You as well. Not really appropriate to demand serious philosophical replies when all you've posted is silly inanity and disingenuous apologia for the murderous actions of an apartheid rightwing government and its military. — Seppo

Your reading is sub-par. I, personally, am anti-zionist and I cannot understand how a religious/ethnic state can claim it is morally defensible. I am not, and have not, even for a single second in this thread said “Israel was justified in doing X.” All of my replies have been aimed at the structure in which we perform our analysis of Israel’s behaviors. It is nice that you want me to say things I have not said, but I’d rather speak for myself.

It's also an idiotic argument since there's absolutely no moral argument to be made that because Jews got shafted in Europe they therefore are free to shaft Palestinians. — Benkei

:up:

Please provide the numbers on how many atrocities were perpetrated against Israelis by those states and resulted in how many Israeli deaths. — Benkei

I didn’t say that the atrocities were perpetrated by them against Israel, I said they have done them and are not collectively responsible for less bad acts than Israel. The only country on that list that comes close to not having done more bad acts than Israel might be Palestine, and that is by virtue of its population size. I imagine if you counted the violations of human rights in the occupied territories by Palestinians, you might find that they are equal to Israel, but I won’t make that promise.

As to the Israel/Palestine conflict, and with no consideration of any other factor besides damage inflicted on populations/property, Israel undeniably has caused more damage and killed more people. What does that have to do with whether we support Israel or Palestine? Is it one factor in the analysis or the only? Are there reasons why we should support Israel despite that? Or not support Hamas/the Palestinian Authority? Or support both of them in their respective domains?

If you want to stratify this into some kind of warble about 'interests' you are welcome to — StreetlightX

Where is that irony meter Seppo was using? This is a philosophy forum. Discussing the Israel/Palestine conflict from a philosophical POV (informed by metaethics, ethics, etc.) in a critical way shouldn’t be objectionable. And yes, we agree, Israel shouldn’t do those sorts of things.

If there is a Palestinian subject of meted suffering on here that would like to offer their view point on whether Israel’s conduct is subject to philosophical analysis, I am glad to hear them out. For my part, I have heard them out in other contexts and have advocated for a secular single state with peace on earth and equal treatment under the law (including reparations). But I recognize I am an outlier in wishing everyone to be reasonable, stop killing one another, and establish a government largely based on the contemporary best practice of a constitutional, western, liberal, secular representative-democracy with related cultural practices of inclusion, non-discriminaiton, accessibility, etc.

Israel stop being assholes! = good.
Israel ignore your own interests and allow the destruction of your government and slaughter of your people before you can respond to rocket fire and fire balloons! = bad

It is that simple. No stratification required.

You may have missed it, but no one has come to the aid of Israel since its independence when attacked. The only reason it hasn’t been attacked again appears to be related to its “undisclosed” nuclear program. The only method the foreign state aggressors have to do harm without Israel lighting them on fire is through the funding/support of non-state actors. Sadly, those foreign governments have decided that the Palestinians and their suffering is an acceptable way to continue their efforts to eradicate Israel from the middle east. Any relations with Israel in the region are predicated upon a particular nation coming to terms with Israel not going away, a reality which so far 5(?) middle eastern countries (states belonging to the Arab League) have accepted. Even “liberated” Iraq doesn’t recognize Israel.

What is not complicated, therefore, is having moral clarity as to who deserves our support and who doesn't. — Benkei

Sure, one can have moral clarity if one has an impoverished notion of morality. Israel can do things that deserve our support and things that don’t deserve our support. The same is true of the Palestinians. Narrowing the only relevant concern around what we (or anyone else) support to whether Israel oppresses the Palestinians makes for a nice soundbite, but poor analysis. Yes - Israel did/does bad things. At the same time, “… far outstrip anything the Arabs and Palestinians have committed combined” is both untrue and not relevant. Syria, Iraq, Saudia Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Somalia, Sudan, the U.A.E, etc. have each committed atrocities since 1945 that when combined far exceed anything that the Israelis have done, but for some reason get a pass when it comes to discussing Israel. Their horrors are merely forgotten because Israel is big bad meanie and Palestinians are just oppressed victims with no agency and no responsibility for themselves given the meanie.

Palestinians “deserve” “our” support the same as any other people, including the Israelis. Bad behavior does not. The Palestinians themselves do horrible things to one another and have laws/systems that should be offensive to anyone paying attention - do they deserve support in that? It may come as a shock, but Palestinians exist outside of their interaction with Israel. Indeed, Palestinians even oppress people.

Nuance isn’t too much to ask for, Benkei. Bending over backwards to make Israel sound like the worst actor in the middle east/arab world is laughable. Yes, they are shits when it comes to the Palestinians, but let’s be serious. If you need a simple example or two, let’s start with female genital mutilation and rapes in Egypt, Sudan, and Somalia since 1948. If you need a less pervasive and ongoing problem than abuses of women, how about we consider Darfur for a bit and you tell me how that was a trivial bit of war crimes that don’t come close to anything the Israeli’s have done since the start of the 21 century.

The Arabs are no angels. You don’t have to be a good person to “deserve” fair treatment. Palestinians can be bad and be victims of Israel’s bad conduct. At the same time, Israel can do good things (you know, like develop medicine, medical procedures, medical technology, technology generally, advance science, agriculture, expand the rights of women, permit religious pluralism, etc.) while doing bad stuff to the Palestinians. It isn’t so clear how we support the Palestinians and BDS the Israelis without encouraging the Palestinians in their bad conduct and hampering Israel’s ability to do the good things.

And just because women, who are so often utterly ignored in any conversation about oppression, deserve yet another shoutout in a context in which the population of the Gaza Strip has approximately doubled since 2000 and more than 50% of Gazans are currently under the age of 18 despite Israel’s occupation, marital rape is explicitly not a crime.

At what point do we question the advocacy of carte blanche support for a culture that would otherwise be detestable if not for Israel being an oppressor? Yes, advocate for human rights (or whatever you want to call it), but stop sticking your head in the sand.

For historical perspective, in about 1890 the US overthrew Hawaii and shortly thereafter claimed all of its land. Hawaii was made a state in 1959, some 70 years later. Israel declared independence in 1948. We are about 70 years later. The US were occupiers, colonizers, aggressors, exploiters, etc. in an undeniable way. Is Hawaii presently occupied by the US and would Hawaiins presently be justified indiscriminately killing people in Hawaii until such time as the US stops “oppressing” it?

Israel is an agressor — StreetlightX

Since 180 is not participating it probably makes little sense to focus on what he said and my response thereto, nevertheless, the demand was not for Israel to stop being an aggressor, but to stop being an oppressor. Regardless, “ethnic cleansing” is clearly not an option just as collective punishment is not an option. If you acknowledge that Israel does have an interest in security and you seriously consider how to balance that interest against Palestine’s interest in not being oppressed, you are in the ball game. It would also be great if you have reasonable definitions/criteria around those points, but if you agree that demanding that Israel imperil it’s ability to defend itself is a non-starter, then we are on the verge of a meaningful conversation.

States are not individuals. The circumstances in which states can use violence legitimately (in ordinary discourse) is fundamentally different than when individuals can. We cannot look to institutions to mediate the boundaries of those circumstances. Even ideas like “aggressor” are unhelpful in evaluating such conduct. There are simply interests and populations negotiating those interests. Rights theory is swell and all, but at some point you have to stop denying the obviousness of the fact that populations disagree about what those rights are and the “right” theory is merely the one that is presently enforced.

Israel's interests involve cleansing Palestinians from the land. — StreetlightX

You make a good argument for an asshole, but a bad one for a peacnik. Particular Israelis fall on a wide spectrum of how to relate to Israeli Arabs, Palestinian Israelis, and Palestinians. The interest of the state, however, is not usually defined as the politics of a particularly reprehensible bunch of them. When one speaks of the interests of a state, generally they are invoking theories of government and statehood, not a particular agenda. In this specific instance, if one does not deny the right of Israel to exist, it seems like that person must acknowledge that Israel has a right to secure itself against destruction. In the context of the nations surrounding Israel that have made it abundantly clear they wish Israel not to exist and groups within the occupied territories have said the same, why shouldn’t Israel take those threats seriously? And if they do take them seriously, how should they respond to those threats?

If we can’t start the conversation with “the Palestinians should not be oppressed/abused/exploited by anyone, including the Israelis” and “the Israelis have an interest in continued existence which they have the right to forcibly defend”, then there appears to be an asymmetry in how each group is being treated in the conversation. The question is generally not whether that is the case, but how much oppression Israel permitted to foist upon others in order to defend itself in the face of ongoing existential threat. That is to say, we are involved with negotiating the legitimate claims of two parties in what feels much like a zero sum game. How does Israel remain secure while instantly stopping any form of “oppression” of the Palestinians? What do you suppose will happen if Hamas is given free transit across Israeli territory so that Israel is not depriving them of their freedom of travel?

or is it that you want people to know that your abuse/mis-use of the term wasn't done out of ignorance, but out of a deliberate attempt to deceive/mislead? — Seppo

Increasingly you seem to have no idea what you are talking about and just want to put words in my mouth. Not one single time did I say Israel has done nothing wrong or that Israel hasn’t unjustifiably abused Palestinians. What I did say is that 180’s demand of “stop oppressing them now” (a paraphrase) before they can claim any moral standing in the conversation is problematic. It isn’t the sort of advice that is offered to be constructive, but dismissive. And if someone is unwilling to actually engage with someone’s interests to see how they can be addressed within the context of the ongoing situation, one might question whether the “oppressor” is seen in the same human terms as the “oppressed.” In particular, one might question why Israel isn’t the oppressed whose methods can’t be questioned until their oppressors stop.

It would be swell if, on a philosophy forum, you could do some. What makes case A and B similar/dissimilar? What constitutes oppression? Can the oppressed ever be oppressors? How might an oppressed group understand demands that they “play by the rules?” To what extent does history have relevance in understanding current cultural behaviors/power?

Othering either group is wrong. Acknowledging divergent interests isn’t equivalent to approving bad behavior.

You're the one mis-using the term — Seppo

Tell me, where does Supersessionism fall in your definition? How about otherness and scapegoatism? Just wondering if you are coming at this from typical western ignorance or something special.

being wrong in the right way is an art to which I've dedicated the better part of my life :grin: — Seppo

You aren’t wrong about that. I hope you finally master it one day.

Its unfortunate how frequently spurious/arbitrary accusations of anti-Semitism are used as an excuse to wave away legitimate criticisms of the Israeli state/military. I'd say that the victims of actual anti-Semitism deserve better than to have it turned into a cheap rhetorical ploy. — Seppo

I wonder if you know what anti-Semitism is. Without going on a long lecture about it, anti-Semitism is structural and is not about "victims." There is/was anti-Semitism in places that don't even have a single Jew and haven't/hadn't for hundreds of years. We can explore this more, but that would be for another thread.

There are lots of legitimate criticisms of Israel. I make them, you can make them, and 180 can make them. What I was specifically criticizing in 180's posts is the idea that Israel must stop what it is doing entirely before anyone can be critical of what the Palestinians are doing in response to their perceived oppression. It isn't that the Palestinians are wrong, but rather that one must consider Israel to have legitimate interests at least equal to that of the Palestinians. You don't have to stomp Jews in the street to participate in/perpetuate anti-Semitism.

This is just textbook whataboutism; — Seppo

No, it is textbook "Here is the way in which what you are doing right now is emblematic of anti-Semitism". Yes, Israel does bad things. No, Saudi Arabia doing bad things doesn't excuse Israel's bad things. Yes, Israel has done bad, unjustifiable things to Palestinians, should be held to account for that, and should immediately desist from doing those things. If someone is concerned about the welfare of people and they manage to spend a disproportionate amount of energy on Israel relative to the harm caused by Israel, one must ask "Why?" I am explicitly not saying don't be critical of Israel. I am, however, calling the internet sport of bashing Israel out for what it is. Here is an analogy - there is lots of trash music in the world. A white dude in Kansas spending all of his time denigrating the rap scene in LA because it is derivative and listening it to it primarily to negatively critique it is probably not so interested in detached musical criticism if he never spends time engaging with country music in the same way.* One can be racist while still being right in a particular criticism.

And there is massive asymmetry between the two groups — Seppo

Undeniably so. And the grinding of the boot into the Palestinian's throat is gratuitous. But just as a police officer is authorized to subdue a suspect, our expectation is that the least amount of justifiable force is applied and that anything beyond that is worthy of criticism. So yes, Israel SHOULD do something other than what it is doing. That does not mean, however, that Israel has no interest/justification in doing some portion of what it is doing. There is never going to be a time where Israel de-militarize to equalize potential use of force between themselves and the Palestinians. That asymmetry cannot, therefore, stand as an independent criticism of Israel. Yes, that means that Israel should recognize restraint in ways that the Palestinians cannot (Israel has guided missiles, Palestinians do not), but regardless of effectiveness of method, BOTH parties are wrong when they fire those missiles at population centers.

my Irony Meter just about exploded! — Seppo

Your irony meter might explode, but the fault is with the equipment. You should talk to the person responsible for calibrating/designing it.




* - I want to be careful here about saying that no one outside of an oppressed community can ever be critical of it and that of necessity such criticism is motivated by bad intent. Intent has nothing to do with the analysis, rather the focus is on the systems which led to doing A over B. Indeed, one can even be supportive of such communities and still be acting in a way that is reflective/supportive of that group's oppression - consider, e.g., fetishism and exoticism.

Do you believe Gandhi, King, X, Mandela, Tutu, Wiesel, ... Ho Chi Mihn ... are wrong? :brow: — 180 Proof

This always feels so disingenuous. They were all wrong, some more so than others, but that doesn’t mean that the causes they are identified with were completely misguided.

Siding with the oppressed does not mean losing any ability to be critical of their methods. It also doesn’t mean that every bad act is an existential threat. We are all born victims of history - some of us better off than others, but none of us responsible for the situation in which we find ourselves. Survival depends upon the consumption of resources - resources which were previously possessed by someone else in a world in which all resources are claimed. The entire world is an oppressive system in which each of us must struggle (alone or in community). Your acknowledgement of one group’s claim to oppression does not mean that it is the only oppression that is meaningful.

It doesn’t take much reading of tea leaves to see the rampant anti-semitism in the hand waving about Palestine. Not because it is about the Jews, but precisely because it is not about the Jews - the state of Israel as a proxy for the modern version of the Christendom vs. Islam renders it nothing but an object to be kicked about without any actual acknowledgment of its interests.

You want apartheid? Go to Saudi Arabia. Bigger population, more oppression, vastly worse, and yet crickets. No endless posts here, or anywhere else really, where people go on and on about how the Saudis should just give up their oppression and return what they stole.

There is a massive difference between Israeli apologetics and seeing Israelis as a group with legitimate interests just the same as Palestinians. Both groups cause harm to themselves and others as they struggle against their oppression.

Maslow's hierarchy is bollocks.

Life is the sickness unto death. Desire is the root of suffering. Self-abnegation is the path to enlightenment.

So say a hell of lot more people than Maslow.

Random article by way of amusement not recommendation.

Sounds a bit like you’ve bought the drugs medicine is selling. A diagnosis is largely a heuristic meant to assist in the treatment of a patient. To the extent that treatment is effective, it is of no moment whether the diagnosis (provisional or otherwise) was correct. We simply stop asking further questions once symptoms have resolved and/or further treatment seems ineffective. Sure, it would be swell to have a correct diagnosis, but the cost of knowing what is wrong is a luxury that cannot be afforded by a system concerned with getting the best medical outcome given the constraints of the system.

Results, not theories, matter in the practice of medicine. Efficacy is not, however, indicative of proper understanding. Paradigms can shift, but that doesn’t mean that antibiotics weren’t effective at treating symptoms.

Universal claims about morality are dumb? Really? — L'éléphant

I’m a nihilist and an emotivist. Any other questions?

I deny your premise and find appeals to pre-history coupled with categorical statements boring. Or as you say, “annoying and unoriginal.” Your continued use of language in a totally unreflected manner will not sway me to join hands with you in your essentialist non-sense. I’m not even convinced yet that you understand the difference between descriptivism and prescriptivism and what value, if any, your appeals to how things were has in a discussion of ethics.

I call it as I see it. That's all. — Agent Smith

A blind man in a dark room describing the sun would do a better job in many cases than you do in describing religion and religious figures. Also, maybe you should read some feminist theory on religion and history generally. The contributions of women may have been historically marginalized/ignored, but it would be nice if we modern folk tried a bit harder at learning about what actually happened before writing off more than 50% of the population.

As for founding religions - outside of Muhammad, I don’t think you’ve named a single person (male or female) that founded one.

Putting aside religion, the comments here, including yours, suffer from a profound lack of awareness of culture/socialization versus essential categorical features (whether the category is biological or otherwise). Western civilization and patriarchy’s need to categorize people in ways to justify oppression was boring 50 years ago. The attribution of characteristics based upon biology needs to stop. Ethics, as a social construct, is not a feature of a particular individual’s biological composition, even if a particular ethic includes distinctions based upon such composition. One cannot strip ethics from culture and one cannot really discuss ethics in the absence of social behavior.

Even @L'éléphant’s passing reference to scientific America in support of the non-sense being spewed is painfully wrong. From the article:

… Shall we blame it on testosterone, the Y chromosome, or other genetic differences? The current evidence doesn't point in that direction. Instead, a recent series of studies by Laura Kray and Michael Haselhuhn suggests that the root of this pattern may be more socio-cultural in nature, as men - at least in American culture - seem motivated to protect and defend their masculinity. These scientists suggest that losing a "battle," particularly in contexts that are highly competitive and historically male oriented, presents a threat to masculine competency. Apparently manhood is relatively fragile and precarious, and when it is challenged, men tend to become more aggressive and defensive. …
— “SA”

This conversation is a bit like the historic study of psychology - a bunch of Westerners studying Westerners or groups they brought to heel making universal claims about humanity. Stop acting as if bad empericism saves flagrantly sexist claims from being sexist. We are, I hope, sophisticated enough on this forums to understand that universal claims about morality are dumb, that discussing a particular morality as if it is a stand in for all possible moralities is dumb, and that the the descriptivism of ethnographers does not set the boundaries for meta-ethics or the normative claims that particular ethical theories make.

An implied or can do just as much work as an express one. Be careful that they understand that discussing evidence of G is separate from discussing evidence of ~G. If they understand from go that any question about G supports your claim of ~G, you won’t get far.

Here is a related type argument: Russell’s tea pot. Notice the contrast of agnosticism as to a particular belief in or belief in not. We can functionally act as if not in the absence of compelling evidence for, but that doesn’t mean we have to actively believe not. Why commit to a position for which you have no evidence and which, in principle, you cannot have such evidence.



https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot

you must either believe — Jon Sendama

Invoking logical nomenclature is useful in its place, but the problem with your statement isn’t about what else you could believe, but about whether you must believe anything. One can have no beliefs with respect to god (or anything else). In some cases, one might call such a position “agnosticism”. When you insist that you must believe “a, b, c, or not a,” and demand someone offer beliefs “e” or “f” as the only alternative to your insistence, you can say that your argument suffers from a number of informal fallacies, but the vastly more important thing is for you to recognize why your insistence is in error.

You make consider ideas like evidentialism useful to your exploration of the theme, but you might also find that a better framework for thinking about beliefs (whether you must have them, what causes them to arise, etc.) more interesting. Take a look at SEP’s article on the ethics of belief.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-belief/

The state budget of New York state on education that comes out of taxes is 2.4 trillion dollars. — god must be atheist

Source? You appear to be orders of magnitude off, even for the entire US spend. NY seems to be around 80 billion for total spend/revenues in 2020. And that is inclusive of all state and federal sources of revenue.



https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/school-finances/tables/2020/secondary-education-finance/20elsec_prelim.xlsx

Randomly, object oriented programming has been compared to substance ontology where process programming is process ontology.

There are so many big issues in questions like this that it is had to meaningfully discuss unless people are coming from the same perspective.

Voters are entitled to representation of their choice (claim). Any restrictions on qualifications or behavior of a representative are effectively restrictions on voter choice. Assuming that unfettered choice is among the major aspirational goals of designing government, there must be a compelling reason to limit that choice.

In the US, there are already tools available to moderate the behavior of members of Congress - which tools are freely available to other members of Congress at any time. The US Constitution includes language (Article 1, Section 5, Clause 2) providing for both the House and the Senate to expel members based on the concurrence of 2/3 of the respective house. This mechanism essentially limits the Federal Government's ability to expel elected representatives absent the highest form of agreement required, a requirement that suggests that the behavior must be so grave that 2/3 of a house acting in good conscience would believe it appropriate to expel a member. What this means is that if a member does something objectionable (whether it was declared objectionable before or after the fact), that member can be removed - no additional laws, rules, etc. are required.

In the context of unfettered (or minimally restricted) choice of representatives combined with a mechanism for Congress to remove bad actors (assuming the act was so bad as to have 2/3 of members agree), grandstanding about yet another rule/law/etc. that can only result in Congress saying, "Bad!" should be seen as the political ploy that it is. If a representative's constituency re-elects them after the bad act (assuming that its occurrence was reasonably knowable), then the people have spoken. This is very similar to Trump not disclosing his tax returns - he didn't, he got elected, and because the Democrats wanted to see them, they tried to make law that would have compelled any candidate to disclose their tax returns. Rather than accept that people were willing to Support Trump in his intransigence, the Democrats tried to change the rules to win (future election) by other means.

Representatives are not employees. Treating them as such misses the point of their existence.

People in favor of pretend restrictions or criminalizing otherwise lawful behavior to get around the inability to expel a member should explain what compelling reason exists to supplant the will of a representative's constituency.

I don't know where you live, but my guess is that you live in a Christian culture surrounded by people that wouldn't identify as Progressive Christians. There is no easy answer at the ground level. People typically know little more about their religion than they do their government or political party - they are just engaged in tribalistic behavior where their tribe is the best and you are either in it or an enemy. My personal experience (both as a child and now with children in the "secular" school system in the US) is not good when it comes to keeping Christianity out of the classroom. Christianity is just the background of the living in the US - be it secular or religious. You can't get around it and people who are Christian have a hard time seeing how pervasive it is (though some see it and intentionally promote it). By way of ludicrous example, the assistant superintendent responsible for curriculum in my district said that Santa Claus is not a Christian symbol/character because he is not in the Bible.

My issue, and the motivation I engage with these sorts of topics, is not in order to give Christianity anymore legitimacy or reasoned defenses. It is, however, to point that religion writ large is not the bogeyman that people make it out to be. When critiquing particular sorts of Christians (even if it is the overwhelming majority of Christians), that critique is expanded to "religion" as if all religions are identical. Religion can be good or bad - they are, after all, created by people engaged in social behavior with all of the attendant perils. Because religion is popularly conceived so poorly in more educated crowds, there is no room for discussing religion in positive terms or even exploring why religion should persist.

My arguments (about religion) are met as poorly by the proselytizers as yours. We can yell and scream all we want, but they don't care and are glad to continue their bad behavior. For as much as people speak of special pleading around religion, it is pervasive. Anti-religion folk want to treat religion uniquely (consider legislation aimed at limiting religious expression specifically while freely permitting other types of speech) just as Christians want Christianity to receive special positive treatment. In either case, religion is deemed a relevant factor when there are fairly limited circumstances in which that is true.

Stop trying to fix religious bad behavior as if that will fix society generally. Issues like bullying are systemic/cultural issues and the systems/culture that permit bullying are indistinguishable from those that permit religious bullying. Focusing on preventing bad religious behavior (religious bullying) to the exclusion of others (bullying for having the wrong physical features) is, on my view, in error. Don't want school yard bullying? Do X. Don't want religious school yard bullying? Do... something other than X?

Want to hate Christianity? Go for it. Want to exclude people because they are Christian? Take a moment to consider whether their specific form of Christianity is relevant to your goals/agenda unless the mere inclusion of a "Christian" would compromise your other goals/agenda. But no matter how you feel about Christians, stop dictating what religion is, was, or can be. Especially stop questioning the legitimacy of someone's religion because it doesn't comport with your understanding of bad religions.

Religion will long outlive us both, maybe we should be fostering better religion (however you understand that) and not just kicking it.

I can't find it. — baker

Here is a snip-it.

Ontology of truth: How many answers are ‘correct’ in the sight of God?
When scholars differ on a matter, is there only one true answer in the sight of God or are there multiple correct answers? There is agreement that in the case of differences in the canonical modes of reciting the Qurʾan (qirāʾāt) there are multiple correct answers,[79] and in differences in doctrinal fundamentals, there is only one correct answer.80 But what about differences in jurisprudence or secondary matters of the religion that are open to interpretation (furūʿ)?81 There is considerable discussion of this topic in the Islamic tradition and the two competing camps are called muṣawwibah (those who affirm multiple true answers; i.e., truth pluralism)82 and mukhaṭṭiʾah (those who affirm only one true answer). . . .
— Difference of Opinion: Where Do We Draw the Line?

that they are right and I am wrong, and that their religion is the one and only right on — baker

Repeating this time and again isn't all that helpful. If you ask a certain sort of religious person, that is the answer you will get. If you ask a different sort, they will give you a different answer. Unsurprisingly, Catholics and a broad swath of Protestants will claim exclusivism.

Here is a bad Wiki article on the topic.

Religious exclusivism, or exclusivity, is the doctrine or belief that only one particular religion or belief system is true.[1] This is in contrast to religious pluralism, which believes that all religions provide valid responses to the existence of God.[2] . . . — Wikipedia on Religious Exclusivism

And here is something that sounds more in Philosophy when speaking about pluralism.

2. Religious Pluralism

A theory of religious pluralism says that all religions of some kind are the same in some valuable respect(s). While this is compatible with some religion being the best in some other respect(s), the theorists using this label have in mind that many religions are equal regarding the central value(s) of religion. (Legenhausen 2009)

The term “religious pluralism” is almost always used for a theory asserting positive value for many or most religions. But one may talk also of “negative religious pluralism” in which most or all religions have little or no positive value and are equal in this respect. This would be the view of many naturalists, who hold that all religions are the product of human imagination, and fail to have most or all of the values claimed for them. (Byrne 2004; Feuerbach 1967)
— IEP on Religious Diversity

I'm happy to discuss the topic if you like, but I can't help but feel that you are more interested in maintaining a view in support of your religious politics rather than learning something about religion. Just let me know which direction you want to go in.

If you are curious about a Christian view on pluralism, here is a random site.

The resources are out there if you care to find them. I'd rather not have to curate the internet for you.

I can’t tell you a thing about him, but I’ve been a fan of Priests for over a decade. Once upon a time he came and visited the “old” forum. His willingness to seriously consider dialethia really opened the door to my willingness to consider affirmative evidence on its own merit and to understand why rejecting indirect proofs is important.

Does a true contradiction yield itself or do we just have to do some empirical work to resolve/reframe the engima? — Nils Loc

What would evidence look like of a true contradiction? Perhaps your methods (and expectations) dictate your results.

@baker,

Additionally, since this is a philosophy forum and all, maybe you should consider the religion of the ancient Greeks and see if you can suss out some “one truth faith” or “one true interpretation” that is about being right for all of times.

The whole point of religion is about being right, for all times!! — baker

There is no “point” to religion.

Religions are not static and change over time. Some religions are more willing to acknowledge that change than others. At any moment in time, there are diversity of opinions among adherents. Some of those opinions are deemed “orthodox” and others “heterodox”, but that doesn’t mean that all disagreements require that there be only one answer.

When dealing with religions that are more rules based, e.g. Judaism and Islam, c.f. Christianity, the rules have to be applied to novel circumstance and as such different people may apply the rules differently and come to different interpretations - all within the confines of orthodoxy. By way of pointing to a much more established “religion” than mine, you may want to look at things like a fatwa, faqih, and ulama. Here is a random article discussing difference of opinion within Islam.

There also religions that are more loosely hobbled together such as Hinduism and therefore must have a wider tent of “orthodoxy.” This is Wiki on Orthodoxy with reference to Hinduism.

Orthodoxy does not exist in Hinduism, as the word Hindu itself collectively refers to the various beliefs of people who lived beyond the Sindhu river of the Indus Valley Civilization. It is a synthesis of the accepted teachings of each of thousands of gurus, who others equate to prophets, and has no founder, no authority or command, but recommendations. The term most equivalent to orthodoxy at best has the meaning of "commonly accepted" traditions rather than the usual meaning of "conforming to a doctrine", for example, what people of middle eastern faiths attempt to equate as doctrine in Hindu philosophies is Sanatana Dharma, but which at best can be translated to mean "ageless traditions", hence denoting that they are accepted not through doctrine and force but through multi-generational tests of adoption and retention based on circumstantial attrition through millennia.
— “Wikipedia on Orthodoxy”

Between Islam an Hinduism, you’ve got around 3 billion people out of a world population of 8 billion. Go tell them what their “religion” is supposed to be.

P.S. The random article I linked has a section entitled “Ontology of truth: How many answers are ‘correct’ in the sight of God?” that you may find of interest.

And pretty much every religion/spirituality categorically disagrees with your claim. — baker

Sure, but my religion does agree with me. And has for a few thousand years. People’s inclination towards certainty isn’t new, but it doesn’t mean that it dominates all traditions.

The claim of being “right” for all of time lacks the sort of humility required from fallible people in an ever changing world.

If you say so ... — 180 Proof

Says the man who cites Ecclesiastes in support of salvation in the afterlife…


5For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for their remembrance is forgotten.
6Also their love, as well as their hate, as well as their provocation has already been lost, and they have no more share forever in all that is done under the sun.
7Go, eat your bread joyfully and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already accepted your deeds.
8At all times, let your garments be white, and let oil not be wanting on your head.
9Enjoy life with the wife whom you love all the days of the life of your vanity, whom He has given you under the sun, all the days of your vanity, for that is your portion in life and in your toil that you toil under the sun.
10Whatever your hand attains to do [as long as you are] with your strength, do; for there is neither deed nor reckoning, neither knowledge nor wisdom in the grave, where you are going.

where "Moses" is indicated as representative of "Judaism" — 180 Proof

What's the common thread, the leitmotif, that unites the following personalities? — Agent Smith

He asked what these personalities had in common, not what these religions had in common. Taking Moses as a symbol for Judaism (which didn’t exist and which he isn’t) in the midst of the major reinvention of the Israelites (a disposed people) as they emerged from Egypt and returned to the promised land is not what the question was or why I said what I said. Moses (the figure in the story) is not a Jesus or Buddha analog. And his message sure wasn’t about salvation in another life.

And yes, your goyish understanding sucks, but it is some good PR for a bad retelling. If you actually want to talk about what Judaism is, it would be swell if you didn’t resort to the political messaging of a group interested in self legitimization.

————-

To add a touch of clarity/context for the muddle that is about to come: if god doesn’t exist and all of the Jewish claims about a relationship to god are false, you can’t look to Jewish mythology (even Jewish origin mythology) to explain what Judaism is or is not or how/why it came to be. You have to study Judaism historical Judaism the same you do any other historical subject. With that said, what we know about people like Moses is what is contained in the story book, not some secret trove of complete historical evidence.

The story of the Hebrews/Israelites/Jews is long with many different periods of thought. As they encountered various cultures, were conquered, dispossessed, reestablished, reconquered, redispossed, etc. the way that Jews thought about themselves and the significance of their religious heritage changed. When you see things like “salvation” what you are seeing is a type of Helenization of the Jews that occured during the latter half of the 2nd temple period through its destruction and co-evolution with early Christianity. That some group of people within a Jewish community tried to incorporate foreign ideas into Jewish thought and that group of people came to have significant influence in how later Judaism discussed things is not an indication that these ideas are either pervasive in the minds of Jews throughout time and/or related to the foundations of Jewish thought.

Looking to contemporary “orthodoxy” as a guide to what historic Judaism was is a fool’s errand. It is what people do that wish to be a part of a particular Jewish community, not what people interested in the historic development of Judaism do. Creation myths (and the ways that are modified/emphasized by particular groups) are about legitimizing the status quo (or subverting it establish a new power). They are not actual studies of the historical record.

In the context of a philosophy forum, the assumption should be that religious myth is ahistorical, i.e. that the mere fact that a myth is told does not indicate that it is true. We cannot, therefore, simply accept what contemporary practitioners of a religion represent to be the truth of their existence.

Now back to the muddle.

——-

You can start with historic question of a) when Judaism came to be and b) whether it is even sensible to say it was founded. Mythic history doesn’t dictate the “facts” of what Judaism is - especially since there is scant historical evidence of either the Exodus or the existence of Moses (and especially not any of the associated miracles or covenants with god).

The biggest issue with what you are missing is that Judaism is theoretically the cultural heritage of people exiled from the land and their historic encounter with what it was to be in exile while maintaining an enduring myth of group identity revolving around a long gone promised land. Your 613 mitzvot didn’t exist when the 2nd temple was destroyed and sure as hell didn’t exist when Moses is alleged to have been around or when Israel first got his name.

In any event, the typical schtick around the 613 mitzvot is that some are explicable and some are not, but they are kept because god said so and not in expectation of some reward. There are but a handful where the tradition says, “Do this in order to obtain that.” While the late 2nd temple period saw talk of the after-life, there was never a time where normative Judaism would have claimed that adherence to the mitzvot was to bring about some better circumstance in the after-life. I commend to you the high-holiday liturgy (traditional or otherwise) and what are considered to be the most important of Jewish prayers - prayers for life and present safekeeping. You do not find people praying for their eternal souls.

Also, your telling of Abraham is off. He was actually rewarded by god during his life and was promised that his blessings would continue. He wasn’t some schlub that toiled in hopes that future generations would benefit, he was rewarded by god in his lifetime and not promised salvation in some here after.

To the extent Judaism might have a salvation myth, it is centered around the coming of the Messiah that will result in the ingathering of the Jews, the return of the Temple, and the Davidic line being reestablished. What is amusing about this is that Judaism is not a temple based religion and no one actually wants it to go back to that (or to have a king). These are symbolic positions within the context of a religion expressly concerned with living. As the saying goes, “You shall live..”

You might consider some of the oldest prayers in Judaism for a sense of what Jews have thought was important from the “beginning”. The Amidah is one such collection of prayers (as is the Kaddish, but the Kaddish is used for more purposes than you might realize). The mourner’s Kaddish, which is what you referred to, says the following:

Glorified and sanctified be God’s great name throughout the world
which He has created according to His will.

May He establish His kingdom in your lifetime and during your days,
and within the life of the entire House of Israel, speedily and soon;
and say, Amen.

May His great name be blessed forever and to all eternity.

Blessed and praised, glorified and exalted, extolled and honored,
adored and lauded be the name of the Holy One, blessed be He,
beyond all the blessings and hymns, praises and consolations that
are ever spoken in the world; and say, Amen.

May there be abundant peace from heaven, and life, for us
and for all Israel; and say, Amen.

He who creates peace in His celestial heights,
may He create peace for us and for all Israel;
and say, Amen.
— “Random Kaddish Translation”

You’ll notice a distinct lack of prayers for the souls of the dead in the after-life. The prayer is for life and to bless the living.

they make promises to their followers which can only be fulfilled after their followers die — 180 Proof

Do you mind finding a single quote of Moses where he talks about the afterlife? Or where he says, "You all must be dead before god will give you the land"? Moses is neither Jesus nor Buddha. He was an outgroup prophet that did what god said within earshot/miracleshot of the people around him. He is even alleged to have had someone else do the public talking for him. He and his brother die in the wilderness within site of the promised land as an act of public cruelty by god. The Israelites, within their lifetimes, conquer/vanquish/eradicate countless peoples/nations as their god among gods gives them the land god promised their forebearers. They get the promised land. No waiting necessary.

Once we enter the realm of dialethism and true contradictions you're going to have to page a professional logician or a Buddhist monk perhaps. — Nils Loc

I'm neither, but here is a thought for the day:

:heart:

You are looking at a red heart.

That statement may be interpreted (call it P) in a variety of ways such as

I1) You are looking at a red heart.
I2) You are looking at symbol of a heart which is red.
I3) You are looking at an image of a symbol of a heart which is red.
I4) ...

It is rather boring to point out that depending on the interpretation of P, P may be true or may be false, and since P can be interpreted in ways that could be true or could be false, P is both true and false. This is equivocation - using different senses of a word as if they are the same. Call this "EP" for equivocated P. EP is often the sort of explanation for why P is both true and false at the same time but not really a logical contradiction and hence not violative of the rules of thought.

And now..

I5) You are looking at screen with lots of pixels that are various colors that are evocative of a red heart.

This fits nicely in EP

I6) You are looking at a screen with lots of pixels that are flashing on an off at a rate that is undetectable to your brain - regardless of the ratio between on and off for a given time period of viewing, you are seeing a red heart.

Is this EP?

No matter how hard you try, there is no sense (as in a sense that you posses/can make use of) in which you are not looking at a red heart even though you know that some portion of time (even the overwhelming majority of time) you are looking at the screen it is not a red heart. We are simply incapable of sensing what is known to be true - you are not looking at a red heart. And yet, we also know that we are seeing a red heart the whole while we are looking at the pixels that are flashing on and off.

So what do we make of I6)? P is known to be true and known to be false. We aren't changing senses as we have only one sense: what we see. Notice that the interpretation of P in this case does not change even though you justifiably, knowingly, believingly assert that you both are and are not looking at a red heart.

Try to imagine how you might demonstrate that you are not looking at a red heart while you are seeing a red heart, i.e. what sort of evidence could you adduce that gives warrant that you are not looking at a red heart? You can do a bunch of inferential proofs and demonstrations - slow things down, build analogous machines, etc. The thing is, all of those inferences do not change that you see a red heart when you look at the red heart that is not a red heart.

So go back to the beginning of my post. Look at the red heart. Now you know what it is to look at something that is and is not a red heart.

So now we know it could be, as opposed to whether it is or ever has been. — Hanover

But meaning is use! And we can't ask what the words mean to us privately, but have to look at the contexts in which those words are used and the resultant behavior! Oh wait. I see what you did there. Applied some analytic philosophy to the analytic philosophers that lost their way because you are talking about a book they hate. Surely Witty thinks you are wrong.

the sacred lies in the realm of ideas — sime

Would you please elaborate a bit on this? I can't tell if you are saying something tautological (eg "sacred" is a non-physical attribute or "sacred" is a category created by/imposed by minds) or something deeper than that.

"That is a sacred tree."
"That is a sacred house."
"That is sacred ground."
"That is a sacred act."
"That is a sacred book."
"That is a sacred vow."

Each of these sentences strikes me as meaningful and well formed. The variety illustrates the end of your sentence "ideas is physically contingent"., but the quoted part of your sentence is what I am trying to better understand.

This quote is for a bit of context for a more general question: are we using "sacred" as in "sacred vs. profane" (that is, the largest bucket) or something more limited such that using words like "consecrated" and "holy" are unrelated to the topic?

Although there are similarities between the terms sacred and holy, which are also sometimes used interchangeably, there are subtle differences. Holiness is generally the term used in relation to persons and relationship, whereas sacredness is used in relation to objects, places, or happenings.
— Wiki on Sacred

When people do the same thing, it's (usually) because they have something in common unless...all of them hit upon the same idea by fluke. — Agent Smith

None of the people you are discussing hit upon the same idea. It is only by ignoring all of the substance of the various traditions around the mentioned individuals that you can claim similarity. Also, the enduring traditions of the religions are not equally as invested in the various figures you mentioned.

Trying to force commonality between religions serves little purpose besides advancing notions of universalism despite the evidence to the contrary.

What were they then? — Agent Smith

Jesus is alleged to be of the house of Judah (which makes no sense, but whatever). Moses was adopted by the Pharaoh's daughter shortly after birth and raised as an Egyptian prince.

one was a slave (Moses) — Agent Smith

Moses wasn’t a slave. Jesus was not a Cohen, i.e. not a priest.

For what it is worth…

Christianity 2.382 billion 31.11%
Islam 1.907 billion 24.9%
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist 1.193 billion 15.58%
Hinduism 1.161 billion 15.16%
Buddhism 506 million 5.06%
Chinese traditional religion[c] 394 million 5%
Ethnic religions excluding some in separate categories 300 million 3%
African traditional religions 100 million 1.2%
…
— “From Wikipedia on Religious Membership”

So like 1% of the world doesn’t fit into one of those buckets. Only 3 of the religions on Agent Smith’s list of major religions are in the 7 “religions” that make up virtually the entirety of religious adherence in the modern world.

Moses wasn’t Jewish (if he existed at all). He did not promise anything about the afterlife and certainly nothing about salvation from self-immeseration. Judaism is not Christianity without Jesus and it isn’t interested in the same themes as Christianity is. The majority of Jews do not believe in revealed truths that come from authority.

I really fail to understand what the value is of doing “comparative religion” when all that seems to be discussed is Christianity, Christianity adjacent tokens, and some theorizing about the Buddha. How about start with a religion of about 1.2 billion people and see what it says as compared to modern science and some of the thoughts of philosophy - you know, Hinduism. Maybe we could do a bit of discussion on Pramana, Brahman, Purusartha, and Naya (epistemology, metaphysics, axiology, and logic). Although we manage to abstract “philosophy” (I know, it isn’t about wisdom anymore, it is all about methods of proper thinking) from context (which was religious until fairly recently as a predominant orientation) in the West and so pretend like there is philosophy outside of religion, when looking at other cultures, the philosophy is still unabashedly maintained in its religious context.

Religious malcontents trolling the philosophy of religion section with no real interest in philosophy of religion (philosophy that comes from religion) or philosophy of religion (philosophy about religion) leads to nothing but impoverished conversations. I often feel tempted to refer to SEP on the philosophy of religion just for the introduction - a rather earnest and sympathetic exploration of why philosophy of religion.

Today, philosophy of religion is one of the most vibrant areas of philosophy. . . .What accounts for this vibrancy? Consider four possible reasons.

First: The religious nature of the world population. Most social research on religion supports the view that the majority of the world’s population is either part of a religion or influenced by religion (see the Pew Research Center online). To engage in philosophy of religion is therefore to engage in a subject that affects actual people, rather than only tangentially touching on matters of present social concern. Perhaps one of the reasons why philosophy of religion is often the first topic in textbook introductions to philosophy is that this is one way to propose to readers that philosophical study can impact what large numbers of people actually think about life and value. . .

Second: Philosophy of religion as a field may be popular because of the overlapping interests found in both religious and philosophical traditions. Both religious and philosophical thinking raise many of the same, fascinating questions and possibilities about the nature of reality, the limits of reason, the meaning of life, and so on. . . .

Third, studying the history of philosophy provides ample reasons to have some expertise in philosophy of religion. In the West, the majority of ancient, medieval, and modern philosophers philosophically reflected on matters of religious significance. . . .

In Chinese and Indian philosophy there is an even greater challenge than in the West to distinguish important philosophical and religious sources of philosophy of religion. It would be difficult to classify Nagarjuna (150–250 CE) or Adi Shankara (788–820 CE) as exclusively philosophical or religious thinkers. Their work seems as equally important philosophically as it is religiously (see Ranganathan 2018).

Fourth, a comprehensive study of theology or religious studies also provides good reasons to have expertise in philosophy of religion. As just observed, Asian philosophy and religious thought are intertwined and so the questions engaged in philosophy of religion seem relevant: what is space and time? . . .
— “Excerpt from SEP on Philosophy of Religion”

Truths are just claims that are expressed as propositions, they don't exist somewhere in the ether. — Sam26

No one said that they do. It is just that different people can utter the same proposition. To the extent that proposition is true when uttered, it doesn't become not true because someone with different epistemic warrant utters it. The criteria for "is true" are not the criteria for "is believed" or "is justified". Are you claiming that when I say, "Ennui is wearing a wedding ring" it is true given my warrant and that when you say "Ennui is wearing a wedding ring" it is false because you lack sufficient warrant?

P.S. Good luck with your book.