What makes life meaningful? How is it that we can wake up in the morning and feel like jumping out of bed, rather than hiding beneath the covers?
A sense of purpose. Our life seems like it has a direction. We have a reason for being. Goals, intentions, to-do's.
In the "Faith" chapter of his book, On Being Certain, Robert Burton, M.D. (a neurologist) says:
By now it should be apparent that deeply felt purpose and meaning are exactly that -- profound mental sensations. Though the underlying brain mechanisms that create these sensations aren't known, the biggest clue comes from those who've undergone "mystical" moments.
A common thread of such descriptions is the sudden and unexpected appearance of a "flood of pure meaning" or an inexplicable feeling of knowing of what life is about without the awareness of any preceding or triggering thought.
Whether or not it is appropriate to use the word faith to describe a feeling of "now I know why I'm here," or "this must be what it's all about," it is impossible to overlook the shared qualities of the feeling of knowing, a sense of faith, and feelings of purpose and meaning.
All serve as both motivation and reward at the most basic level of thought. All correspond to [William] James's idea of felt knowledge -- mental sensations that feel like knowledge.
(This visceral sense of faith is not to be confused with the cognitive potpourri of conscious but unsubstantiated ideas that become articles of faith, such as beliefs in religion, alien abduction, blueberries as a prevention for Alzheimer's disease, and a six-thousand-year-old universe.)
I love Burton's way of looking at science and religion. And anything else that offers up a sense of meaning in someone's life. Like he said, that sense is like any other sense -- such as sight, hearing, touch.
It's just there. Or, not.
A second line of evidence comes from descriptions of when the feeling isn't present. Though not necessarily aware of when we feel purpose and meaning, we are nearly always aware of the sickening feeling when we don't possess them. This isn't an intellectual misapprehension; it is a gut sense of disorientation and a loss of personal direction.
Scientifically-minded people have a sense of purpose and meaning just as much as religiously-minded people do.
Burton talks about how Richard Dawkins, a noted atheist scientist, is ferociously dedicated to debunking mythologies and irrationality -- such as a denial of how evolution has guided the course of life on Earth.
Dawkins lives for this, just as the Pope lives to serve the cause of Catholicism, or a woman lives to raise her children, or a man lives to become the best at some sport.
So a felt sense of meaning and purpose is the root out of which grow stalks of action and commitment. Scientists do science because it is meaningful to them. Religious people do religion for the same reason.
Different strokes for different folks. Whatever turns you on.
We should force ourselves to distinguish between separate physiological categories of faith -- the basic visceral drive for meaning that has real purpose versus the unsubstantiated cognitive acceptance of an idea. Compassion, empathy, and humility can only arise out of recognizing that our common desires are differently expressed.
Nicely said, Dr. Burton. Both science and religion need to recognize that their common ground is a sense of meaning and purpose.
Fairly frequently a commenter on this blog will argue, "science is a form of religion." That's wrong. He or she says that because scientists are deeply devoted to the pursuit of truth about the physical universe.
But devotion grows from a sense of meaning. It doesn't need religion. People can be devoted to all sorts of non-religious things, such as improving one's golf game.
So religious believers should differentiate between the cognitive and non-cognitive aspects of their faith. Meaning, the feeling they have toward divinity, the meaning they derive from religiosity, is shared by scientists (and everyone else on Earth aside from the deeply clinically depressed).
However, the cognitive side of their faith is something different. These are the concepts that accompany the feelings. "Jesus is the Son of God." Well, you think so. But where is the proof?
I'm not justified in questioning the meaning someone gets from his or her religion. I am justified, though, in questioning their purported facts about the cosmos.
Burton ends his chapter with some good suggestions:
We can strive for objectivity; we cannot reach the shores of dispassionate observation. The problem is that to play according to the rules of scientific method, we must concede the possibility that we cannot know if one day contrary evidence might appear and overthrow a cherished theory.
Faith-based arguments, by invoking irrefutable divine authority that will always be right, do not have to make this concession. This uneven playing field isn't going to go away.
...If science is to carry on a meaningful dialogue with religion, it must work to establish a level playing field where both sides honestly address what we can and cannot know about ourselves and the world around us.
...If possible, both science and religion should try to adopt and stick with the idea of provisional facts. Once all facts become works-in-progress, absolutism would be dethroned. No matter how great the "evidence," the literal interpretation of the Bible or Koran would no longer be the only possibility.
With religion and the Internet, be skeptical
Sometimes I wonder whether, as a churchless blogger, it makes sense for me to spend so much time in comment conversations about posts that I've written.
Recently I came to a fuller realization that yes, it does make sense, and why this is so.
There's an interesting correlation between religion and the Internet: both are full of often-anonymous sources making claims that lack persuasive supporting evidence.
So when someone leaves a comment on a web site or blog -- such as this one -- it's an opportunity to practice bullshit detection skills that will come in handy when assessing the validity of a religious belief.
Also in other areas of life, such as deciding whether to respond to an enticing email offer that just arrived from someone in Nigeria who is offering you lots of money in exchange for helping them deal with an inheritance problem.
Anonymity is both a blessing and a curse.
Sometimes it's nice to be able to communicate without anyone knowing who you are, like when you need to blow the whistle on a boss who is doing something wrong and you're worried about getting fired.
But when the person on the other end of the communication doesn't know who the source is, skepticism about what's being said is justified.
Most holy books are full of purported statements from people who are either long gone and may not even have existed (such as Jesus), or are conveniently amorphously identified (such as "ascended masters").
Similarly, most comments left on this blog's posts -- and this is typical on the Internet -- can't be linked to an actual person whose background and credentials can be verified.
So communications in both the religious sphere, and the blogosphere, need to be read with a properly skeptical mind. By "properly," I mean balanced between excessive open- and closed-mindedness.
In the scientific method, as in everyday life, it's necessary to be open-minded enough to let truth in but also closed-minded enough to keep falsities out.
Michael Shermer has a Boundary Detection Kit that helps differentiate between Science, Semi-science, and Nonsense. The first three items are:
And the first three items in Carl Sagan's Baloney Detection Kit are:
In other words, don't believe something just because someone says it is true. Especially if you don't know who that someone is.
Many people take on false identities for one reason or another. Hiding behind a curtain of anonymity, like the "Wizard of Oz," they attempt to convince others to trust their authority.
But if the author can't be identified, how can his or her authority? As Carl Sagan said above, only by giving arguments from authority little weight.
Whether the purported authority is a religious personage, or a guy who left a note on your door claiming he knows how to re-roof your house for an amazingly low price, the guiding principle is: prove it.
The proof needs to be stronger if the known background of the supposed authority is weaker.
By and large I trust the auto mechanics at the Toyota dealership where we take our cars for service. I know that they have certain qualifications, which could be verified if I had any doubts about their competence.
However, whenever my wife and I don't know much about the person or firm we're considering hiring, we do some checking into their qualifications.
Amazingly, many people don't do this either when they embrace a religion, or some "fact" they've come across on the Internet. I can't tell you how often I get emails from people who breathlessly share a Did you hear that... sort of message.
Usually, two minutes of Googling turns up solid evidence that "that" isn't true.
So skepticism is a virtue.
Don't believe anything you read in a holy book or on the Internet (particularly from an anonymous source) unless there's other convincing demonstrable evidence of its truthfulness.
Here's the exception, though: this only applies to the "common ground" that I talked about in my previous post -- not to "private ground."
People often confuse these two areas where truth can reside. The common ground is public, the domain of the scientific method, objective reality that we all can observe and, ideally, agree upon.
The private ground is personal, inside each of our heads, where imagination, emotion, intuition, and direct experience hold sway.
Nobody has the right to claim knowledge of someone else's private ground. Have you ever had someone say to you, "You don't feel that way!" And replied, "How the hell could you know that?" (I have.)
On this blog I see both types of mistakes being made in comment conversations.
I see people uncritically accepting "public ground" statements that should be questioned skeptically. I also see people over-critically rejecting "private ground" statements that should be taken on face value.
For example, if a religious believer says "I feel wonderful when I think of Jesus," it isn't possible to argue with that. Usually I'll respond with "That's great."
And it is. There's nothing wrong with feeling wonderful.
However, if someone tells me, "Jesus died for our sins, and you need to accept him in order to avoid hellfire," my attitude is You don't know that, and No, I don't.
Once you make a public ground statement about a supposed objective truth, you're treading onto the territory we all inhabit. If that statement doesn't make sense, or lacks demonstrable evidence, expect skepticism.
But if you just want to share how you feel, go right ahead. That's your private ground, not mine.
September 13, 2009 in Comments, Religions | Permalink | Comments (51)
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