Science Versus Pseudoscience

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

Article by a scientist
<https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/01/the-key-to-fighting-pseudoscience-isnt-mockery-its-empathy/>
on how to deal with pseudoscience. He argues in favour of being more
tactful, and trying to understand why pseudoscientific ideas appeal to
so many people.

Ultimately, though, at some point the pseudoscientific belief will hit
some stubborn aspect of reality that refuses to give in to the
fantasy. And then we see the denial kick in: the one who keeps drawing
attention to that reality is “fake news”; the believers try
desperately to interpret the facts to mean something other than what
they mean. Once you go too deeply down the rabbit hole, it seems there
is no turning back.

[Gordon]

Faith is a very powerful emotion, religion is based upon it. Thought history
we have people who have gone to war with God being on there side.

Few people will admit they are wrong, so the battle/arguement continues,
sometimes into war.

The Emperors news clothes applies here as well.

The saying, Never argue with a fool; for then there will be two fools, also
applies.

In short, it has been going on for a long time, it is human nature and it
will go on for many more centuries.

[Rich80105]

New Zealand is now quite a secular society - a majority profess not to
have any religion, although many of the moral lessons of Christianity
followed by most of our ancestors still has some influence on our
expectations. Some however regard money as all they need to be
concerned about - rabbit holes are useful to the unscrupulous, and
have sadly affected politics and business practices, including the
integrity of our news media. Your description of the denial of reality
for "fake news" is sadly correct.

I was a little too young to go to one of the Billy Graham "Crusades",
but I knew a few who committed themselves to Christianity based on his
presentation. He undoubtedly did very well for himself, but
importantly he used the money raised for good purposes. The modern
equivalents appear to be less altruistic . . . The same is to a
certain extent true of some political organisations around the world -
the propaganda and personal interests have become more important than
professed aims and ethical standards - Trump is probably the most well
known example of how corruption can be successful . . he has "shown
the way" for others seeking power . . .

We build on those that have gone before us - let us hope that we can
remain as hopeful as your post indicates you may be; certainly when
dealing with crazy people it does not always help to let them know how
others see them.

[BR]

If you want to fight pseudoscience, fight the climate fraud.

Bill.

--
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[Tony]

Hopefull;y you are doing exactly that, reading how others see you - but I doubt
it.

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

On Thu, 11 Jan 2024 21:50:55 +1300, Rich80105 wrote:

> On 11 Jan 2024 03:57:27 GMT, Gordon <Gor...@leaf.net.nz> wrote:
>

>>... although many of the moral lessons of Christianity

> followed by most of our ancestors still has some influence on our
> expectations.

There is still this implicit assumption, is there not, that morality is
something associated with your particular religion, and not with any
other.

[Rich80105]

Your selective snipping has attributed to Gordon the quoted extract
from my response to Gordon. In general, snipping is favoured by those
that do not like what they have written, or responses to those posts,
and use selective snipping to avoid responsibility for their own
words. Originally there may have been cause to snip to reduce the size
of messages, but bandwidth is no longer a problem.

To get back to your post above, yes those with religious views did see
morality as being an integral part of religious belief, but there have
been many over a few centuries who have seen that moral principles for
an effective and coherent society can be developed independently of
religion, also recognising that there are some elements of morality
that are shared by most religious groups. New Zealand was in the early
19th century much more focused on religion and its traditions that it
is now, and we also have a greater variety of religious beliefs. we
still have prayers at the opening of parliament for example, but I
think this no longer references Christianity.

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

On Fri, 12 Jan 2024 13:22:11 +1300, Rich80105 wrote:

> ... yes those with religious views did see

> morality as being an integral part of religious belief, but there have
> been many over a few centuries who have seen that moral principles for
> an effective and coherent society can be developed independently of

> religion ...

They must be independent of religion. Because otherwise, you get the
question: do different gods define different ideas of right and wrong?

I don’t see that as the path to religious tolerance.

[Tony]

Rich80105 <Rich...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>On Thu, 11 Jan 2024 22:15:51 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro
><l...@nz.invalid> wrote:
>
>>On Thu, 11 Jan 2024 21:50:55 +1300, Rich80105 wrote:
>>
>>> On 11 Jan 2024 03:57:27 GMT, Gordon <Gor...@leaf.net.nz> wrote:
>>>
>>>>... although many of the moral lessons of Christianity
>>> followed by most of our ancestors still has some influence on our
>>> expectations.
>>
>>There is still this implicit assumption, is there not, that morality is
>>something associated with your particular religion, and not with any
>>other.
>
>Your selective snipping has attributed to Gordon the quoted extract
>from my response to Gordon. In general, snipping is favoured by those
>that do not like what they have written, or responses to those posts,
>and use selective snipping to avoid responsibility for their own
>words.

Only to your small mind - snipping is a good way to shorten unwieldy threads
and in the case of your posts to remove lies, abuse and defamation.

> Originally there may have been cause to snip to reduce the size
>of messages, but bandwidth is no longer a problem.

Bandwidth was only one reason, conciseness and brevity was one of the other
reasons and still is.

[Willy Nilly]

On Thu, 11 Jan 2024, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <l...@nz.invalid> wrote:
>There is still this implicit assumption, is there not, that morality is
>something associated with your particular religion, and not with any
>other.

That's actually a recent development over the long haul. The Jewish
Old Testament (c. 600BC?) may have been the first to describe ethics
as handed down from God -- e.g., the "Ten Commandments". Elsewhere,
the Earth deities -- which led to the Greek & Roman gods -- were just
as badly & arbitrarily behaved as were people, so you didn't get your
ethics from them. In those days, civil conduct was essential to the
running of society, and those people understood better (than us) how
thin the veneer of civilisation is. So criminal deeds were harshly
punished, but their gods had nothing to do with that.