestly don't see how you derive any of what you say above from what I wrote.

      What I wrote: "For me, a skeptic is a person inclined to question or doubt all accepted opinions. All of them. Whether they are 'likely to be true' or not."

      Your derivation: "yes we as sceptics desire to accept as many true claims as possible and at the same time we want to reject as many false claims as possible. We are working to create an accurate world map as possible thereby. I'm sure we both agree on that added to my original assertion is a fine definition of scepticism."

      I would not agree that that is a fine definition of skepticism nor do I see how you could possibly think that's what I was getting at.

      As I already wrote, that definition seems to be a good working definition of empiricism. It might even fly as a quick and dirty gloss of modern philosophical skepticism. It does not in any way reflect classical Pyrrhonism, the type of skepticism I define above and the type on which Crowley based his writings (we know this because he conveniently left us an alternate name for his Scientific Illuminism: Pyrrho-Zoroastrianism).


      What I wrote: "I also note that a regimented practice like that of the A.'.A.'. would not have allowed him to "believe" in any of the results he was achieving that early in his practice."

      Your derivation: "Ok so would it not be accurate to say that you are proposing that there are two distinct groups of people in this case, those who are not in the A.'.A.'. who can practice A.'.A.'. magick and those who are members of the A.'.A.'. who can practice A.'.A.'. magick?
      "Furthermore in terms of experiential validity, one group (members) produce genuine results but the other group's (non members) produce results that are not genuine and furthermore can be invalidated by the members?"

      How in hell did you get from point-A to point-B on that one? I have never in my life written anything to distinguish between the qualitative experience of members of A.'.A.'. and non-members specifically because I have no personal experience of what membership affords. Intellectually, I know that joining the A.'.A.'. would necessarily assign one a Neophyte to watch over and guide one's practice but, not having been in the position myself, I am not qualified to judge what sort of benefit that really imparts. My only comment even touching on actual A.'.A.'. membership was that, if Los had been a member, he would have had a Neophyte watching his development and correcting him when he strayed off the path.

      I can comment on the structure and intent of the system itself because the foundational documents are all public knowledge. The rest of your projection regarding the supposed superiority of one group over the other is a creation of your own mind, not mine.

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  7. GE, I don't want to get sidetracked on defining and splitting hairs on the philosophical essentials and definitions of scepticism and it's relationship to empiricism. To simplify, I'd say that a Pyrrhonist would accept my above definition of scepticism in terms of everyday evidence- based inquiries into claims made about how the world appears to work. We don't need to drag the ontological ideas of Hume, Kant and Berkeley into this within the confines of the discussion.

    On your points about the A.'.A.'. let me put it another way . You seem to be saying that A.'.A.'. methods of magickal practice somehow differ from non A.'.A.'. methods of magickal practice. I see what you're driving at in terms of, "scientific illuminism".

    You wrote about Los, in that forum- OP as follows,

    < “Despite all of this (his i.e. Los) work and seeming success--several years of it to be... um... precise?--there is one major flaw that jumps out immediately: there appears to be absolutely no method to this madness. He claims that he "didn't just jump into these practices, [he] spent a substantial period of that time performing the basics," but what exactly is a substantial period of time? What are his basics? He performed the Star Ruby "a boatload" but is that a Titanic or a canoe? "Liber-E type exercises"? What are they? Liber E provides a very specific regimen of training to build a solid foundation. Did he test out on all seven chapters or was he just kinda sorta doing something like what was in there? In other words, was his Temple actually in full working order?>

    In other words you're claiming that he (Los) has been tainted because he didn’t stick to the rules and this explains his current views on magick and the cited, “fruitcake factory”. However, on this matter, consider this quote from Crowley,

    “I admit that my visions can never mean to other men as much as they do to me. I do not regret this. All I ask is that my results should convince seekers after truth that there is beyond doubt something worth while seeking, attainable BY METHODS MORE OR LESS LIKE MINE. I do not want to father a flock, to be the fetish of fools and fanatics, or the founder of a faith whose followers are content to echo my opinions. I want each man to cut his own way through the jungle.
    —The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, Ch. 66

    I capitalize and emphasise the, “by methods more or less” assertion because I think it is of import that Crowley himself should say this. To me, this diminishes your point that Los’s practices were ,in your words “ slip-shod”. Your argument now seems to be becoming more clear to me ; those who, (your words) “ practiced Old Aeon style magic” but go on to criticize methods of the A.'. A.'. , just didn’t stick it out and they weren’t rigorous enough. I think that is a flawed opinion.

    On the subject of critiques of A.'. A.'. ‘s methods and practices here are some more words from Crowley, the prime authority on the A.'. A.'

    "I began to see that one might become a Master of the Temple without necessarily knowing any technical Magick or mysticism at all. It is merely a matter of convenience to be able to represent any expression as x + Y = 0. The equation may be solved without words. Many people may go through the ordeals and attain the degrees of the A.'. A.'. without ever hearing that such an Order exists. The universe is, in fact, busy with nothing else, for the relation of the Order to it is that of the man of science to his subject. He writes CaCl2 + H2SO4 = CaSO4 + 2HCl for his own convenience and that of others, but the operation was always in progress independently"

    —The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, Ch. 68

    How do you incorporate this into your argument about Los’s apparent “slip-shod” flaw?



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    1. "To simplify, I'd say that a Pyrrhonist would accept my above definition of scepticism in terms of everyday evidence- based inquiries into claims made about how the world appears to work."

      I'm sorry, I can't accept that as sound. That fundamentally goes against the tenets of Pyrrhonism. The first question of any Pyrrhonist worth his salt is whether or not Knowledge is actually possible. That is the fundamental level at which Phyrronism works. "Everyday evidence-based inquires" are the realm of common sense empiricism, not Pyrrhonism.


      "In other words you're claiming that he (Los) has been tainted because he didn’t stick to the rules and this explains his current views on magick and the cited, “fruitcake factory”."

      No, I'm not. Yet again, you are reading your prejudices into my words. I'm saying that, without an accurate record, we the reader have no way to evaluate Los's claims. We just have to take him at his word, based on his memory of the time, the most fallible of all the human faculties. Crowleyan Magick claims to give individuals who practice it correctly certain powers and experiences. Los denies this claim. However, Los has never practiced Crowleyan Magick correctly therefore how are we, the reader, to give his denial any weight?


      His current views on magick are explained by his inductive reasoning (be it damned for a dog) based on very shaky premises regarding what most religions seem to be like to him, not from experiential data. For someone constantly demanding others to show him the evidence, he has very little to offer.


      It has nothing to do with being "tainted". He didn't do the practices that he says are useless. He developed a reason to call them useless via induction rather than experimentation. He now parrots that reason at every opportunity. I say there is no good reason to take his reason seriously because he didn't do the actual practices.




      Look, kas, we've been down this road before and I'm frankly tired of rehashing it so this will be my last attempt. Read this carefully, word for word. There aren't that many.

      Ready?

      There is only one method that is of any importance: The Method of Science. The keeping of a clear detailed record without attaching objective reality or philosophic validity to anything therein. Doing practices, recording the results, lather rinse repeat. Only once one has a sufficiently large body of data about which one has consciously not attached any meaning should one then go back and try to analyze it. This was the failing that Crowley saw in the rest of the Golden Dawn, most of the Victorian revival, and most of the history of magical records: belief came too early (or, often, acted as a precursor to the work) and clouded judgement. This is also the critique I have of Los's practice and why I don't take his conclusions as having any weight.


      I and any other Scientific Illuminist would be very interested in hearing reports of experiments undertaken. I'm finished, though, listening to the tired drum beat of uselessness from anyone only interested in thinking about what is likely or proven. Just move into the old folks home and end it already. Y'all clearly have no interest in living life outside of your comfortable little boxes.

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    2. There is only one method that is of any importance: The Method of Science.

      I agree that gathering evidence and applying reason to evidence – dispassionately, as free from bias as possible – is important.

      Only once one has a sufficiently large body of data about which one has consciously not attached any meaning should one then go back and try to analyze it.

      Sure, but you say – you said, on that other thread – that our normal ways of analyzing data are insufficient for analyzing this one particular class of data. That’s a weird thing to say. Why would someone conclude that? Even if someone had a good reason for concluding that, how would someone know if he’s discovered a better method for analyzing data?

      You talk about “science” – and you love making metaphors using science – but you chuck our normal methods of analyzing data out the window when those methods (correctly) suggest that nobody has any reason to think these magical coincidence claims are true.

      That’s not science. That’s being a gullible cultist.

      This is also the critique I have of Los's practice and why I don't take his conclusions as having any weight.

      For the thousandth time, I didn’t arrive at my conclusions by myopically studying a single person’s experiences. I arrived at my conclusions by figuring out that no amount of analyzing coincidences or visions can support the kinds of claims that are routinely made about them.

      You never address this point.

      I'm finished, though, listening to the tired drum beat of uselessness from anyone only interested in thinking about what is likely or proven. Just move into the old folks home and end it already.

      There’s a typically occultist attitude for you. Reality is too boring for these types, and anybody who’s not enamored of their childish fantasies of being wizards must be some “old person” with no life in them or no creativity, or some mean ol’ nobodaddy who wants to shackle the human spirit.

      The truth of the matter is the opposite. Reality is more wonderful and exciting than any of us can possibly imagine, and these occult ideas – laughable half-baked guesses that their adherents enjoy pretending are “hypotheses” – are what actually makes the universe small and boring, what actually sucks the vitality and creativity out of people.

      What could be less imaginative than working through some daft self-hypnosis “system” dreamed up by a British bullshit artist a hundred years ago (and then pretending it’s “science,” too!)? What could be less inspiring than pretending that the marvelous random chance of the universe is really the workings of some oompa-loompa on another dimension who’s directing your life like a play? What could be more mind-numbing than thinking that the one and only chance for mankind to evolve as a whole is to have some pimply social reject pretend to talk to his imaginary friends and come away with the astounding “revelation” of goofy rituals, dumb number games, and awful poetry?

      Since there's no evidence that supports any of that nonsense, the only way to think that any stuff like that is true is to want it to be true, and I tend to be of the opinion that wanting a world that small, trivialized, and pathetic is a sign of some kind of deeper pathology.

      Y'all clearly have no interest in living life outside of your comfortable little boxes.

      I have no interest in bamboozling myself for entertainment purposes. You very clearly do.

      As I said on the other thread, I wish you well, and I hope you enjoy yourself in whatever you do.

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    3. "You never address this point."

      "I arrived at my conclusions by figuring out..." holds no weight without data to support it.
      "...that no amount of analyzing coincidences or visions..." No amount? That's a pretty bald assertion. Especially for someone who hasn't done much of it himself.
      "...can support the kinds of claims that are routinely made about them." Vague. Generalized beyond usefulness.

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    4. "You never address this point."

      And we see that, in this post, you continue this fine, empty tradition.

      "I arrived at my conclusions by figuring out..." holds no weight without data to support it.

      "...that no amount of analyzing coincidences or visions..." No amount? That's a pretty bald assertion. Especially for someone who hasn't done much of it himself.


      Boy, you are slow. Some conclusions are evaluated based on analysis of data. Some conclusions are evaluated by logically determining whether the conclusions follow from other premises.

      Here, I’ll give you an example. Take the “hypothesis” that scratching my back causes someone nearby me to blink shortly thereafter. It’s possible for me to gather tons of “data” by writing down every time I scratch my back and whether someone around me blinks and how often it takes for the blink to occur.

      I could amass a huge amount of data this way, and it would all show how a scratch was followed *very* swiftly (in some cases *immediately*) by someone nearby me blinking.

      But guess what? That data isn’t worth jack shit because we know, logically, that no amount of recording blinks in this way can ever demonstrate this particular claim.

      Why? Setting aside everything we know about blinking being an inevitable and regular motor action, my “analysis of data” is a huge post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy.

      And that’s the problem with your gob-stoppingly stupid idea of collecting “evidence” of coincidences. Here’s the so-called “evidence” you want to collect: “I want X, I do a ritual for X, and sometime later X happens.” That’s an example of post hoc ergo propter hoc. You could gather a million instances of that happening, and it would come not even a jot closer to demonstrating that your magick makes coincidences happen.

      If you really wanted to demonstrate this claim, you would have to study waaaay more than coincidences that happen to one guy. You’d need to pick some kind of specific result, you’d need representative sample groups of “magicians,” you’d need a magick-working group and a control group, and you’d need a calibration period to determine how statistically likely the specific result is to happen on its own. THEN you’d be able to have the magick-working group work magick for the result, and THEN you could gather data.

      If you did that, then you *would* have a chance able to show that doing magick makes the result more likely to happen – to a statistically significant extent – than without doing magick.

      I'd be curious to see you actually respond to these points, but I'm not holding my breath.

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  9. @GE well done you completely ignored my two most glaringly important points. We don't need to wrestle over a definition of, "tainted" and whether or not I mislabelled. I think you know what I meant.

    In your responses were you using a fallacious appeal to ridicule by any chance? – (an argument made by presenting the opponent's argument in a way that makes it appear ridiculous) ? I feel (consciously or not) you are also employing another informal fallacy, namely argument from repetition (argumentum ad nauseam) – signifying that my point has been discussed extensively until nobody cares to discuss it anymore.

    Now onto those glaring points you , err, didn’t address. Your latest goodread, "the Psychology of Hashish" was written in 1909, the pre World War One period as were those tomes of scientific illuminism (The Equinox). The following was written by Crowley, years later in 1929 (wisdom of years perchance?)


    “I admit that my visions can never mean to other men as much as they do to me. I do not regret this. All I ask is that my results should convince seekers after truth that there is beyond doubt something worth while seeking, attainable BY METHODS MORE OR LESS LIKE MINE. I do not want to father a flock, to be the fetish of fools and fanatics, or the founder of a faith whose followers are content to echo my opinions. I want each man to cut his own way through the jungle.
    —The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, Ch. 66 (1929)

    I capitalize and emphasise the, “by methods more or less” assertion because I think it is of import that Crowley himself should play down the rigorous, by the book, data-collation in the pursuit for conclusions. To me, this diminishes your point that Los’s practices were ,in your words “ slip-shod”. Your argument now seems to be becoming more clear to me ; those who, (your words) “ practiced Old Aeon style magic” but go on to criticize methods of the A.'. A.'. , just didn’t stick it out and they weren’t rigorous enough in massive and extensive data collation. I think that that is an overgeneralization and is somewhat pedantic. Let me elaborate.

    On the subject of critiques of A.'. A.'. ‘s methods and practices here are some more words from Crowley, the prime authority on the A.'. A.'

    "I began to see that one might become a Master of the Temple without necessarily knowing any technical Magick or mysticism at all. It is merely a matter of convenience to be able to represent any expression as x + Y = 0. The equation may be solved without words. Many people may go through the ordeals and attain the degrees of the A.'. A.'. without ever hearing that such an Order exists. The universe is, in fact, busy with nothing else, for the relation of the Order to it is that of the man of science to his subject. He writes CaCl2 + H2SO4 = CaSO4 + 2HCl for his own convenience and that of others, but the operation was always in progress independently"

    —The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, Ch. 68 (1929)

    Apparently you want to leave it at that but I don't see how you can incorporate these overwhelmingly significant 1929 opinionS of Crowley into your argument about Los’s apparent “slip-shod” methodolgical flaw.

    Nevertheless, if you do want to leave it at that then may you find your True Will and live by it.

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