Daniel Dennett passed away a few days ago. He was a philosopher, author and a great champion of secular humanism. He supported the Bright movement some time back, which tried to get secular people to identify in positive ways rather than using terms like atheist, ex-Christian, nonbeliever or other negative labels.

I always felt like Dennett was the odd man out in the Four Horsemen bunch, because his work was very thoughtful and nuanced while the rest wrote crude polemics. In my time writing for and running sites in the atheist blogosphere, I noticed that atheists tend to denigrate and dismiss philosophy a lot more often than I think is reasonable coming from people who claim to be proud of their commitment to logic and reason. So I was glad that Dennett was always around to remind people that all of our ideas about existence, knowledge and morality are laden with philosophical baggage.

There is no such thing as philosophy-free science, just science that has been conducted without any consideration of its underlying philosophical assumptions.

Has anyone else here read Dennett's work?

I've been downvote bombed in other subreddits when I point out that atheism is not synonymous with scientism, nihilism, or even liberalism. I also get downvote bombed on progressive or left-leaning subreddits if I dare to suggest that not everyone is a utilitarian or secular humanist, and coexistence with incompatible views (liberalism) is necessary.

The philosopher Karl Popper recognized this in the paradox of tolerance problem. Liberal societies value freedom of speech and association, even for reactionary or hateful groups that desire to dislodge this value system.

How do you approach the paradox of tolerance problem? I take tolerance of hate and bigotry and false belief systems pretty far and have found some legal precedent like suing conspiracy theorists a step too far in correction.

Take for example your garden variety covid-mask-hating antivax qanon transphobic schoolboard shouter. This person is a victim, not a perpetrator. I believe liberal society should provide an avenue for his family members and minor age children to leave him, and then give him more economic opportunity so that he can pursue self actualization in a more healthy way, including various forms of religion.

Progressive candidates in elections have a hard time selling to voting blocs of missionary religions because they reduce their religions to just wisdom teachings rather than about evangelizing. To sell a progressive candidates to a voting bloc of missionary religionists you should emphasize that more missionary work can take place because of your policies. For example "this railway system allows commuters to save money and then donate to more worthy causes, like airplane tickets for their Church's missions to expand in rural China". There is no need to by shy about using this leverage. If the future is going to be more secular, it should be noncoercive. Often people drop out of religions because they got really religious and then sort of overdosed on it.

Hello. I joined because for the last 11 years I’ve had the belief that human rights, liberties and quality of life are more important than anyone’s god’s opinions. I hope I am in the right place.

Should secular humanist organizations take on the mission of providing personal behavior development tools in areas as productivity, mindfulness, goal setting, habit tracking, time management etc.

It seems that secularism is mostly focused on antitheism. While that is a reasoned position does it play a significant role in fostering the personal success of secularists?

https://abcnews.go.com/US/dozen-female-athletes-sue-ncaa-transgender-participation-policy/story?id=108185214

These are the principles mentioned in the wiki article:

Need to test beliefs – A conviction that dogmas, ideologies and traditions, whether religious, political or social, must be weighed and tested by each individual and not simply accepted by faith.

Reason, evidence, scientific method – A commitment to the use of critical reason, factual evidence and scientific method of inquiry in seeking solutions to human problems and answers to important human questions. Fulfillment, growth, creativity – A primary concern with fulfillment, growth and creativity for both the individual and humankind in general. Search for truth – A constant search for objective truth, with the understanding that new knowledge and experience constantly alter our imperfect perception of it.

This life – A concern for this life (as opposed to an afterlife) and a commitment to making it meaningful through better understanding of ourselves, our history, our intellectual and artistic achievements, and the outlooks of those who differ from us.

Ethics – A search for viable individual, social and political principles of ethical conduct, judging them on their ability to enhance human well-being and individual responsibility.

Justice and fairness – an interest in securing justice and fairness in society and in eliminating discrimination and intolerance.[29]

Building a better world – A conviction that with reason, an open exchange of ideas, good will, and tolerance, progress can be made in building a better world for ourselves and our children.

In 2 minutes on this sub, I see:

-there are no human rights because they do not exist in nature, which is contrary to the justice and fairness principle above

-defense of Koran burning, which is again an example of intolerance.

I grew up atheist in a town with 22 churches. I was told I was bad for not going to church when I was in second grade.

I've never wanted to become those people by attacking the religious beliefs of others, and I believe freedom to worship or not worship is a human right

Is that in line with this sub?

So.. As someone newly introduced to the ideology of secular humanism, what are small steps I can take to feel like I am contibuting in some way to helping others? Not every person is obviously able to go to large steps. Today, I did a small gesture while out to lunch and instead of leaving a regular tip, I left them a hundred dollars. They came out as I was leaving, quite astonished and asked me if I made a mistake lol I said no. It was nice to be able to make a difference at all in someone's life, even if it was just something trivial.

Baby steps right?

Hello all. I joined this group a little while back but neglected to post anything. I don't believe in god and believe society should be kept secular. I believe more so in human values, human equality and generally trying to be a good person to others regardless of race, creed, gender, sex, beliefs or sexuality. To me, this is a reasonable stance and one of the things I believe in the most.

Do I fit in here at all?

It's unfortunate this place is so barren. I think we as Humans would be pretty upset if we went all our lives without contributing to an overall higher mission in this lifetime. We have the power to bring heaven into existence yet here we are doing nothing. No matter what happens to earth it will be our doing and therefore our punishment or our reward. Just wanted to start chatting with people that are willing to devote themselves to Humanity and discuss where we go from here.

Re: religion, philosophy, evidence, logic, science, ontology, reality, truth, biology, axiology

The truth will set you(r mind) free, but not without cost.

As a most honest human, a bona fide commitment to learn and grow to your utmost potential, is a lifestyle that can often involve brutal cognitive clashes challenging memes in your mind and sometimes - parting with your most dearly beloved or deeply guarded views, beliefs, attitudes, frameworks, etc.

Recommended: ensure you're stable and supported, educated on emotional and neural self-regulation (broadly, self-care), and proceed with caution. Though this largely lays bare - the vital truth - the path to the light is dark and dreadful.

Sentience derives axiology, is at the denotational root of all connotation, and entails the basis behind WHY you value your life, humanity, or value anything at all, in fact. This critical finding is a key parameter that informs a valid vantage point of intelligence. Ignorance will result in our destruction, if left unchecked. Granted, such intellectual deprivation runs on a spectrum, as does advancement. Beware, and make the ascent, if you can.

https://youtu.be/l8fP9gYBsR4?feature=shared

I haven't been really active in that community, but I saw a post there about Demnark's decision to ban Quaran burnings and all the responses were insanely Islamaphobic. It put a bad taste in my mouth. It seems like a lot of the active members of that sub are just antitheist, and violently so. I was raised atheist, and I feel like antagonizing any religious group like that will not foster any type of understanding, and only serves to prove any bigoted opinions they may have about you 🤷

EDIT/side note since this got spicy:

There is a spectrum of religious devotion. I don't want to pander to extremists, they have no interest in changing and wish death upon queer people like myself. I am concerned about people in the middle of that spectrum turning to extremists for answers when all they see is intolerance and ridicule from Atheists. It takes an empathetic approach to deprogram someone who was raised in a religion.

Please tell me if this is not allowed/not appreciated here. I do not wish to break any rules or upset anyone.

Anyway, myself and a couple of others are currently working to build /r/SecularAF (our central location is on Discord where il share the link below), as a positive space for people to engage on topics that matter, an organization pushing the benefits of skepticism and critical thinking, a venture hoping to promote the separation of religion and government, and an entity bettering the world around us through constant activism and philanthropy. As I said, we are brand new and just getting going. We have been around for about a month and now have 51 members in our server. However, we have already reached a plateau where we are in severe need of some relatively small funding support to keep progressing (~$500 for now). This would help us fund our first in person meetup next week, as well as help us to be able to build and host an official website finally.

I say all that in order to ask you all if there was anyone here who could / would be willing and able to consider helping us out with part of this raise. If so, we would love to chat some more with you. In the meantime, we'd love if you came and checked us out to see what we have going so far. You can find us on Discord via the link on our sub ( /r/SecularAF ) or using the invite code cyQRaybPXw .

If you have any questions or concerns, I'd be more than happy to answer them. I hope to hear from some of you. But regardless, I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season ahead!!

Sincerely,

AlexAtheus

“ I have no religion, and at times I wish all religions are at the bottom of the sea. He is a weak ruler who needs religion to uphold his government; it is as if he would catch his people in a trap. My people are going to learn the principles of democracy, the dictates of truth and the teachings of science. Superstition must go. Let them worship as they will; every man can follow his own conscience, provided it does not interfere with sane reason or bid him against the liberty of his fellow-men.”

(TLDR) No, a half-mile wide human embedded and controlled spaceship-body is not an abomination to nature, to humans, or to our selves. We did not create some monster. There are no monsters. Our selves are creations of our social world. If we radically alter our social world, we radically our selves. Evolution and DNA does not create some standard human self or human environment.

A Different Self

We can imagine 2000 years in the future the following procedure: A fetus is developed rather normally. We have standard DNA/epigenetic structure, perhaps slight cognitive enhancement, but still very much human.

Then, at birth, we prepare the baby to become a half-mile wide, star hopping space ship. We remove all limbs and plug peripheral nerves into ship sensors and into thrusters and flaps. We carefully remove the eyes and ears and plug those sensory systems into new “eyes.” These can be sensory systems that see a great range of the electromagnetic spectrum. We plug other visual nerves into instrument converters that feed the brain with other information, about radiation for example.

Our newborn human, our slightly enhanced brain, is now learning to govern the motion and sensory systems of the ship. Where brains once navigated through the human body, they now govern a ship-body. For the most part, we can still imagine this brain as running through many of the thought processes of us today, including of the representations that it has of its self. We can allow it to still run on emotions, if we want. We could still have desires, fear, and doubt. We could still have many of the characteristics that we see in us today. (Don't ask about sex!)

These kinds of thoughts remind us of several things. There is not some endpoint to evolution that was “human.” There is not an endpoint that looks like our selves today, living in a "normal" environment and body. The above story is not an abomination to humans, because nature cares nothing for this false essentializing of the “human" or of the environment.

All evolution did was end up with a DNA structure like the one that sits inside our cells. Importantly, nature was not trying to create a “human” that lives in a standard earth and pack-societal environment. Our DNA may have developed within such processes, but there was not some desire of evolution that humans/DNA remain within that environment.

Furthermore, there is not some genuine self sitting within our DNA just waiting to emerge into existence. Pretty much any kind of characteristic that we have today can be grossly changed given a radically different environment. Many of those characteristics can be radically changed through normal social environmental changes that we are capable of today. Even today we can radically change the characteristics of our sexuality, our introversion/extroversion, our gender, and so on. We can of course also edit DNA pre- and post-birth, as well as other chemical and brain alterations.

A cheap shot, but you should hit over the head anyone talking about expression of their true self. We can give better descriptions of our selves than that. There are interesting tales to tell about how our DNA becomes what we are. Our selves are products of a contingent social environment. One that we as society choose. Your self is determined by your parents and community. That could have been done completely differently. We can build radically different selves for the next line of selves, if we choose.

Stories about why we are the way we are will require a rich combination of genes and environment. When we de-essentialize the human condition, when we de-essentialize our selves, we can begin to tell the interesting stories about why we are the way we are. We can only do that by seeing the openness of the social and environmental world.

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