That makes two of us, comrades in ignorance.

A faithful muslim obeys and honors their religious authorities — Noble Dust

They don't have religious authorities that compare to Christian ones. There's no Muslim pope. There are guys who serve the community, there are Muslim scholars of various schools, but none of those exert authority per se. So in Saudi Arabia, the power behind the Wahhabi family is the monarchy. In turn, the Wahhabis assure the legitimacy of the king. It's a very stable relationship.

Christian authorities don't need that kind of backing, which makes separation of church and state a little easier to accomplish.

Now it feels like postmodernism, with its scepticism towards both Enlightenment universalism and the individual subject of experience, is precisely the kind of philosophy that suits modern society, with its fragmented public sphere and atomized populace. That is, it doesn’t seem like much of a challenge to the status quo, not significantly critical at all, despite sometimes seeming to be. — Jamal

Postmodernism passé? I often wonder to what extent it ever emerged from academe, other than through a few slogans and misunderstood terms. I think you're right that its tendencies broadly seem to match those of mainstream Western culture. But what drove what?

EDIT: I just realized: in fact, self-critical Enlightenment has not only led to postmodernist anti-humanism and anti-universalism; it has also led to philosophers like Zizek, who (I think) has made it his mission to rehabilitate both universalism and the subject. So all is not lost! — Jamal

Sounds like this could be its own OP. Deliverance by Zizek. I note that in a 2004 interview, Zizek observed-

Often, the worst way to become prisoner of a system is to have a dream that things may turn better, there is always the possibility of change. Because it is precisely this secret dream that keeps you enslaved to the system.

Could Enlightenment be that dream?

I don’t want to argue now against increased mastery, but can you explain why you think it coincides with moral improvement? — Jamal

It's partly because increased means changes the calculus to tip the balance towards the moral choice. Such as how the abolishment of slavery in the West coincided with the industrialisation of the West. It's easier to say "let's not have slaves because slavery is wrong" when you've got machines to do the back-breaking labour you wanted to force onto someone else. The promise of being able to do better is given to us by technological and economic improvement. The solutions we rely on today didn't exist before, and the problems we'll solve in the future will be solved with technology that doesn't exist today.

The other half is that outcomes are not just the result of our will to be good. We might look at the state of policing and law and condemn our societies as unjust. But perhaps these are just the limitations of our organisational infrastructure, our laws, and our technology, we're just bad at these things.

It's complicated, and my explanation is not exhaustive, but that's the gist of my point.

Sure, I think of humans like that sometimes. I was really just referring to the suffering of human beings, usually caused by other human beings. War, oppression, and poverty, that kind of thing. That last paragraph in the OP was a rather grand and emotive way of making the point that we shouldn’t reduce those past evils (not that they are consigned to the past) to steps on a ladder to present or future happiness. — Jamal

Why make such a point? Is Pinker guilty of reducing human suffering to mere rings in a ladder? I'd argue it's clear that Pinker resents the suffering being caused by the conditions he's described, and your attempt to critique him for either forgetting or reducing these issues seems hollow to me. Is it somehow offensive to the victims of war and poverty to call those ills primitive? Or... is there a better word than primitive that you would've preferred he used?

I don’t think that’s what I’m doing. It’s more an examination of ideology, of the myth of inevitable betterment, which I think is implied in the unthinking description of unhappy conditions as primitive — Jamal

Considering that poverty, conflict, disease and so on all predate not only civilisation itself, but human existence. I don't think it's that unreasonable to call those conditions primitive. Why are you sure the implication is that any unhappy condition is primitive?

It's partly because increased means changes the calculus to tip the balance towards the moral choice. Such as how the abolishment of slavery in the West coincided with the industrialisation of the West. It's easier to say "let's not have slaves because slavery is wrong" when you've got machines to do the back-breaking labour you wanted to force onto someone else — Judaka

There are many counterexamples. Together they show that mastery of the conditions of life and moral improvement do not, as you claimed, “almost always” coincide. Take slavery. Far from depending for its existence always on a lower stage of technical development, it was in fact enabled by mastery. It was the complex settled agriculturally-based society that led to class domination, exploitation, imperialism, and slavery. That's very general, but I don't think I need to go into details, because it's common knowledge.

It’s just a movie, and it’s been criticized as being historically innacurate, but what I think is so powerful about Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto is its critique of modernity, especially because it achieves this without casting the Europeans in the role of the modernizers. It shows how civilization, with its achievements in knowledge, art and architecture (those wonderful pyramids) was built on oppression. We shouldn’t glorify the hunters and gatherers, but there is a truth conveyed by this stark contrast (one which is backed up by our study of history and prehistory) even if in the film it’s a simplistic caricature.

I think I'll leave it at that, rather than make a long list. I could do that, but again, it's common knowledge. If the list was chronological, near the end would be the Holocaust and Hiroshima. They depended on technical mastery, and they are still within living memory.

The gist here is that things are more complex. History is not just onwards and upwards, and moral improvement is not technologically or economically determined in any simple way.

However...

The promise of being able to do better is given to us by technological and economic improvement. The solutions we rely on today didn't exist before, and the problems we'll solve in the future will be solved with technology that doesn't exist today. — Judaka

I broadly agree with this. I do believe, for example, that our technical mastery potentially allows us to ensure that everyone has food, shelter, and basic healthcare. It's tempting for me to think in crude terms like this: first, we had egalitarian hunter-gatherer societies, then we had agriculture and industry that made life worse for many people for a while, but now we have the means to achieve a new egalitarianism again, but this time with lots of cool stuff: art, science, knowledge, washing machines, space exploration, long healthy lives, and freedom from the tyranny of nature. That's pretty much the old-fashioned socialist or Marxist view, and probably the regular Liberal view as well, and it's always been where my sympathies lay. But to me it's no longer adequate, either descriptively or morally. This doesn't mean it's entirely wrong, only that it should be critiqued to build a better picture of reality, to show the gap between progress and Progress (between real advances and the myth of inevitable betterment over time).

The other half is that outcomes are not just the result of our will to be good. We might look at the state of policing and law and condemn our societies as unjust. But perhaps these are just the limitations of our organisational infrastructure, our laws, and our technology, we're just bad at these things. — Judaka

Yes, I don't think I see any objection to this either.

Why make such a point? Is Pinker guilty of reducing human suffering to mere rings in a ladder? — Judaka

Sometimes yes, and that's my point. But it's not really about Pinker.

Considering that poverty, conflict, disease and so on all predate not only civilisation itself, but human existence. I don't think it's that unreasonable to call those conditions primitive. Why are you sure the implication is that any unhappy condition is primitive? — Judaka

Not sure I understand this. Pinker does explicitly describe some present-day conditions as primitive. I think it's unreasonable because those conditions might not be mere relics. They might be built in to the way our societies are organized.

the gap between progress and Progress (between real advances and the myth of inevitable betterment over time). — Jamal

I don’t remember, does Pinker claim inevitable betterment over time? I seem to recall warnings about anti-enlightenment (I think that’s the term he uses) movements, as I mentioned earlier.

Obviously. I've said repeatedly that I'm revealing how a particular myth is reproduced in discourse, merely using one short passage from a famous author to do it.

In the OP? I don’t see the claim.

First paragraph.

I've also emphasized it and expanded on it in later posts.

In the memories of many readers—and in the experience of those in less fortunate parts of the world—war, scarcity, disease, ignorance, and lethal menace are a natural part of existence. We know that countries can slide back into these primitive conditions, and so we ignore the achievements of the Enlightenment at our peril. — Steven Pinker

This isn’t claiming “inevitable betterment over time”. If you’ve somehow shown that it is making that claim in other posts I’ve missed it.

This isn’t claiming “inevitable betterment over time”. — praxis

I have not made that claim.

It's not that complicated or subtle, and if you really want to get clear on what I'm saying, I don't think it's too difficult. Just read what I've written with an open mind, applying the principle of charity, and resist the temptation to be pedantic or to leap to the defence of a thinker you admire, just because I appear to be attacking him.

These are some very good thoughts, to which I don't have much of an in depth response. I'm just thinking out loud, and I know it can be annoying to bring religion into this discussion, although I think it needs to be part of it. I appreciate that you bring a measured and seemingly fairly unbiased attitude to discussing religion, which is rare. I'm of course not advocating for any religion, but trying to think and talk through how best to interface with religion in regards to a topic like this, because I think we generally do it pretty badly. Thanks for the response.

It seems to me that atheists submit to authority in their thinking as much as religious people. The ideal atheist, maybe not so much, but then the ideal atheist is just a form of the ideal of the independently rational person, contrasted not with religious people as such but with the blind following of authority of any kind.

I think that everyone is bound, at least to some extent, by their conditioning and ideologies and that this is inescapable. Maybe that's all that you're trying to say? — praxis

Essentially, yes. I just sometimes do so in a way that might be knowingly provocative, i.e. describing secular views with religious terms. I do this not to get reactions or seek attention, but to try to get us to think differently about how value systems work, and to step outside of our own assumptions. Doing this can lead to not only better understanding of oneself but of other people who are different than ourselves. If I sound like some idealistic high school teacher, I don't really care.

You forgot to mention that the purpose, meaning, and value within it are shared. — praxis

No I didn't, I mentioned that.

As for religion, it's as though you're only willing to acknowledge the positive aspects — praxis

In this discussion, I haven't criticized religion, no, because I'm trying to illustrate it's role in this whole "progress narrative", and to do so religion needs to be considered with as little bias as possible, and with an open mind. I was raised protestant and in some ways truly despise protestantism, but I'm not here to do that. I'm trying to get us to be open minded towards the religious perspective. I'm using Islam because I've been learning more about it recently.

Using the crusades to criticize religion is low hanging fruit. I won't even get into it.

If my ultimate authority is science or whatever, what happens if I were to defy its decrees? Would I be declared a heretic and ostracized by the scientific community and lose the sense of purpose, meaning, and value that I share with them? :fear: — praxis

I don't know what your ultimate authority is. My guess is if you feel that you don't have one, you're just not aware of what it is.

They don't have religious authorities that compare to Christian ones. — frank

Yes, I'm not saying they do. but Allah is certainly the ultimate religious authority. The ulama is to be respected. Again, the word Islam means "Submission"; it's in their very fiber, it would appear.

I don't know what your ultimate authority is. My guess is if you feel that you don't have one, you're just not aware of what it is. — Noble Dust

I think it's Pinker :wink:

In the OP? I don’t see the claim. — praxis

I've just realized that I misinterpreted this. I thought you meant my claim that "I'm revealing how a particular myth is reproduced in discourse, merely using one short passage from a famous author to do it."

When I said "Obviously," I meant that it was obvious that Pinker warns us...

about anti-enlightenment (I think that’s the term he uses) movements — praxis

To deal with this misunderstanding once and for all, my point is not that Pinker outright claims inevitable betterment over time, but rather that his thinking, and the idea of progress that underlies it and is common in our culture, tends towards that or depends on it unknowingly.

Often, the worst way to become prisoner of a system is to have a dream that things may turn better, there is always the possibility of change. Because it is precisely this secret dream that keeps you enslaved to the system.

Could Enlightenment be that dream? — Tom Storm

I like this.

It seems to me that atheists submit to authority in their thinking as much as religious people. — Jamal

My intuition agrees, but what's a concrete example? Without pulling out the straw man of scientism, there does seem to sometimes be an unthinking trust in science, whereas in reality science lives and breathes by constant change and updating of previously erroneous hypotheses, etc.

Maybe that's a good example, I'm not sure. I'd rather give as examples extreme nationalism, fascism, Stalinism, etc.

Often, the worst way to become prisoner of a system is to have a dream that things may turn better, there is always the possibility of change. Because it is precisely this secret dream that keeps you enslaved to the system.

Could Enlightenment be that dream? — Tom Storm

Typical Zizek. Looking at the context though, what I think he means is that if the better world is a dream rather than a realistic aim that is conscious of the difficulty of getting there, it functions as pacification.

I agree we tend to interface with religion badly. I think the fault lies (not wanting to come across as too fence-sitting here) on both sides. Excessive defensiveness, essentially. That's why I was trying to emphasise difference rather than scoring either. Athiests (rationalists, empiricists...) are, quite fairly, bristled when told they 'just the same' as religious people in their belief systems, having made such strenuous efforts to try something different. The religious are again quite fairly, upset when told their approach is old-hat or the 'cause of all wars', or some such trope. The former is a process judgement, the latter a value judgement. I think if the religious would concede a process difference and the non-religious would refrain from value judgements there might be some bridges which could be built.

My suspicion is that the loudest voices (which are often the minority) on either camp are distrustful of such a solution because each know their flaws and are afraid to have them exposed, but then I have a habit of psychologising everything so...

It seems to me that atheists submit to authority in their thinking as much as religious people. — Jamal

I agree in real life, but the reason for discussing the 'ideal' atheist here was to highlight to process difference. Essentially, one cannot check on any way the qualification of the authority in a religious approach, it's about trust and faith. No one asks for Moses's qualification, no-one checks his methodology statement. He is accepted by faith to have heard the will of God. I might trust a scientist to tell me how things are, say with physics, of which I know virtually nothing, but It's not faith. I check their qualifications. I go through a different (not better or worse, but different) mental process to arrive at my decision to believe them.

I do, however, agree that in practice, there are so many quasi-religious belief systems out there "extreme nationalism, fascism, Stalinism, etc. " as you later list, that very few atheists obtain anything but a small portion of their beliefs through the scientific process and with the modernisation of most religions (dropping out of biblical literalism etc), the difference is minimal. It's more a philosophical difference than a practical one.

That's why I was trying to emphasise difference rather than scoring either. Athiests (rationalists, empiricists...) are, quite fairly, bristled when told they 'just the same' as religious people in their belief systems, having made such strenuous efforts to try something different. The religious are again quite fairly, upset when told their approach is old-hat or the 'cause of all wars', or some such trope. — Isaac

I don't accuse you of fence-sitting, although I do it a bit myself; however, while I agree with what you say here, and I agree that it's fair for atheists to be bristled by being called religious, the only difference is that I'm not aware of this being common. Not to toot my own horn, but I feel that I've been poking the flames in this way here for years every now and then, to not much use, but I don't see this approach happening often. In other words, if it's been done before, I'm not aware of it; I came to this position on my own. On the other hand, the religious are of course used to being told that they're old fashioned, so that is nothing new.

My suspicion is that the loudest voices (which are often the minority) on either camp are distrustful of such a solution because each know their flaws and are afraid to have them exposed, but then I have a habit of psychologising everything so... — Isaac

I agree, but I also psychologize everything. :smile:

There are many counterexamples. — Jamal

That's fair, and there will be continued exploitation in new ways as we acquire the means for it. Future generations will certainly be able to add things to your list that have yet to occur. But I believe we're trending towards inevitable improvement, it's just far easier to dominate and exploit than to prevent domination and exploitation. We're trying to create technology to improve people's lives, we're aiming towards peace, and we want to solve the conditions Pinker describes. Are we putting our full effort behind it? is humanity united in improving our overall condition? Of course not. But I believe progress will be made and is being made, I believe this trend will continue.

One thing that does annoy me, and I'd guess you feel the same, is how the current year is treated as though it's the end of history. I've little doubt that future generations will view our age with contempt... Our exploitation, our flaws, we're going to be judged as backward people... What's with this attitude of "it's the current year, how can these basic injustices still be here"? Are these people blind? There are horrendous flaws, why are they acting as though we've made it?

I favour the notion that we should judge people and civilisations by standards appropriate to their age, but to see the trend of history, we mustn't do that. It feels wrong to praise an age that liberated one group by dominating another, but it is part of our trend upwards. Imperialism was a mission of oppressing and exploiting other peoples, but it did enrich the cultures doing the pillaging. They experienced improvements in all areas, and brought their people out of their previous state of poverty, liberating them, triggering further advancement, and eventually leading to the industrial revolution.

It's built on oppression like you said, but I'm not saying the trend that I'm using to predict future improvement is a moral one, it's not even related to morality. Many are eager to attribute our recent success to philosophical, economic and political ideas. I'd argue that our recent successes are owed almost entirely to the industrial revolution. There was slow improvement before the industrial revolution but afterwards, the rate of change has become ever more drastic.

People can adopt new ideas or philosophies, and political and economic systems can change, but this technological advancement can never be undone, and it's set in motion things that cannot be undone. It's this that creates the feeling of inevitability. We don't possess the power to stop it, it's beyond being controlled.

What are you trying to correct in this view? Progress isn't inevitable for you, but is it probable? Perhaps highly probable but you want to mention that perhaps something might go wrong and we should worry about the possibility? Or is your goal self-flagellation as the latter half of your OP seems to imply? Does Pinker's self-congratulatory book annoy you because you feel humans are beyond redemption? Do you just feel uncomfortable with a focus on what's going well, and you'd prefer to focus on the areas in which we're failing? What's your angle here?

Out of interest, what framework do you use to determine if someone holds acceptable or unacceptable beliefs? Do you hold to notions of progress?

I'm unsure of what you mean by

what framework do you use to determine if someone holds acceptable or unacceptable beliefs? — Tom Storm

Or rather, the question seems out of left field to me, so I'm at a loss. If you could elaborate it would be helpful.

Yes, it is a bit and perhaps a digression. I guess your approach to evaluating beliefs is different to mine, I was curious about your approach and whether you identify progress as a tangible phenomenon and to what extent you see secularism as being a barrier to or carrier of progress.

Again, the word Islam means "Submission"; it's in their very fiber, it would appear. — Noble Dust

That word is an inheritance from the Arabian culture that produced Islam. It was originally an agreement between traveling merchants and raiders. A merchant could "submit" to a raider a gain protection. Muhammad was a merchant at one time, and then he became a raider.

Ok, cool. I don't know how that affects the discussion. The word used to mean that, now it means what it means now. There's no special mojo that makes the original use of the word have some power after that use has fallen out of favor.