My Thoughts on Religion and Mysticism in General

I make absolutely no bones about criticizing the worst aspects of religion or indeed, any other spuriously held beliefs.

I have personally been an atheist for as long as I can remember, well at least from the age that I grasped the meaning of the word. Indeed, even as a young child I never bought into the God concept. I guess I would clarify my position thus: I do not believe in God for the same reason, that I do not believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy (sorry children). One cannot produce evidence for Santa Claus and Tooth Fairies and of course sane people don't attempt to. The reason one cannot, is because they are arbitrary man-made speculations that have no context within reality. There is a difference between an arbitrary statement and a false one. Even the false can be falsified through context, for example: 2 + 2=5 is falsifiable, because one can frame it within context. The same that applies to arbitrary mind spun speculations like Santa Claus and Tooth Fairies, applies equally to the God concept. It is an arbitrary speculation, because it is simply a subjective mind-spun idea and is devoid of context.

Let me give a simple example of context, as it relates to objectively definable entities within reality. Try if you will to point to an entity in the World called species - of course you cannot. The fact that one cannot point to an entity within reality called species, does not falsify objective context of the concept species. One needs to realize that species is a higher level concept and belongs in a hierarchy of man-invented labels, that help us identify categories. So, one cannot point directly to an entity called species, but one can identify an animal, that belongs to the category of a particular species such as a mammal, one still cannot point to an entity called mammal, but from mammal one can point to a dog called Spot. This hierarchical string of man-invented contextual labels, which we use to categorize through the process of language, helps us store information in an organized way in our brains. You will note that the above chain of hierarchical identifications, from species to mammal to a dog called spot, is what verifies the objective nature of the original concept in the hierarchy - re: species.

Now, here is the main point, what one absolutely cannot do with the concept of God, ghosts gremlins, fairies Santa Claus et al, is to identify a conceptual objective hierarchy of context, that allows one to string a context of conceptual identifications, in the form of category labels, that would allow one to for example identify the God concept as objectively definable, with reference to reality, it cannot be done.

The reason one cannot identify the God concept, within objective context, is because it is an arbitrary man-invented speculation, that is subjectively arrived at and not objectively arrived at within context of something axiomatically knowable.

Now, individuals do of course have different definitions of God. There is God in the Einsteinian sense, which he used simply as a metaphor and shorthand to personify the universal forces as a totality. There is also Spinoza's God, which he simply referred to as nature. I would have no problem with someone labeling me as a philosophical Spinozian in the context just described.

The other kind of God of course, is that of the major monotheism's. These are the kind of gods that I call arbitrary and man-made. These are the gods that individuals believe in, not based on evidence, but simply because they are believed on faith and passed down through tradition.

What applies to God applies to all forms of mysticism one can think of; from mind-reading, Tarot Card reading, UFO abduction, Crystal Healing, Water Divining, Telekinesis, Ghosts, spiritual healing, dream analysis, in fact I could go on and on with an ever expanding list. What all these have in common, is that they all rely on faith and are believed without a shred of evidence in their favor.

So, am I being a kill joy, to all the mystics out there. Well maybe. But the fact is that I write these articles because I think it matters. There are a lot of charlatans in the World who prey on the feeble minded, who sometimes out of desperation, look towards a mystic for help. Not all mystics are in it for the money, but many are, and they will happily rip off, the next 'mug-punter'.

What I find particularly disturbing is the inculcation with mysticism, of a child's mind. The child mind is desperately and courageously attempting to grow its mind and integrate aspect of reality. Religious mysticism in particular, is poisonous to the child mind. What is particularly vile, is the inculcation of the child mind with the concept of Hell.




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Atheism or Religion?

The claim that neither religion or atheism is right, is on its surface, a fair pronouncement, that somehow you can weigh one logically against the other and each is equally preferable. But when you dig a bit, you realize it is a hollow claim. It is a claim that presupposes an equal footing, between religion and atheism. Therefore, one cannot disprove the religious position and thus, one has to hold just as much faith that there is no God; as a theist holds that there is. Let us 'dig' in, to see why the claim is a poor one.

When an atheist says there is no God, it is based on probability and that probability is arrived at, based on the improbability of the claim. This simply means, it is improbable based on the simple fact, that there is no evidence to lead to probability. On the other hand, when a religious person says they believe in God, it is not a belief based on probability, rather, is is a belief built on faith and tradition.

Thus, we arrive at two different methods of knowledge. The religious position that holds the God concept as true, is a belief based purely on faith and tradition, whereas, the atheist position against the concept of God, is held as a belief grounded in improbability.

One can say as an atheist, there is no evidence to back up the religious proposition and therefore, there is no reason to hold it up as probable, until such evidence can be presented. A theist on the other hand, cannot say, 'there is no evidence against the possibility of God, therefore God is a probable concept'.

For a theist to say, there is no evidence against the concept of God, is really no different, than that of a mystic, who believes in the tooth fairy and saying: 'one has no evidence against the possibility of tooth fairies, therefore, they should be held in the realm of the probable'.

The very point is, that the concept of God lies within the same category as tooth fairies, hobgoblins, gremlins, ghosts, vampires - et al, none of these arbitrary mind-spun concepts can be disproved or indeed proved, that is because one cannot prove or disprove a negative. What one can do however, is offer a base of probability and simply say, unless you can present any evidence, then your claim is simply an arbitrary speculation and remains in the category of improbable.

Indeed, because the God concept lies in the same arbitrary conceptual category as tooth fairies, that is enough on its own, not only to dismiss it as improbable, but most likely impossible.

What makes the God concept an arbitrary concept, not to be taken seriously as a probable event, is the fact that it is a supernatural speculation. Supernatural means 'above nature'. This alone means it is unprovable by the laws of nature, because to prove it, one would have to do so, through some supernatural means. One would have to suspend all know laws of physics, to grasp 'a straw' that would bring the God concept into the realm of the probable. The fact that it's a supernatural speculation, is enough on its own to dismiss it as nonsense.

There is another point here too, and it is one that theists are liable to forget to mention. The burden of proof in any honest claim; or an attempt at a claim of probability, is that, the burden of proof is with the one making the claim. So, if someone makes a claim that God exists, then the burden of proof is their's. Unless such evidence can be presented, then an atheist has every right, to hold the God concept up, to be as likely as tooth fairies and hobgoblins.




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Is Fear a Good Thing or a Bad Thing?

All of us have natural fears. It is unlikely that any of us would survive even one day, without the ability to experience the emotion of fear, even in modern society, our fear keeps us alive. One of the reasons we can cross a busy main road, without being run over, is because of our ability to fear being knocked down by a vehicle. From this perspective we can understand fear as a necessary, inherited trait of our Darwinian past.

No primitive ancestor of ours, could have survived the jaws of a Saber Tooth Tiger, if they had no fear response to such predators. A car traveling at 50 miles per hour is, I guess one could say, a modern day equivalent of a 'saber tooth tiger'.

This kind of fear, that protects us from real potential danger, is of course necessary, for our survival in the every day World.

There is however, an artificial kind of fear, that is instilled in us, based not on any real danger within the World. But rather, these fears are instilled in us, based on mystical premises, that cannot be objectively defined within reality.

Children are particularly vulnerable to irrational fears, which are instilled in their minds by adults. Indeed, from a young age, all of us are bombarded with images and stories of ghosts, gremlins, devils, witches and all kinds of monsters lurking in dark corners. Of course, a good percentage of us grow out of such beliefs, but there are many adults, who still believe in ghosts, witches, devils, gremlins and monsters. Indeed, there are believe it or not, adults who believe in fairies and angels.

While we live in a society, where parents, usually unknowingly and seemingly 'innocently', instill fears in their children, then we will always live in a society that is partially entrenched in irrational fears. These fears just get passed on from one generation to the next. These fears of course, are also entrenched in the media, and get implanted in our minds in a fuzzy colidoscope of sublimation; while we are in this subjective stupour, our mental facililty to grasp reality, rots in a quagmire of mysticism.

I think it is, most definitely better to be loved than feared. It is most important that your children grow up loving and not fearing you. The best place to start, in instilling a loving relationship with your children, is in being honest about the reality in which they exist and openly telling them, there are no such things as ghosts, witches and monsters... Except of course the 'monsters' in real life; the bad people, who do monstrous things to other people.

The young child mind, is courageously involved in the mental struggle of understanding the universe, in which it finds itself. There is nothing healthy, in stultifying that mental growth, with irrational mystical beliefs, such as ghosts, witches, gremlins and monsters and indeed, perhaps the most irrational concept every erected in the mind of man, the God concept.

So the answer to the question... 'Is it better to be loved or feared?' - I would say: that a World filled with a little more love (the more the better), would naturally, be a less fearful World and a better World for all of us.




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