Church of the Churchless

Denying scientific truth isn't welcome on this blog

I've loved science since I was a child.

Way back when (late 1950s) I crammed a card table into my bedroom closet, hung a light over the clothes rod, and happily conducted science experiments via chemistry sets and science kits delivered every month, thanks to my mother, who also deeply admired science.

(I wrote about this in a 2007 post, "Thanks for the chlorine gas, Mom (cough, cough).")

Since, I've retained my love of science, even though I ended up getting a B.A. in Psychology and a Master's degree in Social Work. But then I completed the course requirements for a doctorate in Systems Science before becoming a Ph.D. dropout.

So it pains me when I see commenters on this blog denying scientific truth. Well, it more than pains me. it also irritates me. That's what led to me adding a note to a new Open Thread post this morning, addressing it to the commenter who has been doing the most frequent denying.

I put it in red for emphasis.

Here's a new Open Thread.

Remember, off-topic comments should go in an Open Thread. Also, anti-science comments. [Note to Spence Tepper, a noted anti-science commenter on this blog: your comments denying scientific reality about consciousness or any other subject should go in an Open Thread from now on or they'll be deleted. I can't tolerate your comment spam any more than I'd tolerate someone arguing that global warming isn't human caused or that the Holocaust never happened.]

Look, I realize that scientific truths are constantly changing. Old truths are modified, improved upon, sometimes discarded entirely.

However, at any given moment, there are certain core truths in science. We know that the Earth is round, not flat. We know that gravity is the result of curved space, in accord with relativity theory. And we know that consciousness arises due to goings-on in the human brain, even though how this happens is largely unknown.

So when Tepper left comments saying that neuroscience isn't certain that consciousness arises in the brain, that is so flat-out wrong, I was amazed that someone as obviously intelligent and well-read as Tepper could say such a thing.

The only reason I could find is that because Tepper believes in supernatural stuff, he is purposely making false statements about science in order to "preach" his religiosity in a backdoor manner, rather than expressing it directly.

I prefer honest proselytizing rather than sneaky proselytizing. Well, actually I prefer no proselytizing at all, since I'm not a fan of religious dogmatism in any form. But I don't mind people stating their beliefs in a simple "I" form. As in, "I believe that Jesus is the Son of God and redeems sinners."

OK, I don't share that belief, but thanks for letting me know what you believe. Now, maybe, we can have a conversation about our differing world views.

However, when someone like Tepper tries to overlay their subjective religious/supernatural beliefs over objective scientific truth in an attempt to make science into something other than it is, that's when I get irritated at a sneaky approach to proselytizing.

If you're a religious believer, fine. Most humans are, billions of them.

I'm also fine with you leaving comments on this blog. All I ask is that you try to stay within the bounds of the topic of a post I've written, or if you want to go outside those bounds, share your thoughts in an Open Thread post, otherwise known as free speech for comments. 

But if you're a denier of scientific truths, keep your falsehoods to yourself, or share them in an Open Thread. The United States, along with much of the rest of the world, is experiencing a surge of anti-science. 

I don't want this blog to be a part of that. It's highly destructive to the health of societies. Science is a wonderful way, maybe the only way, to bring people together via commonly held truths. If this blog can help attain that common understanding of reality in some small ways, I'll be really happy.

For those following the comment game, Spence Tepper lost

For those who have been following the interesting exchange of views about consciousness and the brain in comments on a recent blog post, I'm pleased to present the final score on a debate about whether there's evidence that awareness can be free of filters and concepts.

Commenter Spence Tepper ended up without scoring a debate point due to his religious dogmatism. Commenters Appreciative Reader and myself scored numerous debate points because we used facts and logic. Tepper never actually played the debate game, choosing to ignore calls to produce evidence for his assertion.

Bottom line: you can't win a game unless you're willing to play the game. Calling out "I won!" from the sidelines is a spectator sport, not a genuine sport.

Here's how Appreciative Reader put it in his typically courteous and reasonable fashion.

Hey, Spence.

Most of what you say now, in this last comment, is reasonable, and I agree generally with most of that, I guess.

Except! Except, that isn't what this was about, was it. You'd claimed, originally, that meditation enables us to bypass the model-building thing of our brain, and bypass those mental filters to apprehend reality directly. That extravagant claim of yours is what Brian had flagged, and asked you to substantiate. And pre-empting exactly this kind of bobbing and weaving, I'd wondered if you could do that, without changing the subject etc.

(Here's your own words, that Brian had quoted there: "...if we can go to that place of awareness within ourselves free of filters, a place where filtering and conceptual reconstruction do not function, who knows what we may experience? Maybe God? But no label would work there. Maybe reality directly. Maybe pure experience of the moment. Maybe the moment is eternity." And you've said similar, often enough, other times as well.)

If you'd been able to substantiate that claim, then that would have been fantastic. I'd have been first to accept it, and change my mind and my worldview accordingly. If you hadn't been able to do that, even then, had you directly admitted that that isn't evidenced, but merely how it appears to you, personally and subjectively, and what some religious traditions teach, fair enough, no harm done. We'd then have known clearly where we stand. And nor would that have detracted from your experiences --- except we wouldn't be then looking at them as (allegedly) a "direct" apprehension of reality.

As it happens, you did neither. In your reply to Brian, you simply doubled down, with this further extravagant and unevidenced claim thrown in: "You have experience but it is often entirely beyond the thinking brain, and so without impression, zero memory. You think you saw nothing. But thinking is the problem. You saw something, you can't think of it. (...) You'll have to Grok it. Sartori it."

Once again, the claim that in meditation you experience something that is beyond the thinking brain. In as much as these words of yours are linked to what you'd said before, presumably you mean to imply that this is that direct apprehension of reality, that you'd referred to earlier.

In other words, all you did was to "substantiate" your extravagant claim, with yet another extravagant and unevidenced claim.

--------------------

And now, now you present to me very reasonable comments, very wise views on meditation, and indeed evidenced opinions on meditation. All of which I agree with. Except none of them have anything to do with that original claim.

The one part of your comment now that does directly deal with that original claim is where you say: “Part of that reality reconstruction the brain does all the time. We don't have to be a willing, mindless participant in that.”

That’s worded kind of ambiguously, but it seems to indicate that meditation allows you to go outside of the reconstruction, the model building, that the brain does. In which case it’s simply you repeating your original claim, yet again, in different words, instead of substantiating it. (And yes, like I said that's worded ambiguously. If you didn't mean to convey that by those words, then fair enough, I take this last back. But in that case, again, this has nothing to do with your original claim at all.)

As for the Mayo Clinic link, it’s a cool article, and I enjoyed reading it. But it’s simply a general article written by the clinic staff, a kind of overview of meditation, and it doesn’t come close to providing the kind of evidence we’re talking about here; and nor does it actually claim, either, that meditation helps you apprehend reality directly and minus the filters of mental model-building.

-------------------------

It's a straightforward issue. You know my views on meditation. I'm a fan, and in fact a practitioner and aspirant myself. I agree that meditation is generally beneficient, in terms of what you've discussed here, and more. In general I'm interested in knowing more about all of that, sure.

But the issue we're focused on at this time is this: Can meditation enable us to bypass the model-building via which filter we apprehend reality indirectly, so that we might be able to apprehend reality directly? That had been your claim. Can you substantiate it? If not, then I don't see the issue with clearly admitting it, and retracting that original claim. (And nor do you need jettison that POV altogether. You can always present it, instead, and if you like, as a speculation, maybe, rather than as fact. We can speculate all we want, about whatever we want, why not, as long as we're clear that speculating is all we're doing.)

Not to force the issue beyond this! And apologies if any of my comments in this thread appeared less than fully courteous. Absolutely no offense intended, Spence. Cheers.

How we talk online is much different from how we talk in person

Next year I'll celebrate the 20th anniversary from when I started this blog in 2004. But, hey, I figure that  I might as well spread out the festivities by making some observations from time to time about this here Church of the Churchless.

Like, right now.

The most important thing I want to say is gratitude. Over the years I've learned a great deal from the people who visit this blog and leave comments. Typepad, my blogging service, says there have been 70,198 comments on 3,390 posts. 

So that's about 21 comments, on average, per post that I've written. I read most comments, though if I'm busy, I'll just take a glance at a comment, especially if it's a lengthy one. 

Those comments are my blog's way of having a conversation -- with me, and with other blog visitors. I wish Typepad allowed for editing of comments by the people who share them, and that it was possible to organize the comments in a different fashion than in a chronological fashion.

But wishes aren't reality. Anyway, I deeply appreciate the time and effort people put into their comments, though obviously the quality varies from a high quality essay to random observations that make little sense.

Which is no different from the conversations all of us have in everyday life. But otherwise, there's big differences between how people communicate online versus in person. 

Online, many choose to not use their real name. I can understand why in certain circumstances. For example, on this blog criticism of a religious leader, or the religion itself, can be problematic if someone uses their real name and is still involved with the organization they're criticizing. 

That's why most people who write to me with an interesting story about their faith ask that I share it anonymously. The downside of anonymity, though, is that it enables people to say things in cyberspace that they'd be reluctant to say to someone face-to-face.

I'm definitely guilty of this myself at times. So if I'm directing a blog post or a comment at a specific person, I need to do better at visualizing that person standing in front of me as I say what I want to say about them.

Another problem with online conversations is that in ordinary life communication doesn't just involve words. It also involves a tone of voice, facial expressions, body language. And of course, an ability to say things like "I don't quite understand; please elaborate on what you meant when you said _______"

So its easy to misunderstand those with whom we interact online.

I like to express strong opinions. Many commenters on my blog posts also like to express strong opinions. So we’re going to feel misunderstood by other people at times. That comes with the territory of expressing strong opinions in a setting where only written words can be shared, not the other ways we use to communicate with people.

In a way it's surprising that comment conversations on this blog are as friendly and productive as they usually are, given how many obstacles there are to understanding another person in cyberspace.

But sometimes feelings get hurt. This is unfortunate, though often unavoidable. Partly it's due to different ways of communicating between men and women. I don't want to overemphasize this. It just seems like a reality to me. 

I talked about this in a 2005 post on my HinesSight blog, "Why men don't share their feelings."

“How’re you doing?” says Dennis as I walk into the Pacific Martial Arts changing room. Instead of replying with my habitual robotic “Fine, how’re you?” I have a crazy impulse to actually tell him. I’ll share my feelings!

“Well, my feet have been tingling for about a week. I don’t know what’s going on. I’ve got an appointment to see a doctor tomorrow.” Without missing a beat (appropriately: Dennis is a drummer) I hear, “You’ve got a brain tumor. No doubt about it. You’re going to die.”

For the rest of our hour and a half training session, whenever I stop to check on how my feet are doing Dennis again says, “Oh yeah, you’ve got a brain tumor. Your time is up.”

Sensei Warren, our regular martial arts instructor, came in late. After telling him my tale of tingling feet I got a marginally better prognosis: “You’ve got diabetic neuropathy. No doubt about it. You’re going to lose your feet.” And I don’t even have diabetes.

Now, I know both Dennis and Warren care a lot about me. They demonstrated their manly concern by telling me that I’m either going to die or lose my feet. If one of them had given me a big hug and said “Don’t worry, everything is going to be all right,” I would have begun to worry that he had a brain tumor.

If I want sympathy, I’ll tell my troubles to my wife. From my marital arts buddies I get camaraderie and support that isn’t expressed in words. Dennis taught the class that evening. He started off by saying, “Let’s work on kicks tonight since your feet are giving you a problem.”

Which is what we did. For almost an hour. The unspoken message was, “Your feet are OK. Suck it up. This is no big deal.” That’s pretty much what the doctor said the next day: “Your feet look fine; I’ll do a blood test anyway; call me in a month if you’re not better.”

I'm sharing this anecdote because it points to a seeming fact: men are more comfortable with the rough-and-tumble of online communications because they're more used to joking around with each other in some rough ways.

This is fine.

But I worry when a woman shares something on this blog, then gets attacked in an intense fashion. Mostly or entirely by men. That's when I feel protective toward the woman, since I feel responsible for providing a safe space for people to share their ideas without feeling like they're in some sort of danger.

Well, those are my thoughts for tonight. Thanks for listening. I'll get back to a regular Church of the Churchless blog post soon.

Here's how you can help me deal with trolls on this blog

Frequent commenters on this blog will have noticed that I turned on the "moderate comments" feature this morning. I did this because an Internet troll who calls himself Harry Poole was leaving a bunch of troll'ish comments after I wrote a blog post about the weird questions he asked me in an email.

So rather than leave them up for a while and then delete them, I decided to publish comments manually instead of automatically.

That's no big deal for me. But it inconveniences other commenters who are used to seeing their comments published immediately (unless my blogging service wrongly sends the comment to a spam folder, which I try to check several times a day).

This is my plan for dealing with Harry, which I'm asking for the help of regular commenters with. Tomorrow morning I'll go back to automatic publishing of comments, though I might turn that feature on at certain times. I'll delete any troll comments from Harry as soon as I notice them.

(Harry is welcome to leave non-troll comments. They won't be deleted if Harry decides to act like a normal commenter. Meaning, Harry doesn't insult me or other commenters; Harry discusses ideas in a reasonable fashion; Harry complies with this blog's comment guidelines.)

In those guidelines I note that trolls thrive on attention, so the best way to deal with them is to ignore them. Thus I'm requesting that visitors to this blog ignore any troll'ish comments left by Harry or a pseudonym that they come across before I delete them. If someone mentions Harry in a comment that's a response to one of Harry's trolling comments, I'll delete that response also.

It's unfortunate that people like Harry exist on the Internet, because they make cyberspace life worse for everybody. We all know what's it like to be in a group where some jerk tries to dominate the conversation, insults others in the group, and refuses to engage in reasonable discussions. They have to be removed from a real-life group, and they also have to be dealt with in Internet sites like this blog.

Mystical experiences need testing if they become a worldview

As I've noted before, and surely will do so again, one of the pleasures I get from this blog is reading intelligent comment conversations on posts that I've written. Or in this case, on an Open Thread where the comments are the substance of the post. 

Below is a comment that Appreciative Reader left on an Open Thread in response to a comment by manjit. If you want to read manjit's comment, click on that link and scroll up to the preceding comment.

Appreciative Reader has a knack for saying things in a way that I've never come across before. I'm not saying that his ideas are totally unique, just that how he expresses those ideas often is wonderfully clear and creative.

He's correct in noting that every personal experience is subjective, so not rational, logical, or scientific. The world's greatest physicist, along with everybody else, is engaged in a totally ineffable experience when eating a strawberry. 

So mystical experiences are simply a subset of all experiences.

They can't be put into words, or pictures, or numbers, or anything else, just as any other experience can't. I make this point frequently on this blog: nobody can question someone else's personal experience, because they aren't the person having the subjective experience.

However, once someone claims that their mystical experience has a meaning beyond the personal, that's when I tend to agree with Appreciative Reader that reason, logic, and science come into play. He just has a fresh way of saying this, as you can read below.

That said, I'm not totally convinced that his thesis is correct about a worldview needing confirmation by reason, rationality, logic, or science. I put raspberries on my cereal every morning. The taste of those berries is "mystical," in the sense that no one but me knows how they taste to me.

But it seems a stretch to say that the fact that I buy raspberries whenever I do our weekly grocery shopping makes raspberries part of my worldview, and so requires confirmation by reason, rationality, logic, or science. 

Anyway, Appreciative Reader and manjit have made me ponder things that I usually take for granted. So their comment conversation has benefitted me in that regard. I guess I tend to see a dividing line between symbolic and non-symbolic sorts of experiences, which is a bit different from how Appreciative Reader sees things.

Yet maybe we're seeing similarly. So long as I simply enjoy the taste of raspberries in a subjective, non-symbolic fashion, I'm in the realm of unquestionable personal experience. However, as soon as I try to describe their taste in some way, now I'm in the realm of questionable interpersonal experience.

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Dear manjit,

As ever, pleasure to read your thought-provoking comment.

You think Brian’s approach pseudo-scientific. I’m afraid I don’t agree, at all. I’m kind of curious why you think *that*, but I’ll let it pass, because there’s way more meat in your comment, that I’d like to address, and that I’ll be glad if you’re able to answer, whenever you are able. (I’ll bookmark this thread, so that I don’t miss it, should you end up responding after awhile.)

I’ll resist the temptation of addressing much of your comment, in the interests of (relative!) brevity, and instead focus on just two things, on which your thoughts will be of great interest to me.

The first, and most important, of where we disagree is where you say this: “I think one of your incorrect understandings of mysticism is that there is anything rational, logical or scientific about it.” I’m very interested in how you can possibly have arrived at that conclusion, especially in context of how I see this, which is as follows:

I agree, the mystical experience itself is not rational or logical, in and of itself. Nothing subjective ever is. If we’re content to experience whatever mystical experience we have, and simply stop at that, then, agreed, there’s no reason for reason, rationality, logic, or science to intrude in there. But the moment we incorporate that experience into our worldview, immediately it is subject to all of these things.

And nor is this peculiar to mystical experience, I’d say this applies to any and every subjective experience. You see the sun rise in the morning. Or, say, you feel that kind-of-painful-yet-pleasant pump in your bicep after working out.

Both of those mundane, non-mystical experiences, if you’re content to register them, and simply let them be, then that’s the end of it; and there’s no call to bring in logic, reason, rationality, or science into it. However, the moment you incorporate these experiences into your worldview, even in the slightest bit, then your surest way to arriving at a worldview, a model, that comports best with reality, is by following logic, and reason, and science.

Likewise with mystical experiences, surely? If you’re content to simply have those experiences, and then leave them be, well then, sure, that’s the end to it.

But if you go worldviewing your way with those experiences, no matter how much or how little, no matter how concretely or how vaguely --- even if only negatively, in questioning the veracity or the completeness of what we know about the world --- well then, right then, right there, is when it becomes subject to rationality and to science.

(To be clear, I’m not saying mystical experiences might not occasion reason to question, maybe even revise, our worldview. They well may. My point is, the moment you do even that much, the moment you do anything other than simply register that experience, completely passively and completely without any thoughts about it at all; the moment you incorporate that experience into your worldview [no matter how much or how little, no matter how concretely or how vaguely], right then, right there, is where science becomes the surest way of ensuring that that worldview, that model, those thoughts, comport best with the actual reality.)

Which is why I cannot see how you can possibly state, as you did, that there’s nothing rational, logical or scientific about mysticism.

My other point of disagreement is where you say this (and I’ll quote that paragraph of yours in full here):

“One man's "loose-jawed goggle-eyed imbecelic dogma" is another's belief that the universe was created ex-nihilo, like a rabbit out of a hat, or that life & consciousness are the product of the random, purposeless, accidental bumping together of inert matter, as if putting some oil and pigment in a bag, giving it a good shake for 10 seconds, then throwing it at a canvas could create a perfect replica of the Mona Lisa, and assorted other credulous and magical beliefs. Humanity has a long history of conflating the cultural status quo with reality itself, and implying anyone who challenges it is a "loose-jawed goggle-eyed imbecelic" dogmatist. Very often they're more right than wrong. However, very often they're more wrong than right.”

Well said, that. I agree with much of what you’ve said there. But the essence of it, the actual point of it, that is what I disagree with completely; and, again, wonder whether you might not end up changing your mind about this on thinking a bit more about it.

Haha, agreed, things popping into existence out of nowhere does sound crazy. That goes for lots of things, and indeed most things QM [quantum mechanics], agreed, absolutely. But why do we imagine that reality must necessarily comport with our native intuition about what makes sense?

After all, our intuition itself is shaped by our evolution, and is no more than what we needed to deal to best survive while running around naked in the wilds of Africa. Whether something *sounds* reasonable to our intuition, can hardly be the touchstone for evaluating whether something is *real*.

So then, if not intuition, then how *do* we make sense of the world around us, and within us? By following the evidence. By using reason and logic. In short, science. Even if that, for the present, leads us to such apparently goggle-eyed and imbecilic --- read “counter-intutive” --- explanations, as well as non-explanations, like things popping in out of nowhere, and quantum superposition, and the rest of it.

That is, there is a huge huge huge difference between the “goggle-eyed imbecilities” that science reveals to us, and the other extravagant explanations we think up about the world by means other than scientific. And what's more, basis what I’ve said just now, perhaps you’ll agree that if there’s apparently a double standard at play here, then it’s entirely warranted, in fact it is the only thing that *is* warranted, in this context.

   -- Appreciative Reader

Back to basics: our faithless faith and commenting policies

It never hurts to return to the basics. So in this easy-to-write post I'm going to copy in one of the first posts I wrote after I started this blog in 2004, "Our Creedless Creed," plus this blog's commenting policies.

Regarding the latter, note that comments are supposed to stick to the subject matter of a post. I'm flexible about this, but today two commenters (UM and Nimfa) engaged in an almost entirely irrelevant series of eleven chat comments on a post about the RSSB guru's authoritarianism. 

That's unacceptable.

As you can read in the commenting policies, off-topic comment conversations should go in an Open Thread, which I call "free speech for comments." When people read a blog post, a newspaper story, or such, then click on the comments, they expect to find comments about the subject that's been written about.

Hijacking comments for purely personal purposes is a form of spam. Again, I'm fine with an occasional off-topic comment, and admit that I haven't been consistent in enforcing this rule, but don't be surprised if your comment is deleted if it doesn't pertain to the topic of a blog post.

Here's Our Creedless Creed. It's in the category of  "Basics of our faithless faith." I'm impressed that after 18 years of blogging, during which I've become steadily more atheistic, there's nothing that I would change in the creedless creed other than the last item. Currently I don't think it is likely that death provides any final answers. 

If you think that any of these statements are inaccurate, make your case in a comment on this post. That will be totally on-topic! I'll add numbers to the items to make it easier to comment on them.

UPDATE: I decided to add "any possible" before "immaterial reality" to make clear that currently there is no evidence of an immaterial reality separate from our universe. And I added "may" in the final item of the creed to make clear that if consciousness ends with death, as is very likely, getting any answer after death is low probability but still possible.

Our Creedless Creed

Note: to make this Creed more readable, some qualifiers have been omitted. So "God" signifies God/ultimate reality/final truth, not just a personal divinity. And "religion" signifies religion/spiritual path/philosophy, not just a mainstream theology.

(1) There is no objective proof that any religion knows the truth about God. If there were such proof, most people on Earth would have converted to that faith long ago and all scientists would be believers.

(2) Spirituality thus is an individual affair. Proof of any metaphysical realities that exist will be subjective, not demonstrable to others.

(3) Every person has the right to pursue their own spiritual quest without interference, so long as he or she doesn't interfere with the rights of others.

(4) Since the veracity of each and every religion is unprovable, equally unprovable are the moral and ethical tenets derived from any and all religious teachings.

(5) Thus morality also is an individual affair. There are no absolute laws of right and wrong as there are absolute laws of physics. Subjectivity rules in ethics.

(6) Individual ethical decisions may be formed into a collective codification of societal norms, or laws. These are purely human, not divine.

(7) Science is the surest means of finding truth. Theory, experiment, analysis of data: such are the tools of science, whether directed toward knowing material or any possible immaterial reality.

(8) Religious teachings are hypotheses to be confirmed through individual research. As such, they must not be taken as gospel truth by adherents of a particular faith.

(9) Religious doubters, skeptics, and heretics should be honored for their efforts to assure that unproven assertions about God are not put forward as solid truth.

(10) Every adherent of a particular religion should say to himself or herself, "I could be wrong." If he or she won't do this, other people can say it for them: "You could be wrong."

(11) This creedless creed of the Church of the Churchless also could be wrong. It needs to be reexamined and revised regularly.

(12) Death may provide the final answers (if only momentarily). The spiritual quest is to get answers ahead of time. But the big question is, "What are the questions?"

And here's this blog's commenting policies.

You're welcome -- even more, encouraged -- to leave comments on Church of the Churchless posts. Some of the most interesting writing on this blog comes from other people, not me, Brian the Blogger.

All I ask is that comments be in accord with the following policies. Otherwise a comment probably will be deleted or edited.

(1) No personal attacks on me or other commenters. Challenge the message, not the messenger. Best: You're wrong, because... Semi-OK: You're a fool, because... Not-OK: You're a fool.

(2) No extreme obscenity. Write as if you were in a congenial coffeehouse discussion group, not a high school locker room after your team lost the game in the final seconds. Mild swear words are fine. But goddamn it, don't go over the top.

(3) No rants about the uselessness of this blog. If you're a religious believer, I can understand why this blog could make you angry. Solution: don't read it. If you need to vent, leave a comment on my "I Hate Church of the Churchless" anti-site, not here.

(4) No commercial or religious spam. Advertising, in a comment or a URL, obviously isn't acceptable. Neither are lengthy quotations from a religious scripture, or preachiness. See #5 below.

(5) No irrelevant comments. Please stick to the subject matter of a post in your comment. If you want to talk about something else, leave your comment in an Open Thread, email me with a blog post suggestion, or use the Google search box in the right sidebar to find a previous post on this blog concerning your "something else." (Note: Open Thread comments also should adhere to the policies above.)

(6) No trolling. On the Internet a "troll" is someone who tries to disrupt normal discussions through various annoying behaviors. Here's some ways to recognize a troll. Best response to them: no response. Their sad lives thrive on attention, so ignore them.

(7) No false "facts" about critical issues. As the saying goes, everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts. This applies to this blog, especially about COVID-19 and other critical issues. Blatantly false comments won't be published if they're about life and death or other critical topics such as global warming.

Lastly, one of my pet peeves is how uncourteously many people behave on the Internet. "Flame wars" aren't productive, so try to keep your cool if you disagree with what somebody has said.

I agree with Wikipedia's take on Flaming: 

An Internet user typically generates a flame response to other posts or users posting on a site, and such a response is usually not constructive, does not clarify a discussion, and does not persuade others. Sometimes, flamers attempt to assert their authority, or establish a position of superiority over other users. Other times, a flamer is simply an individual who believes he or she carries the only valid opinion. This leads him or her to personally attack those who disagree. In some cases, flamers wish to upset and offend other members of the forum, in which case they can be called "trolls".

Is a mechanism required for realizing Oneness?

Below I've shared a lengthy comment from "Appreciative Reader" that deserved to be made into a blog post. Why?

Because the comment is nicely thought out and well written.

It addresses an interesting question: whether someone's experience of Oneness just happened, and can't be described in a step-by-step fashion, or whether a mechanism that leads to an experience like this can be communicated to others.

I tend to agree with Appreciative Reader that in general, someone's spiritual realization is capable of being analyzed and critiqued to a significant degree.

As I've noted before, dreams are highly personal and unlike everyday experiences. Yet if I remember my dream, I can describe it to another person -- albeit with that description including language like "It was sort of like this" and "Hard to describe, but this is the best I can do." 

Of course, dreams aren't considered to be a reflection of a reality existing outside of the mind of the dreamer, while many, if not most, people view their spiritual experiences as reflecting something true about the world/universe/cosmos.

I'm assuming that an experience of Oneness is more like that, and less like a dream.

So while it doesn't make sense to challenge the veracity of a dream -- this is just what the brain does while we sleep -- it does make sense to question the nature of a spiritual experience, if the person who had the experience claims that it points to a truth about our shared reality.

As a final observation, I agree with Appreciative Reader that Oneness isn't what the Buddhist notion of emptiness is all about. Emptiness concerns the lack of a lasting essence or permanence in objects, including us.

The emptiness of existence is characterized by interdependence, interrelationships, dependent arising based on causes and conditions. Superficially this has to do with unity or oneness, but not in a deeper sense. 

Oneness implies a foundation to reality. Buddhism teaches that actually there is no such thing. Even emptiness is empty, not standing by itself as an independent metaphysical principle.

Here's what Appreciative Reader said in the comment. I've corrected a few typos and broken up some paragraphs to make them easier to read.

=========================================

Osho Robbins, I just read the seven posts you’ve addressed to me. Thanks for the detailed response.

I’ll compose this response to you in two parts. In the first part, I’ll touch on all of the points you raise, in those six posts of yours, in the order you’ve raised them ; but I’ll do that very briefly. I’ll number these out, and if you wish me to expand on any of these, then I’ll be happy to if you ask. And in the second part, I’ll concentrate on one specific part of your comment ; and I’ll do that at some length, because I think this might be crucial to our discussion, and will, or at least I hope it will, settle this might-there-or-might-there-not-be-a-specific-mechanism-for-Oneness issue once and for all.

------------------------------

(1) I’m afraid your Oneness is nothing at all like Nothingness, nor Buddha’s Emptiness. Do you remember, in our original discussion I’d clearly demonstrated exactly this to you, beyond all doubt, by quoting your own words back to you? I can do that here as well, if you want me to.

No, it isn’t, at all, a matter of semantics. Your Oneness, or Non-Duality, is very different from Nothingness, and no, it does not comport with the Buddha’s teachings.

(2) Your invoking the Buddha at that point was exactly and entirely a case of fallacious appeal to authority. We refer to Einstein or Newton as authorities when speaking of reality, because it is established that what they published, within their core field, is descriptive of reality.

That isn’t something we can say about the Buddha’s teachings, any more than we can say that about the Bible or the Quran. The only thing that the Buddha is a bona fide authority on, are his own teachings (just like the only thing that Tolkien is a bona fide authority on, is Middle Earth).

To invoke the Buddha’s words as an argument on actual reality is as fallacious as invoking LotR as an argument on actual reality : to do that you’d first have to show that what you’re referring does comport with reality in the first place.

(3) You’ve gone into great detail discussing your experiences. Despite not buying into the core arguments you present, nevertheless I do find your core experience fascinating, and your account of your broader experiences very appealing.

Please do not let my repeated refutation of such of your arguments as I find fallacious stand in the way of your sharing more of these, because I find them both enjoyable and instructive; and, like I’d said, in some odd way I find myself empathizing very closely.

(4) You’ve discussed at some length, across three posts, why you believe your Oneness is neither perception nor knowledge, and why asking for a mechanism is meaningless. I intend to focus on one particular example you’ve presented to illustrate your point, and address that particular example at some length ; and hopefully show you thereby, once and for all, what exactly I mean when I keep demanding that you discuss the mechanism of this knowledge, and why your claim that such demands are pointless is mistaken. I’ll do that in the next section of this post of mine.

(5) The video you’ve referenced, on the Multiverses, seems fascinating. (Watched a short portion of it for now.) As with the earlier one of Brian Greene’s that you’d linked, I’ve bookmarked it. Bears listening to, absolutely. One keeps putting these things off, time constraints I’m afraid, but thanks for posting the link. I’ll get to watching all of it when I can.

(6) You’ve asked me about the origin of thoughts, et cetera. That question is actually very much like that other question you’d asked me (Who am I?). Both questions are seemingly very deep, and people of earlier ages clearly had a blast faffing around with those questions, but modern neuroscience has very clearly and simply answered both questions.

The answer to the earlier question I’ve already given you. And the answer to the latter question is, apparently our thoughts arise in our brain before we even become aware of it. So that we are, in effect, no more than witnesses of our consciousness.

(Mind you, the above does not present you with a get-out-of-jail-free card. To answer the question you’d asked of Spence in a subsequent post : Even if, as it appears, the narrative we build around our actions and our lives is a post-facto construct, nevertheless that construct is still a fact, so that for all practical purposes that makes no difference.

Although sure, knowledge of this mechanism might nudge us to be more consequential in our evaluation rather than purely judgmental, but that’s about it, as far as what difference this makes.

You still need to produce the narrative explaining your thoughts and your actions, or else admit to ignorance of it. This last won’t help you in this particular discussion we’re having, because this is simply a broad outlay underlying all of our thoughts and actions, not just that particular realization of yours.)

---------------------------

And now, here’s the portion I wanted to focus on in some detail in this comment of mine.

In discussing why you think asking for a mechanism isn’t really applicable to your realization of Oneness / Non-duality, you present this example, that I’ll first quote here in full :

This is my answer. There is no mechanism because the thing you are asking about (How the oneness communicated) didn't happen.
It is like this:
Person A - sitting at home.
He does not realise he is at home.
He thinks he is somewhere else.
He now decides it is time to go home. He puts on his coat to leave the house to go home.
"where are you going?" asks his friend.
"I am going home" he replies.
His friend takes him outside the house.
"Take a good look: is that your house?
Look at the garden - it's your garden.
Look at the front door and the door number and the street name"
"Oh yes - you are right - I am already at home.
I was just mistaken for a while when I was sitting the settee" he says
He then re-enters his house and sits on the same settee.
Nothing has changed. He is sitting in the same place.
He has not gone anywhere.
His mistaken idea that he is not at home has been corrected,
He now KNOWS he is at home and does not seek to go home anymore.
What is the mechanism by which the home communicated to him that
this is his home? How does he know he is not mistaken again?
There has been no communication and no mechanism is needed.
He simply was mistaken when he thought he was not at home.
That mistake has been corrected and he can now see clearly that in fact he was ALWAYS at home.
He didn't go anywhere, and nothing has changed.
Only his mistaken notion (that he is far away from home) has been removed.
This is what it is like. ONENESS is already the case - always was and always will be. ONENESS did not suddenly happen. It always was. no mechanism is needed.”

In that example of yours, here’s how I’d describe the mechanism of how Person A, who had hitherto believed he was not at home, has now come to believe (or has come to know, if you prefer that latter word) that he is at home after all and in fact has been at home all along.

I think we can split up that process, or that mechanism if you will, into four distinct parts:

Step 1 : Person A, on being directed by friend, clearly sees his house and garden and neighborhood and door number and street name. Direct perception, if you will.

Step 2 : Person A then brings up the conception that he has of his own home.

(And what does that conception comprise of? We don’t know, in this case, because you haven’t detailed that. It’s probably his own memory, And it might, possibly, also include other ideas he’s gleaned about his home from other sources, including his friend’s words. If we are to study Person A’s identification of his present locale as his original home, then it becomes imperative that we do find out what exactly this conception of his own home comprises of, that is, how exactly he’s come by this conception.)

Step 3 : Person A then compares his direct perception of what he’s seen just now, with the conception that he has of his own home.

Step 4 : Having compared his immediate perception with his conception of his home, Person A then decides that his perception coincides with his conception of home (that is, his perception is either exactly identical to his conception, or else it is sufficiently close).

Therefore, he concludes that he is, indeed, sitting in his own home. As a result, he replaces his old belief (or old knowledge, if you will), that he’s NOT in his home, with this new belief (or new knowledge, if you will) that he IS, indeed, in his own home.

As you say, this is indeed a paradigm shift. That is, it is an outright overhauling of Person A’s worldview.

However, to say that no mechanism is applicable here is clearly entirely erroneous. There is a very definite mechanism at play here, that you yourself have not been aware of, because you hadn’t been watching out for it.

Now that I’ve clearly spelt this out, using your own detailed example that you yourself had presented to explain your POV, I hope you do understand what I’m asking for? I hope you now get what I mean by “mechanism”? And I hope you see how a demand that you clearly discuss that mechanism is entirely reasonable in a discussion on how Person A came to believe (or know, if you prefer the word “know”) he’s now at home?

And also, why I’m insisting that you discuss this mechanism also is probably obvious now. First, in order to clearly understand your POV — because any discussion of your Oneness is incomplete without a discussion of this mechanism, and because a clear understanding of your POV is simply impossible without a clear discussion of this mechanism.

And second, once you clearly describe that mechanism, then we can suss out to what degree we can rely on different portions of this mechanism. That is the only way to reasonably arrive at an opinion on how reliable is your realization.

(And forget me, even if I did not exist at all, even then I should think even for you this exercise would be essential, for you to clearly understand your Realization, and to then clearly evaluate if your Realization holds up to scrutiny. To simply gloss over those steps and to focus on the paradigm shift itself, while ignoring the underlying mechanism of that paradigm shift, and what is more to directly assume that that paradigm shift is bona fide, is clearly fallacious.)

(Mind you, I’m not saying here that your paradigm shift is fallacious. But I AM saying that your directly assuming that your paradigm shift is beyond examination, and your assuming without examination that it is bona fide, is what is fallacious. It is only after carrying out this examination, and this evaluation, that one can arrive at a reasonable conclusion as to whether that paradigm shift is bona fide or not. Because, as you can see, and as I can further elucidate at greater detail if you ask me to, each of those steps, in your particular example, can admit of error. Which is not to say there is necessarily any error there ; but absolutely, at every step there is the possibility of error.)

The point of clearly identifying this mechanism is twofold : first, it facilitates a clear understanding of your paradigm shift ; and second, it gives us a clear basis to evaluate how reliable is your paradigm shift.

I realize you might need to introspect, to go back to clearly recalling and visualizing that experience of yours, in order for you to clearly identify and to describe this mechanism of your realization of Oneness. Take your time, Osho Robbins. Identify the steps involved.

(Probably it will mirror the four steps that I myself identified in your example, but feel free to structure it out as you think might best capture the process.)

As and when you’re done with identifying this in your mind, and at such time as you’re comfortable doing this, let’s now, finally, have a clear description of the mechanism of your having arrived at your paradigm-shifting understanding of Oneness or Non-duality.

Narratives and cognitive structures aren't "traps"

What never fails to amaze me is how religious believers and mystical enthusiasts will use the power of their human mind to criticize other people who use their human mind to criticize religion and mysticism.

The plain fact is that there's no way to communicate with other people except through mental capabilities such as language, reason, and such.

So unless someone wants to remain in their own private internal world -- and everyone who comments on this blog has indicated this isn't what they want to do -- narratives and cognitive structures are the only way to interact with others.

That doesn't have to be done through language, of course, though words are a powerful means of communication. Paint a picture. Dance. Perform music. 

There are lots of ways to communicate a narrative. But underlying all of them is a message to be shared, and someone else to share it with. Absent that, each of us lives in an isolated subjective realm.

Below is a comment on a recent post from "Appreciative Reader." I liked it so much, I felt it deserved to be featured in a blog post.

One of the points made by Appreciative Reader is what I restated ahove: if a person wants to communicate with others, it makes no sense for them to denigrate language, narratives, and cognitive structures.

After all, that denigration is occurring by means of -- no big surprise -- language, narratives, and cognitive structures. This is like someone standing on a sidewalk, yelling at passers-by, "No one should be standing on the sidewalk!"

Dude, you really should practice what you preach before you do your preaching. Here's the comment from Appreciative Reader.

Hello, Dungeness. Long time!

I’m afraid I’m hogging the comments section of this thread. But I’m going to permit myself one more longish comment, because I disagree in the strongest possible terms with your POV, and I would like to articulate my disagreement clearly, and invite you to see if you wouldn’t, in light of what I’m going to say, like to revise your view.

-------

Now at one level, obviously, I agree with um, and with you as well, as I’ve already said earlier on. If personally you don’t care to engage with narratives as far as some particular field, or even more generally, then that is, at one level, merely a question of your personal predilections, and as such your business and no one else’s. No question of “disagreement” with an essentially personal choice of that nature.

-------

But the part where you generalize that kind of approach, when it comes to mysticism? The part where you seem to see narratives and cognitive structures as “traps”? I’m sorry, that’s something I find entirely nonsensical. Here’s why.

The beauty of the scientific method is this, that it helps us navigate through, and discover more and more about, and make use of, reality as we find it. Irrespective of the nature of that reality.

What you’re resorting to is basically magical thinking. Faced with any and every thing, the closed-minded God-believer will say, “…because God!”, without thinking through what that means. What you are doing is the exact equivalent of that, except instead of “…because God!”, you’re using the more sophisticated but essentially similar “…because mysticism!”.

And you know what, even in a world of actual magic, that kind of magical thinking is …I’m sorry, nonsensical.

What is Rowling’s Hogwarts after all? It’s a system of understanding, and cataloging, and analyzing, and then channelizing the magical forces in a (fictional) magical world. No real magician (as in, real magician in a hypothetical or fictional world where magic reigns) would simply put up his hands and say “…because magic!” and leave it at that.

The real magician will find out how exactly the magic operates, essentially use the scientific method and empiricism on that magical world, much as we apply the scientific method to QM [quantum mechanics, I assume] for instance. Unless he is able to do that, he can never even become a magician.

So, I’d say your view, that narrative-building as far as mysticism—even granted, for the sake of argument, that mysticism is a thing (which after all in a larger context is by no means a given)—as something that is essentially beyond cognitive understanding, is …well, blinkered, not clearly thought through.

-------

Of course, in a mystical world, or in a magical world, or in our everyday mundane world, whether you personally engage with some particular narrative, or any narrative, that like I said is a whole different matter. That is your business and yours alone.

I can choose to live in this world without having formulated any detailed narrative, any detailed personal worldview, about the nature of QM, or for that matter even gravity, or the universe, and still manage to live a full enough life, as long as those aspects are not important to my everyday functioning.

But to see all narratives as “traps”, and to see mysticism, should mysticism be a thing (or for that magic, should magic exist) as something essentially beyond cognitive understanding, that kind of POV simply does not hold up to examination.

-------

I’m reminded here of the fable, parable, whatever, of someone-or-other finding a piece of truth on the way. And the Devil looks on at what’s happening, smiling. The Devil’s minions are super worried, and grovel their miserable way up to their horned scarlet master, asking him in wheedling tones why he’s not worried, because that piece of truth can take that man forever out of the Devil’s reach.

And the Devil smiles knowingly, and says, This has happened before, and this will happen again, and all that poor fool will do is go cataloging that piece of truth, and never actually leave my dominion.

I guess the message within that fable, parable, whatever, is what you’re channeling here, right? Well, okay, at a personal level that message does make some kind of sense. If I wish to live in this world, using things like computers and GPS and computers and whatnot, then, if I get caught up in compulsively understanding the mechanism of each and every thing I see and would use, then that bottomless rabbit hole would end up being what my entire life will devolve into.

I’ll never actually use those things, I’ll never find the time to live my life. Which is clearly dysfunctional, unless that kind of inquisitiveness is, A, somehow limited and focused, and B, somehow channelized, into a profession perhaps, such that I draw some kind of personal benefit from it.

To that extent, and also to the extent that it is, like I’d said earlier, a matter of one’s own predilections, this kind of attitude, of not wanting to get into cognitive structures and narratives, might work, at a personal level, as long as one doesn’t get too deep into whatever-it-is, and as long as one is …well, lucky enough to get by despite one’s ignorance. The channelizing of one’s energies away from cognitive understanding might then even be beneficial, at a personal level.

But to generalize that argument, as you are doing, and to think of cognitive structures and narratives as “traps” is, …I’m sorry, that makes no sense at all.

UPDATE: Here's a response from Dungeness.

Brian, since my name is invoked in your commentary, I hope you'll include my
response to this off-point screed about my remarks. I certainly didn't generalize
any attack on cognitive structures and narratives at all. Gosh, I didn't build up
or advance any "narrative" except that it's entirely dubious to opine that
an inner transcendent experience can be "proven" hallucinatory or bonafide
through cognitive means either by skeptic or believer.

Here's my full response:

@ But to generalize that argument, as you are doing, and to think of cognitive structures and narratives
@ as “traps” is, …I’m sorry, that makes no sense at all.

Wow, that's quite an indictment AR. I was responding to your targeted question
of whether a transcendent inner experience was a "hallucination or bona fide". I
only asserted that the cognitive trap was trying to make sense of a transcendent
experience in an attempt to validate it as "hallucination or bona fide". Language and
logic as we know them fall short in that Solomon-esque endeavor to validate an
transcendent experience. I only suggested a different lens and a mystic's discipline
were needed. Perhaps in lieu of "needed", "helpful" would be a more acceptably
non-denominational term.

I never "generalized" this to "cognitive structures and narratives". That's overreach.
By the way, I explicitly lauded scientific rigor and never suggested we abandon it
either. At a practical level, the clarity, heightened awareness, and health benefits
of a mindfulness discipline only enhance science and its path of discovery.

@ Faced with any and every thing, the closed-minded God-believer will say, “…because God!”, without
@ thinking through what that means. What you are doing the exact equivalent of that, except instead of
@ “…because God!”, you’re using the more sophisticated but essentially similar “…because mysticism!”.

To equate mysticism with magical thinking and close-mindedness is dismissive and
misses the mark also. Ironically, mysticism, in contrast to the blind faith of religion,
insists that you confirm premises experientially within via a disciplined practice of
mindfulness. Mysticism acts collaboratively and complementarily with science.
There's no place for magical thinking.

"We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive
where we started And know the place for the first time." --T.S. Eliot

More churchless do's and don'ts from commenters

In my recent post, "Here's some churchless do's and don'ts for the new year," I invited blog visitors to leave their own do's and don'ts in a comment. So far, five people have done that. 

Here's what they said. Nicely done, guys.

Osho Robbins

DON'T seek God because He ain't seeking you
DO live your life as an ordinary person
DON'T seek enlightenment because it's already there
DO simply BE YOURSELF
DON'T try to be anything other than what you are
DO simply BE YOURSELF
DON'T complain about your life
DO simply accept what you have in life
DON'T think you NEED anything to be happy
DO be happy regardless of circumstances
DON'T seek perfection as it does not exist
DO embrace all aspects of who you are
DON'T be fake and a hypocrite
DO be authentic and true to yourself and others
DON'T connect your self worth to what you do or achieve
DO understand there is NO SELF
DO understand that if there is no SELF there is no SELF WORTH either
DO understand that the SELF you experience is not YOU
DO understand that there IS NO YOU
DON'T SEEK heaven, God, Self or Nirvana - they don't exist
DO live each moment of your life
DON'T take anything for granted
DO realise that you cannot take anything with you because there is nowhere to go
DO simply live and LET GO in each moment
DON'T hold on to anything as all is false
DO enjoy each moment and let it go
finally....
DON'T try to be anyone special or above the rest
instead
DO be ordinary and be happy with what life gives you each moment
and when death comes - embrace that as you embraced life

Spence Tepper

 

Don't worry about Do's and Don'ts.
Be yourself. Be willing to learn more about that... Or not.
Try to be a better person if you can....
Or just be whatever you are.... But try to be nice.
If you can hurt yourself and others less, and help yourself and others more, that's always a good thing.
If you choose to believe in anything and have faith, there is power in that.
If you choose to tear down walls, that's nice too.
But there is great power all around and within you, and it is accessible when you put your daily thinking and logic aside to see, to feel, to hear, to witness.

The engines of the creation are on all the time and you have connections to them.

Whether it is within yourself or this world. It is all inside you. There is nothing outside you that you can sense.

But in all events, be gentle. Everything that is and that we are, including our choices, comes from things we don't fully understand.

And our actions have results we can never fully predict. Results affecting others.
So be gentle. Seek to be awake more than in control.

manoj

DON'T waste your precious life following a debilitating Cult (Radha Soami)

DO realize we are already, what we are looking for

DON'T bother with Fake Babas too (GSD)

DO look for inspiration from within

DON'T look back, that's not where you're going

DO realize the impossible is always possible

DO it all, while you have the time...

Uchit

DONT fall for a sheep in wolves clothing , GSD being a perfect example

DO do your independant research before you trust someone

DONT listen to a man that thinks he knows it all on a stage

DO listen to your own gut instinct

DONT Become a RSSB agent, a servant of satan, thinking it is seva.

DO look after your self and loved ones

DONT be a sheep and blindly follow the crowd

Dragonslayer

Do - enjoy your life and your dreams
Don't - waste your life in cults like RSSB
Do - keep your own power
Don't - give your power to fake clowns
Do - learn from your mistakes
Don't - stay in places you don't progress
Do - wake your brothers and sisters from the RSSB hell hole
Don't - Give up
Do- enjoy your freedom

Do you think this person likes me? Hard to tell.

It's sometimes said that love can masquerade as hate. If so, whoever wrote this comment on one of my blog posts really loves me. Oh, so sweet. Makes my day. (But I decided not to publish the comment, since it goes against the blog's commenting guidelines.)

Shame poor Brian defending his pathetic flock of denial driven derelict delinquency. You are the miserable little coward you dumb little asshole creep. No wonder your blog site has steadily degenerated into a pathetic little ass wipe between your godforsaken psychophant collection of irrelevant disgruntled groupie goons, and anyone who has the guts and temerity to speak outside of your narrow little gutless narrative of insidious and unscrupulous cowardice, has either left of their own accord or have been silenced by your gutless little megalomaniac tendency that you feign in your attempt to promote your lousy miserable useless inadequacy as the pathetic irrelevant egocentric punk you are behind your veil of vile arrogance. You're a lousy piece of insignificant trash and those with some inherent insight know it, the pity is you don't.

No false "facts" and other commenting policies

It's time to remind visitors to this blog of the Church of the Churchless commenting policies. I approve comments that are in line with these policies.

Which is almost all comments. But some people continue to disregard them. Note that I've added a new policy regarding false information about COVID-19 and other critical topics, number 7.

After 16 years of running this blog, which as gotten 58,484 comments, I'm used to commenters saying all sorts of crazy stuff about their religious beliefs. That's the nature of religion, subjective and unprovable.

But spouting false stuff about COVID-19 is way different. Saying COVID-19 is just like the flu, for example, is dangerous because it is completely wrong and can lead people into not wearing a mask, practicing physical distancing, and other essential safety measures.

Here's a reminder of the commenting policies.

You're welcome -- even more, encouraged -- to leave comments on Church of the Churchless posts. Some of the most interesting writing on this blog comes from other people, not me, Brian the Blogger.

All I ask is that comments be in accord with the following policies. Otherwise a comment probably will be deleted or edited.

(1) No personal attacks on me or other commenters. Challenge the message, not the messenger. Best: You're wrong, because... Semi-OK: You're a fool, because... Not-OK: You're a fool.

(2) No extreme obscenity. Write as if you were in a congenial coffeehouse discussion group, not a high school locker room after your team lost the game in the final seconds. Mild swear words are fine. But goddamn it, don't go over the top.

(3) No rants about the uselessness of this blog. If you're a religious believer, I can understand why this blog could make you angry. Solution: don't read it. If you need to vent, leave a comment on my "I Hate Church of the Churchless" anti-site, not here.

(4) No commercial or religious spam. Advertising, in a comment or a URL, obviously isn't acceptable. Neither are lengthy quotations from a religious scripture, or preachiness. See #5 below.

(5) No irrelevant comments. Please stick to the subject matter of a post in your comment. If you want to talk about something else, leave your comment in an Open Thread, email me with a blog post suggestion, or use the Google search box in the right sidebar to find a previous post on this blog concerning your "something else." (Note: Open Thread comments also should adhere to the policies above.)

(6) No trolling. On the Internet a "troll" is someone who tries to disrupt normal discussions through various annoying behaviors. Here's some ways to recognize a troll. Best response to them: no response. Their sad lives thrive on attention, so ignore them.

(7) No false "facts" about critical issues. As the saying goes, everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts. This applies to this blog, especially about COVID-19 and other critical issues. Blatantly false comments won't be published if they're about life and death or other critical topics such as global warming.

Lastly, one of my pet peeves is how uncourteously many people behave on the Internet. "Flame wars" aren't productive, so try to keep your cool if you disagree with what somebody has said.

I agree with Wikipedia's take on Flaming: 

An Internet user typically generates a flame response to other posts or users posting on a site, and such a response is usually not constructive, does not clarify a discussion, and does not persuade others. Sometimes, flamers attempt to assert their authority, or establish a position of superiority over other users. Other times, a flamer is simply an individual who believes he or she carries the only valid opinion. This leads him or her to personally attack those who disagree. In some cases, flamers wish to upset and offend other members of the forum, in which case they can be called "trolls".

Comments not posting

Typepad, the blogging service I use, is having a problem with comments. They aren't being posted correctly. Only the name of the poster and the date show up, and apparently sometimes not even that. I've let Typepad know about the problem. I'm getting the comments and am publishing them, but they aren't showing up at the moment.

UPDATE: Comments seem to be posting OK. I suspect the problem could have been a comment that someone posted with HTML that wasn't correct. I've noted that incorrect HTML in a comment can cascade and affect other comments. So generally it isn't a good idea to use HTML. URLs will be converted to live links automatically without HTML.

Open Threads are now going to be insult-free

Some religiously-minded people have been using the Open Threads on this blog (free speech for commenters) to insult other commenters in a nasty way.

I apologize for allowing this to go on, though I have been disapproving some of the extra nasty comments.

My rationale, for what its worth, was that allowing religious people to show how hateful and mean they are demonstrates why it makes sense to either be an atheist, or to be a religious person who is a normal nice human being who respects the views of others.

But now I've decided to adhere to the rule I've stated in every Open Thread post.

Leave a comment on this post about anything you want to talk about. Remember that I'm moderating comments, so it could take a while for your comment to be published. Almost every comment submitted to an Open Thread will be approved. Personal attacks on someone are an exception. Argue with ideas, not insults.

A commenter who doesn't use his real name, but goes by "Georgy Porgy," has been one of the worst offenders. So from now on Georgy Porgy is no more. He, or she, can take their hateful comments and spew them somewhere else. 

And if he or she tries to comment under another fake name, Georgy Porgy will have to behave himself or herself, unlike the little boy in the namesake children's rhyme. 

Georgie Porgie, Puddin’ and Pie,
Kissed the girls and made them cry,
When the boys came out to play
Georgie Porgie ran away

So Open Threads are now safe for people to leave comments on. Like I said, the worst offenders have been religiously-minded people, mostly followers of a guru, Gurinder Singh Dhillon, who heads up the Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB) religious group. 

Why they think it reflects well on Dhillon and RSSB to be so nasty is beyond me. But it does show that religiosity can bring out the worst in people, not the best.

Reminder: no trolling, flaming, or off-topic'ing in comments

A recent burst of comment activity in trolling, flaming, and off-topic'ing (new word!) leads me to once again remind visitors to this blog of its commenting policies. 

That link, which is echoed in the Commenting section of the Navigation bar at the top of the page, replaces another post that said the same thing, but in a less detailed fashion. 

I've copied in the commenting policies below. If you submit a comment and want it to be approved, be sure to read what follows closely and follow the policies. 

Regarding irrelevant off-topic comments, it will be obvious from the title of a post and what is said in the post what a relevant on-topic comment is.

Here's an example of what it is not: in a previous post about changing one's mind I mentioned Donald Trump in passing as an example of how I came to accept the reality of his election after a few days.

A commenter then left a lengthy comment about how wonderful Trump is. I didn't approve it, because the comment was wildly off-topic, since it had nothing to do with changing one's mind.

So Ii you're religious, view this as the Six Commenting Commandments. Otherwise, the Six Commenting Rules.

You're welcome -- even more, encouraged -- to leave comments on Church of the Churchless posts. Some of the most interesting writing on this blog comes from other people, not me, Brian the Blogger.

All I ask is that comments be in accord with the following policies. Otherwise a comment probably will be deleted or edited.

(1) No personal attacks on me or other commenters. Challenge the message, not the messenger. Best: You're wrong, because... Semi-OK: You're a fool, because... Not-OK: You're a fool.

(2) No extreme obscenity. Write as if you were in a congenial coffeehouse discussion group, not a high school locker room after your team lost the game in the final seconds. Mild swear words are fine. But goddamn it, don't go over the top.

(3) No rants about the uselessness of this blog. If you're a religious believer, I can understand why this blog could make you angry. Solution: don't read it. If you need to vent, leave a comment on my "I Hate Church of the Churchless" anti-site, not here.

(4) No commercial or religious spam. Advertising, in a comment or a URL, obviously isn't acceptable. Neither are lengthy quotations from a religious scripture, or preachiness. See #5 below.

(5) No irrelevant comments. Please stick to the subject matter of a post in your comment. If you want to talk about something else, leave your comment in an Open Thread, email me with a blog post suggestion, or use the Google search box in the right sidebar to find a previous post on this blog concerning your "something else." (Note: Open Thread comments also should adhere to the policies above.)

(6) No trolling. On the Internet a "troll" is someone who tries to disrupt normal discussions through various annoying behaviors. Here's some ways to recognize a troll. Best response to them: no response. Their sad lives thrive on attention, so ignore them.

Lastly, one of my pet peeves is how uncourteously many people behave on the Internet. "Flame wars" aren't productive, so try to keep your cool if you disagree with what somebody has said.

I agree with Wikipedia's take on Flaming: 

An Internet user typically generates a flame response to other posts or users posting on a site, and such a response is usually not constructive, does not clarify a discussion, and does not persuade others. Sometimes, flamers attempt to assert their authority, or establish a position of superiority over other users. Other times, a flamer is simply an individual who believes he or she carries the only valid opinion. This leads him or her to personally attack those who disagree. In some cases, flamers wish to upset and offend other members of the forum, in which case they can be called "trolls".

Great comment about RSSB truth-telling

Here's a comment by "j" on a recent blog post about Gurinder Singh Dhillon's involvement in a financial fraud investigation that I heartily agree with. 

Truth needs to be spoken. Journalists, in India and elsewhere, do a good job of revealing truth, by and large. Yes, sometimes they make mistakes, as do we all.

But the stories in the Indian financial press about the RSSB guru's alleged role in financial fraud have been almost entirely accurate, and I've been pleased to share them on this blog. I'll continue to do so. 

Sure, I know that some devotees of Radha Soami Satsang Beas, the religious organization headed up by Dhillon, dislike news that puts the guru in a bad light. The truth shines equally in all directions, though. We shouldn't ignore a truth just because it makes us feel uncomfortable.

In that ignoring way lies dogma, blind belief, and intolerance. Let's be open to truth wherever it may lead. This is "j's" comment, which starts with a quote from another commenter.

"Brother with respect one simple question to all of you. Why all of you are passing your judgements without having a strong evidence or proof , if u have so then why u are wasting ur time here, if have go to the concerned authorities and if not then dont shout and keep ur mouth shut and watch all that happening like a respected spectator. This i request to both who are in favour of dera and to those who are not.Thnx"

Another appeal from the RSSB sangat (my brothers?) to cease and desist from making any online comments about RSSB.

How many people outside RSSB know that 20 or so years ago, this organization's current guru banned any discussion of RSSB on the web? The ban has never been lifted, and the prejudice against any criticism of RSSB has been deeply ingrained in the sangat's culture.

I'm guessing that the same people who are "horrified" at critical comments about RSSB have no problem reading other news sites about events in India and across the world. I'm also guessing they're not writing to these media sites and imploring their brothers there to keep mum and just observe events dispassionately.

Let's be frank. No one here is accusing the RSSB gurus of anything that isn't based on evidence. I don't see any of the wild and lurid accusations against Gurinder here that you tend to find on some Sikh sites.

What we're commenting on is public record: 2 separate parties have accused Baba Gurinder Singh Dhillon of taking huge sums of money and refusing to pay it back. I believe the diversion of the Beas river is also a matter of public record.

If you believe as your Guru does that commenting on those matters of public record is indecent and unseemly, that's your right. But you apparently forget that not all of us here are followers of your guru, and we don't agree with you or him that silence is the best policy.

Commenting is good. Insulting is not.

I've added a "Commenting" link in the navigation bar at the top of this blog to remind people of my comment policies. They're pretty loose, but if you're wondering why a comment of yours wasn't approved, do some introspecting after you read the comment policy. 

Each guideline is important, but failure to follow the one about insults probably irritates me the most, because there is nothing more boring than simple-minded personal insults. They belong in middle school, maybe, but not elsewhere. Like I say...

It's boring to insult people in a comment. Don't do it. Stand up for issues, ideas, concepts, and such that you feel need discussing. But don't insult other commenters, or anyone else. Criticize what someone says or does, not the person themselves. 

Try to imagine you're in a person-to-person conversation. It is fine to say, "Hey, I disagree with what you're saying about ______. The way I see it is ______." It wouldn't be fine to say, "Hey, you're an idiot for saying _____. You should keep your mouth shut from now on." 

Crackdown on off-topic comments coming on Wednesday

I've been engaged in a blog "Tune-Up" with Typepad staff that is leading to some appearance and content changes. For example, a Navigation bar has been added at the top of the page.

So I figure I might as well make a long-considered change to my commenting policy.

Well, it isn't really a change, since I've always asked visitors to this blog to keep comments related to the subject of a post, with off-topic comments going either in an Open Thread or in a post related to whatever the commenter wants to talk about.

Since this request has been widely ignored, starting next Wednesday, September 11, I'm going to stop approving comments that aren't related to the subject of a blog post. That gives a two day (secular) grace period for people to adjust to this new policy.

Remember: there are still two ways to say what you want on this blog, so long as a comment isn't excessively critical of another person, insulting, or profane.

(1) Leave a comment in an Open Thread. These free speech posts can be found either by looking in the Recent Posts section in the sidebar, or by clicking on the Open Threads category in the sidebar.

(2) Search for a post related to what you want to say. This can be done via the Google search box at the top of the sidebar. Since 2004 I've written about a great many spiritual, religious, philosophical, and scientific subjects. Most likely someone will be able to find a post related to whatever they'd like to share in a comment.

I'm cracking down on off-topic comments because I find them annoying. I read a lot of news stories online, and regularly visit blogs and web sites with information I'm interested in. 

When I click on a "comments" link, I want to read what other people think about the subject of the article or story. When there's a bunch of off-topic comments, that makes it difficult to find the comments that actually relate to what I care about.

A relatively small number of commenters on this blog have been using it as a sort of message board where they engage in personal discussions, debates, criticisms, and such unrelated to the subject of the post the comments are appearing in.

That's fine in an Open Thread from now on, because an Open Thread has no subject.

However, as noted above, on September 11 my time (Pacific Coast of United States), I won't be approving comments outside of an Open Thread that don't relate to the subject of the blog post the comment has been left on.

Let's take a break from "message board" commenting

As I've noted before, and surely will note again, I try to strike a balance in my comment moderating between keeping comments on-topic (of the blog post they're associated with) and free-floating comment conversations, which sometimes veer into "message board" sorts of frequent back-and-forth talk.

Things have gone too far in the message board direction, with an excessive amount of personal attacks, insults, and such. So if someone's comment hasn't been approved today, don't take it personally. This is just my way of bringing back an added dose of civility, respect, and relevance in comments.

I just added a new Open Thread post where comment standards are less strict. So please keep "message board" sorts of interactions there, and personal insults to a minimum. If your argument depends on calling someone else an insulting name, consider whether you even have a reasonable argument.

Dilbert on circular debating skills

I think the guy in the green shirt honed his circular debating skills by being a religious person who comments on my blog posts.

Good simple comment policy

Perusing news about an upcoming VW crossover, I noted the Motor1 comment policy. Nice. I couldn't agree more. Hope Church of the Churchless commenters feel the same way.

Comment respectfully, please

Here's some reminders to those who leave comments on Church of the Churchless posts. I've been loose on these guidelines, because I support free speech. But I'm going to be a bit stricter from now on.

-- Try to comment on the subject of a blog post. If you leave an occasional off-topic comment, that's fine. But in general, off-topic comments should go in an Open Thread post.

-- This isn't a discussion forum. I realize that some commenters like to engage in lengthy, and often repetitive, comment conversations. Try to keep them brief. When you've made your point, and someone doesn't agree with you, move on. Stop arguing. Find another subject.

-- It's boring to insult people in a comment. Don't do it. Stand up for issues, ideas, concepts, and such that you feel need discussing. But don't insult other commenters, or anyone else. Criticize what someone says or does, not the person themselves. 

-- Brief quotations in a comment are fine. However, speak in your own words, mostly. For sure, don't include lengthy quotes from a supposedly holy book or scripture. Remember: this is the Church of the Churchless, not the Churched.

-- In general, be respectful. Be thoughtful. Be reasonable. Be factual. Be open-minded. Be flexible. Understand that we're not out to change minds. My goal for this blog is to give people an opportunity to make up their own minds.

I'm also surprised I'm not dead yet

I enjoy getting comments from readers of this blog, even those who want me dead. Can't resist making some observations on what Kaur said.

Looks like President Trump's oft-repeated "fake news" lie has made its way to India. On behalf of all rational journalism-loving Americans, I apologize for this export of ours.

Here's some real news. Actually, I started this blog in 2004 because Christian religious fundamentalists played a big role in re-electing George W. Bush as president. And, I'd come to see the downsides of all religions. 

Thanks for the compliment about me being shrewd. And for spelling it correctly. I don't use the word "shrewd" much and struggled to type it just now. But my blog isn't forced on anyone. So far as I know, everyone has to search it out. But if some higher power is forcing it upon people, let me know. That's a higher power I could worship (for an entirely selfish reason).

I'm surprised I'm not dead yet also. Of course, that's because I'm alive. When I'm not surprised, I assume I'll be dead.

If someone wants me dead, it sure seems like they could come up with worse ways of dying than a heart attack. How about flesh-eating bacteria? Or being hacked to death by a Saudi Arabia murder squad? Just some suggestions.

I've started working on a book that will be a compilation of some favorite posts from the early years of this blog. Those posts criticize several religions, including Christianity and Islam. I'm an equal opportunity critic of religious fundamentalism. I just tend to write the most about the religion I'm most familiar with, Sant Mat.

Regarding my narrow mindedness, actually I have a pretty wide brain. Can't remember my hat size, but it is quite large. At my last physical exam I don't recall any mention of an evil heart. I'll have to ask my doctor if I might have that diagnosis. 

Critical thinking welcome here. Preachiness, not so much.

On this blog I've gone back and forth with moderating comments. After deciding a few weeks ago to return to approving comments before they're published on this blog, I'm feeling good about doing this.

I'd rather have just a few -- or even just one -- thoughtful comments on a post than a bunch of irrelevant comments, especially if they're of the "Praise God!" or "Praise Guru!" variety.

But for many years my boundless Buddha-like compassion for religiously-minded beings has led me to offer an "open thread" option to those who want to express themselves in a fashion that isn't appropriate for comments on regular blog posts. Such as, being preachy.

(Here's the newest Open Thread that I just put up.)

This is a big difference between open-minded atheists like me, and dogmatic religious devotees.

I can pretty much guarantee that few religious web sites or blogs allow commenters to criticize their faith, while most non-believers are fine with open discussion of their viewpoints. 

Critical thinking is key. I love comments that exhibit thoughtfulness, even if the commenter disagrees with me. 

Now, I don't have a definition of "critical thinking," nor do I feel like looking one up. Instead, here's my ideas about what this entails.

I'll start with the most important word, critical, since I think most people understand what thinking means. Critical can mean "important," and that's certainly true with critical thinking. It also connotes a certain skeptical questioning, not taking things on faith.

A critical thinker isn't a blank slate, since all of us have preconceived ideas, assumptions, world views, and such.

However, we need to be willing to hold the attitude "I could be wrong." Many, if not most, religious believers aren't willing to do this. Though they may use critical thinking in other parts of their lives, they put it aside when it comes to their belief in God, heaven, life after death, and so on.

The main goal of critical thinking is to understand reality as clearly, completely, and accurately as possible. A related goal is to enable individuals to have productive discussions of what reality consists of, since without critical thinking as a foundation for such discussions, they'd degenerate into people making claims that stifle open debate.

Let's imagine a group talking about global warming -- it's causes, consequences, and what should be done about it. Then someone chimes in with "Jesus saves!" or "God is in control, so no worries." That would stop the discussion in its tracks.

Critical thinking mainly is directed at objective reality, the world outside of our internal subjectivity. 

If someone says, "I believe in God," or "I like chocolate ice cream," there's little that I'd feel like saying in response except, perhaps, wonderful. However, if that person says "God is real," or "Everybody should like chocolate ice cream the best," I'd want to argue with them.

During the 15 years I've been posting regularly on this blog I've seen countless (almost) examples of religious believers mixing up their subjective faith with objective reality. No reasons need be given for subjective faith, but very good reasons must be provided if a claim is made about objective reality.

Typically, truths about objective reality require an extensive process of review, discussion, debate, and criticism.

No one gets to say "the world is like this: _____" without that claim being put under the microscope of critical thinking. Saying so doesn't make it so. Facts, evidence, sound arguments -- those things make it so.

Look, I'm not saying that every comment on this blog outside of an Open Thread needs to be an intellectual tour de force. I'm simply encouraging visitors to this blog who want to leave a comment on one of my posts to be thoughtful in your arguments. Which doesn't mean serious, necessarily. Humor and thoughtfulness are allies, not enemies.

Each of us should be able to laugh at our mistakes, our tendency to believe that we're correct even in the absence of evidence, our unwillingness to admit I could be wrong.

Again, I see this as a difference between us atheists and religious believers.

I'm not certain that God doesn't exist. I'm open to evidence and arguments that God does exist. All I ask is that religious believers have the same attitude. Admit that you aren't certain God exists. Be open to evidence and arguments that God doesn't exist.

If this happens, we can have a dialogue based on critical thinking. 

Here's a few cartoons about critical thinking.

 

I'm back to moderating comments

Unfortunately, a few commenters who've been abusing this blog's free speech preference have forced me to start moderating comments for a while.

What this means is that I'll approve comments for publication as soon as I'm able to do this. May take a few hours, so be patient.

Here's how I put it in a recent comment of my own:

Daljit, great point. No, RSSB doesn't have any web sites or blogs where people can freely comment. But I'm pleased to allow this, because unlike RSSB, I believe in free speech and open discussion of ideas -- even, or especially, those I disagree with.

I do have some commenting limits, though. "Trolls" aren't welcome here.

Meaning, people who aren't really interested in open discussion of ideas, but just want to spout their own narrow views, usually religious, with boring repetition. I'll be patient with them for a while, to see if they're really Troll-like, then their comments get deleted.

One commenter in particular has caused me to start moderating comments, ilanovitch. I've deleted all of the comments he's written.

Perhaps it's just an amazing coincidence that he writes in a style that's very similar to "Ashy," who also used other names, as described in a 2009 blog post, "Commenting quandary." And that ilanovitch also lives in Cape Town, South Africa, where Ashy lived.

It's too bad that religious fanatics don't have better things to do than come on this blog and leave so many off-topic, obnoxious, insulting comments I have to moderate comments temporarily. 

Anyway, rest assured that non-troll comments will be published by me if they're mostly on-topic and not overly preachy. Remember: commenting is a privilege, not a right. 

Another RSSB defender attacks the messenger, me

This blog has been alive and well since 2004. That's 15 years of talking truth to religious power here at the Church of the Churchless.

After over 4 million page views, 2,526 posts, and 42,239 comments, I'm well aware of the games religious believers play when their cherished faith comes in for criticism. One of their favorite ploys is to attack the messenger when the message being shared is so convincing, they have no effective response to my truth-telling.

Recent case in point: commenter Chris.

He's been doing his best to defend the Radha Soami Satsang Beas guru, Gurinder Singh Dhillon, against a criminal complaint filed by his cousin, Malvinder Singh, alleging that Dhillon, his family, and close associates have fraudulently siphoned off hundreds of millions of dollars from companies once managed by Malvinder and his brother Shivinder, who reportedly aided and abetted in the financial theft in exchange for a promise that Shivinder would become the next RSSB guru.

In addition, the complaint says that the guru has made death threats against Malvinder. Not exactly how one would expect that a supposedly "spiritual" guru would behave, though there are plenty of examples of other Indian gurus behaving badly. 

Now, it seems to me that even if someone was a devotee of a guru who has been accused of such serious wrongdoing, especially since investigators in India have documented the money trail that leads to the guru's doorstep, they would say something like, "Wow, these are serious accusations. I sure hope they aren't true. But this purported wrongdoing needs to be closely examined."

Chris isn't that sort of person, though.

He's been doing his best to attack my credibility, even though I've simply been writing about what the Indian financial press has been reporting. Thus he's doing the attack the messenger thing, rather than responding to the details of the message regarding Gurinder Singh Dhillon's reported misdeeds.

After Chris wrongly claimed that I'm an "icon for dissatisfied meditators," I challenged him to explain why, if this was true, I've been meditating every day for 50 years. If I, and other spiritual but not religious types, are dissatisfied with our meditation, seemingly we wouldn't be so happy to meditate.

Here's the most recent comment from Chris, along with my responses in red. I enjoy puncturing religious pretense, so it was a pleasure to reply to Chris' comment. Since my name is Brian Hines, I'm the "BH" in the comment Chris shared.

As a gesture of good faith, I'll do you the courtesy of replying to your points and questions first. I have assumed you will permit me to be rigorously honest with you. . . . , . . .

Hey, I love honesty. Especially rigorous honesty. That's the best kind. I sprinkle rigorous honesty on my cereal each morning -- that's how much I adore it. 

BH: “you claim to be devoted to the truth." I have not made such a "claim" here. Can you quote me? FALSE ASSUMPTION 1

Oh, I'm sorry. When I said in a comment that you (Chris) claim to be devoted to the truth, I thought you'd take that as a compliment. I stand corrected. You don't claim to be devoted to the truth. But I am. I guess I assumed that you were as devoted to the truth as me. My bad.

BH: “you speak of things that you have no knowledge of." Brian you don't know me, nor what I know. FALSE ASSUMPTION 2

Well, what I was thinking of when I said that about you was the above-referenced statement you made about me being an icon for dissatisfied meditators. Since you don't have direct knowledge of how satisfied I or others are with our meditation, I stand by my assertion. But if you do know how satisfied we are with our meditation, I look forward to seeing evidence of your mystical powers. 

BH: "Such as, what I and other critics of the RSSB guru have experienced in meditation, and continue to experience." I have made no such claim to such knowledge. And I admit I don't have it. FALSE ASSUMPTION & ACCUSATION 3

Hmmmm. It sure seems like you made that claim. Below is an excerpt from one of your comments. You said that I and others have embraced "erroneous certainties." But I'm glad that you now admit that you don't know whether what we non-religious meditators experience in meditation is true. So I accept your apology. You wrote;

"Most people live their lives out of self-invented illusory certainties. In my view Brian Hines and many others here have merely swapped one set of erroneous sureties for a different set. As we ALL have the right to do. But if Mr. Hines wants to claim he is spreading 'truth' -- and doing it very publically -- then he also can be held accountable for what he spreads. Don't you think? Or has he now become an untouchable icon for dissatisfied meditators, thus someone who must be defended at all costs, even when he is clearly in error?"

BH: "As Sonya correctly said, we are not the 'dissatisfied meditators' that you say we are." I meant specifically surat-shabd-yoga meditation. And I wasn't referring to JUST you. I was colloquially referring to you and some of your defenders/supporters. In your case I was referencing how you have often expressed a dissatisfaction with the results of your decades of RS surat-shabd yoga. I admit I have made an assumption of my own, that someone who had satisfactory results in surat-shabd yoga would not be regularly engaged in the kind of comments that are commonplace here.

Ah, now we get to the crux of what is bothering Chris. He apparently believes that surat-shabd-yoga meditation is the only genuine kind. I heartily disagree. I spent 35 years diligently practicing that sort of meditation, which is that taught by Radha Soami Satsang Beas.

For about 15 years I've been meditating in a Buddhist fashion, using Vipassana (mindfulness) and Metta (loving kindness) practices. In my experience mindfulness and loving kindness are better ways of meditating. But everyone has to decide for themselves.

I'm just surprised that Chris is so judgmental about meditation practices that differ from the one he prefers.

I'm also surprised that Chris seems to be suggesting that he has achieved some sort of meditation heights that us mere mortals haven't. Do you really believe that surat shabd yoga meditation is better than other types, Chris? Regardless of the answer, I now understand why Chris is so defensive about criticisms of the RSSB guru.

If the guru really is guilty of the crimes he's been accused of, this would show that surat-shabd-yoga doesn't make one a better human being, given that Gurinder Singh Dhillon is the spiritual leader of a surat-shabd-yoga sect.

BH: "You seem to look upon meditation as some sort of a contest...” No, I have not written that, and I do not think that. FALSE ASSUMPTION 4

Again, I stand corrected. When you spoke of "dissatisfied meditators," I understandably assumed that you had a vision in mind of what a satisfied meditator would be like. It's good to know that notwithstanding your statements about surat-shabd-yoga meditation, actually you don't believe that sort of meditation is better than other kinds. On that we agree. Which is why I'm pleased to stick with mindfulness and loving kindness meditation.

BH: "If you're willing, please share what you consider should make someone dissatisfied with their meditation." I regard this as a devious attempt at entrapment used as a defensive avoidance tactic. But ...only you can know for sure. Whatever, I have no interest in pursuing such a line of enquiry and don't see how it adds to the discussion of you presenting one-sided allegations and speculations as if they are factually proven, when any honest person knows that, as yet, they aren't.

Gosh, Chris, I politely said "if you're willing..." No need to view my request as a "devious attempt at entrapment."

Didn't you just say that you don't view meditation as some sort of contest? I simply was wondering why you claimed that I and others were dissatisfied with our meditation. Seemingly that claim would be backed up by a criterion of what would make someone satisfied with their meditation.

Regarding the allegations made against Gurinder Singh Dhillon, you should complain to the Indian financial press and Malvinder Singh, since they're the ones reporting on and making those allegations. I sprinkle my blog posts on this subject with "allegedly" and similar terms. I've never said that they were factually proven. Maybe you've been reading some other blog and mixing it up with this one. Hey, we all make mistakes. 

BH: "Again, along with Buddhist teachings, I consider that coming closer to the reality of the present moment, whatever that reality consists of, is what meditation is all about. If you disagree, share your own view of meditation." Again, I see this as yet another irrelevant point to my specific observations and therefore a diversionary tactic. There.

There? That's your answer to my query about whether you believe coming closer to the reality of the present moment is what meditation is all about?

I simply was trying to understand how you view meditation. Sounds like I was correct in assuming above that truth isn't your primary goal in meditation. That's fine. Everybody is entitled to their own illusions. Whatever works for you, do it.

Will you now reply to the previous observations and the related questions put to you? Here are a few more: Can you see how you have again in this reply made many false assumptions and made unfounded claims?

No. 

Can you see that you have built a picture of what is occurring between us based on those false assumptions AS IF they were 'factual' and 'true'?

No.

Can you see how that appears to be a pattern of behaviour?

No.

UPDATE: I just came across a comment by Sonya that is too good not to share in this post. GSD refers to Gurinder Singh Dhillon, the guru of Radha Soami Satsang Beas. Enjoy:

@Chris Why do you keep saying “dissatisfied meditators”. I was very satisfied with my meditation when I followed RSSB and am still satisfied with meditation today. That had nothing to do with GSD. It’s GSD’s stomach churning behavior and the comments I personally witnessed spew out of his mouth as well as his inappropriate behavior that were intolerable.

Maybe you haven’t spent enough time in his close presence to understand this yet. As you’ll see in one of Brian’s recent posts he threw in “allegedly” and made reference to how Stephen Colbert often throws in “allegedly” when talking about Trump.

That made me laugh... All of the other late night TV show hosts repeat the news... (and they don’t even say allegedly) that’s exactly what Brian is doing (on a more serious note). Watch Colbert, Trevor Noah, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, James Corden, John Oliver... they repeat the news and add their own Op Ed to it...

I wish India had an SNL [Saturday Night Live] type show... maybe they do. If so, I’d love to see it because this whole RSSB, Dhillon, Singh scandal has rocked the Indian Media. They like to refer to it as a potboiler... they say it has all the makings of a Bollywood movie with a guru even thrown in! It’s a blockbuster Bollywood film in the making.

You should spend some time watching the News channels in India cover this... get a translator. It’s sadly very entertaining. Or are you more of a Fox News and Info Wars kind of guy/girl? (respectfully, Chris could be either) What made GSD will break GSD.

Want to be preachy? Head to this other blog, please.

Preachiness, fundamentalism, dogmatism... not welcome here. If you've got an overwhelming urge to leave a comment praising God, a guru, your spirit guide, or any other religious entity, do it on Atheist and Believer, a blog that welcomes proselytizing (within bounds). Comments may be moderated here, and won't be approved if off-topic or preachy. If not moderated, a comment may be removed if off-topic or preachy. Scroll down for the real posts. 

"Atheist and Believer" blog begins, so comments have returned here

My atheist "prayer" has been answered. Praise No-God! 

As noted in an earlier post today, I said that I'd bring back comments to this blog if someone would start a different blog where true believers in Sant Mat/RSSB could discuss their adoration for the guru and his teachings rather than cluttering up the Church of the Churchless with religious dogmatism -- where comments like that aren't welcome.

Spence Tepper, a frequent commenter on this blog, has started the Atheist and Believer blog. An initial Welcome post presents an appealing perspective.

To keep my end of the blog post bargain, I'm going to resume allowing comments on this blog, albeit with comment moderation where I approve comments before they're published. 

My expectation is that anyone who visits this blog and wants to share off-topic comments about how marvelous their religion, mystical experience, or spiritual beliefs are will head to Atheist and Believer where those sorts of comments are welcome.

Within bounds, though. You can read about those bounds on the Welcome post of Atheist and Believer. 

Look: I realize that the believers in Sant Mat/RSSB who have been using this blog as a message board aren't doing this to drive me crazy, but rather have needs for connection and communication with other believers that weren't being met in other ways. 

But now that Spence Tepper has started his blog with an open door policy (again, within certain bounds), I feel much better about not approving comments that are off-topic or excessively preachy. In the past my boundless Buddha-like compassion has made it tough for me to crack down on people who abuse the commenting privilege on this blog.

Now that those people can find a home on Atheist and Believer, my attitude will be "If this comment doesn't fit, it's going into the unpublished pit." (Couldn't resist the O.J. Simpson trial allusion.)

Comments could come back if someone sets up a RSSB/Sant Mat blog

I've gotten emails from several regular commenters on this blog who wish that comments on my posts would be allowed again. Here's what I said to one of these people.

It’d be great if someone, like you, would start a blog or message board — blogs are easier to set up and run, in my view — focused on discussions of Sant Mat and the RSSB teachings. Then I could publicize that blog/board as The New Place to share comments and messages on those subjects, including the RSSB gurus, both past and present. 

 

Yes, David Lane has been doing this. Assume he still is, because I haven’t visited his RSSB/Sant Mat discussion group in many years. And I’m sure this sort of thing exists elsewhere on the Internet. It may be a forlorn hope, but for quite a while I’ve been thinking, “I wish the religious crazies had another place to leave their comments and messages.”

 

As it is, those people are abusing my blog through their off-topic commenting. 

 

Over 14 years and many thousands of posts, I’ve built up a readership that is relatively small, but pretty steady. This isn’t easy to do. When I started, I was thrilled to have 20 page views a day. The Internet is so vast, as you know, that getting noticed in a gigantic cyberspace is tough to accomplish.

 

So it bothers me that my blog is being hijacked by people who are unwilling to start their own RSSB/Sant Mat blog, either because this is (or was) discouraged by the guru/Dera, or they don’t want to go through the trouble of what I’ve done for those 14 years — write (hopefully) interesting content regularly day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year.

 

Anyway, give this some thought. 

 

It would be easy to set up such a blog. I like Typepad, which offers free blogs, I’m pretty sure, if some advertising is accepted. Otherwise the yearly cost is minimal. Blogger is free, I believe.

 

You are sort of a bridge between me and the crazies (I understand you may not view them that way, but I do). They would be interested in a Sant Mat/RSSB blog that you set up. Again, hopefully this would take comment pressure off of my blog, and I could go back to allowing comments, either moderated or non-moderated.

Basically, I'm willing to try allowing comments again, so long as the people who have been using my blog as a Sant Mat/RSBB discussion group do their religious thing someplace else. If someone sets up a Sant Mat/RSSB blog, I'd be pleased to publicize it.

I just Googled "Sant Mat RSSB blog." Not surprisingly, several of my posts turned up on the first page of Google results. But I don't see any site/blog that allows comments and has regular posts about Sant Mat/RSSB subjects. Interestingly, a RSSB Facebook page has guidelines that are much stricter than my commenting policies have been. 

Break-in attempt to my account

So, after turning off comments on this blog last night because religious crazies were spewing wildly off-topic comments on my posts to a greater degree than ever before, I wake up this morning to find from my email inbox that one of those crazies has been trying to break into my Typepad blogging account.

My laptop's screen couldn't show all of the attempts to reset my password. There were 126 in total. 

They failed, and I've notified Typepad of the break-in attempts. I've also asked Typepad, which is familiar with hacking, to do their best to identify the person who is trying to break into my account.

Whoever you are, and I suspect you're one of the regular religious crazy commenters on this blog, I want to let you know that you've strengthened my conviction that eliminating comments from this blog is a good thing.

There's no reasoning with religious dogmatism. Likely you think you're doing God's work by trying to break into my account. You feel superior and entitled, so you think it's perfectly fine to do something illegal and immoral. 

Instead of meditating, reading a holy book, or pondering the mysteries of the cosmos, you engaged in many efforts to reset my Typepad password. Wow. Very spiritual of you. So spiritual. 

You've made me feel even happier to be an atheist. Thanks for that, religious crazy.

Religious crazies cause no more comments on this blog

I'm done with comments here on the Church of the Churchless. Comment moderation means more work for me.

But when I allow unfettered comments, the religious crazies who have chosen to abuse this blog as a forum for them to blab about their chosen form of dogmatism litter their comments with abandon -- paying no attention to my oft-repeated request to keep comments on-topic with the subject of a post, and to limit their religiosity to Open Threads where I've allowed complete free speech.

So I've decided to do two things: (1) turn off comments on new posts, and (2) moderate comments on existing posts, because it doesn't seem to be possible for me to not allow comments on old posts.

Now it's going to be easy to moderate comments, because I'm also turning off email notifications of new comments, so they won't be cluttering up my inbox. 

Bottom line: I'm fed up with having this blog used to discuss Sant Mat and Radha Soami Satsang Beas dogmas, since this blog is called Church of the Churchless, not Church of the Churched. I've been exceedingly patient with comment abuse over the years, but my patience has run out.

You know who you are, religious crazies.

You have an astounding sense of entitlement and egocentricity. You've failed to appreciate the time and energy I've put into this blog over the past 14 years, instead using it to spew your fundamentalism, Eastern variety, in a daily flurry of comments.

I'd say "Good luck with finding another web site willing to embrace your religious nuttery," but that'd be a lie. I wish you no luck, except insofar as you follow the light of truth, reason, and demonstrable evidence toward reality rather than fantasy.

No more comment moderation

I've decided to stop moderating (approving) comments, after a brief time doing otherwise. It's a burden on me, and an inconvenience to commenters, to have to do this. 

What I hope is that people will stay on-topic as much as possible with their comments, putting comments unrelated to a blog post in an Open Thread. I've just added a new Open Thread. Old ones can be found by clicking on that category in the right sidebar.

I believe in free speech. I also believe that speech should be founded on love, caring, and compassion to the degree us fallible human beings can do this. Life is tough. Life is short. Let's support each other, even when we disagree with each other.

The two are compatible. We should be able to say "I don't agree with you" while also feeling "I love that we have different views and still enjoy each other's company." (either in physical reality or cyberspace)

Why do religious people go on atheist sites?

Here's a positive review of my new comment policy on this blog, where I now moderate (approve) comments before they're published. One day in, I'm enjoying the lack of off-topic crazy comments from dogmatic religious believers. 

I regularly exchange emails with the person who wrote what follows. John used to be religious, but now, like me, he's seen the atheist light. 

John makes some good points. I don't know any atheists, which includes me, who go to religious sites and try to convert believers to atheism. But this churchless blog gets many visits and comments from religious people.

Why? Well, like John says, I agree that believers in God get a lot more defensive when someone questions their religion, than atheists do when someone questions their lack of belief in God.

Which makes sense.

I don't get upset when someone questions why I don't like country music. Since I don't have any attachment to that type of music, it doesn't bother me if a country music lover thinks I'm a fool for not being a fan of that genre.

Plus, atheists are used to being put down by religious people, while this is much less common for believers -- given that the vast majority of people in the world believe in some form of supernatural divinity.

This is the message I got from John today.

Hey Brian, I saw where you are moderating comments again.  Good for you!  I think I’ve talked about this before, but I can’t understand why religious folks go on sites like yours and try to convert people, or “prove” that others are wrong, or whatever.  It seems very common. 

I wonder if atheists go on religious sites and rant and rave and such?  I would think there are some, but my suspicion is that it’s less common.

I kind of understand why the religious folks like to argue their points.  I was never really zealous in my religious days.  I was very serious about my faith, but I didn’t argue with many people who didn’t believe like I did.  But I think it’s more threatening to have a believer’s beliefs questioned than it is for a non-believer to have their non-beliefs questioned.  LOL  If you know what I mean?

There were a few times that I got into a discussion with an intelligent atheist or agnostic and they would ask me questions that I just didn’t have the answers to.  That was very unsettling!

I thought the cartoon that you posted was great, as well.  Oh man, how accurate is that?  I remember, in my early days of walking away from religion, I read a lot of Wayne Jacobsen’s material.  At that time, he talked a lot about how religion always seems to have a hook in it. 

“Invite your non-churched friends to the church picnic!”  Why?  Just so you can get to know that and bless them and see that they have a good afternoon getting to know some great people?  NO!  It’s so we can get them to come back, and eventually get them saved.  And then they will tithe, of course. 

And inevitably, if they get worked on long enough without getting saved, then they are normally discarded and the believers move on to someone else.  Often with the attitude from your cartoon.  I’ve heard many a church member say something along the lines of, “well, I’m glad they are going to hell”.  Really?!?!? WTF?  Ugh.

I have yet to hear of a blogger whose mind was changed by the religious comments on their blog.  And vice versa. 

In my experience, and in others that I’ve talked to, any time a person makes a big change in their beliefs, it’s usually because something happened to make them start thinking and seeking answers.  Now, in that seeking they may come across someone who says something that will help them down the road a bit. 

But the classic knocking on someone’s door out of the blue and converting them to your beliefs, or flooding someone’s comment section, usually doesn’t have the desired result.  Most of the time, it actually works in the opposite direction!  The person being preached to normally walks away just that much more sure of their own beliefs.

Thanks, as always, for the great posts.

Talk to you again soon.
John

Comments are back to being moderated. Religious craziness is the reason.

I just turned comment moderation back on for this blog. That felt good. My experiment is over with allowing people to post comments on their own, saying whatever they like (pretty much; I did have my limits).

The breaking point came today when I scrolled through a bunch of comments on my most recent post, "Buddhist wisdom: pay attention to the breath until the self dissolves." 

Those comments surpassed the usual level of religious dogmatism, inanity, incomprehensibility, and plain gibberish that I'm used to seeing from a group of core commenters who have been using this blog basically as a message board to reinforce among themselves their faith in an Eastern form of mysticism known as Sant Mat.

Um, I kept reminding them that the name of this blog is Church of the Churchless, not the Church of Sant Mat. And the tag line is "preaching the gospel of spiritual independence," not "bowing down at the holy feet of the guru."

But those warnings fell on deaf ears, because religious craziness is an addiction, and addicts can't break their habit easily. 

I'm sympathetic to those addicts. I used to be one myself, back in the days when I too believed in the teachings of Sant Mat. But I  was nowhere near as fanatic as the above-mentioned commenters. I liked to give reasons for my belief, and I didn't consider that what I believed was 100%, for-sure, absolutely true.

So from now on I'll be moderating comments to see if they relate to the subject of a post and aren't filled with religious preachiness. It's bothered for me for quite a while that this blog was being used to spread religious craziness via comments, but I managed to stifle my feelings about this.

No more.

I'd rather have one intelligent, reasonable, thoughtful comment on a post I write than a hundred incoherent comments about how wonderful holy sound and light are, and how lucky the commenters consider themselves to have found the One True Way. Which is complete bullshit that I don't want contaminating this blog any longer.

Further, I know that normal human beings who want to express their opinion about a post get turned off by the mass of comments that have nothing to do with what I wrote, and often insult anyone who expresses a view that challenges their dogmatic religious sensibilities.

My commitment is to seeking truth and encouraging respectful discussions about that quest. I've allowed that commitment to be diluted by being overly accepting of wacko comments. Again, no more. 

Understand: I still very much welcome comments on my blog posts. What's unwelcome are off-topic comments that contain religious dogmatism unrelated to the subject of the post. Geez, I write a post about Buddhist meditation and virtually all of the comments are about how awareness of breathing is the Devil's workshop.

Why? Because Sant Mat fundamentalism says so. Not good enough. Not even close. If you can't think for yourself, don't even think of leaving a comment on this blog, because it won't be published. Like I said, intelligent, reasonable, thoughtful comments will be approved, whether or not I believe in them.

But if you want to use this blog to spread religious craziness, start your own blog or message board. I'm done with allowing this blog to be used that way.

Commenters, please, don't lie and don't preach

I just added another Open Thread post so commenters who want to share something preachy, off-topic, or untrue have a place to do so. It's this blog's free speech zone, where anything goes. 

Also, I've been loose about off-topic and untrue comments on regular Church of the Churchless posts, but there are limits -- and I hope commenters will do better about staying on topic and being truthful. 

As I've noted before, I enjoy reading comments on blog posts and newspaper stories. However, if I'm reading a Washington Post story about Jamal Khashoggi's murder by the Saudi Arabia hit squad, I don't want to see comments that, say, proclaim "It's a George Soros plot!"

In fact, I don't see such comments, because newspapers typically moderate comments in accord with pretty strict comment guidelines. 

Likewise, if I'm having a conversation with a group of people, and we're talking about climate change, it is both impolite and jarring if someone interjects with, "I'm a Christian. Praise Jesus!" Yet this is akin to what some commenters do on this blog, albeit not about Christianity or Jesus.

(I'm thinking mainly of you, "777.")

I delete those sorts of comments unless they are in an Open Thread. I also delete comments about me deleting those sorts of comments.

Here's another problem regarding truthfulness. Today a couple of commenters said stuff that is so obviously untrue, it took me just a couple of minutes to debunk the falsehoods. 

Look, if I can do this in a couple of minutes, so can every commenter. Before you publish a comment that makes a wild claim, do some research to confirm that it is true.

Where I live, the United States, we have a president who lies constantly. I and a great many others are fed up with this. I don't want this blog to be a platform for lies. Or, if you like, untruths. (A lie is an untruth that someone knows to be untrue; often it is difficult to tell the difference between a lie or an untruth.)

Here's the first untruth, a comment posted by Spence Tepper on a recent blog post.

No, the brain doesn't send radio waves. The link Tepper shared in the comment doesn't say that. It says that the brain can emit weak electrical fields which may propagate between nearby layers of neurons. These aren't radio waves, which are only one form of many types of electromagnetic waves.

The MIT School of Engineering answered a question, "Can brain waves interfere with radio waves?" Here's part of the answer. 

Radio waves and brain waves are both forms of electromagnetic radiation — waves of energy that travel at the speed of light. The difference between brain waves, radio waves, and other electromagnetic waves (such as visible light, X-rays, and Gamma rays) lies in their frequency — that is, how often the waves peak and trough in a second. 

Radio waves, which include radio and other wireless transmission signals, as well as other natural signals in the same frequency, peak and trough at between 50 and 1000 megahertz — that’s between 50 million and one billion oscillations per second.

The human brain also emits waves, like when a person focuses her attention or remembers something.  This activity fires thousands of neurons simultaneously at the same frequency generating a wave — but at a rate closer to 10 to 100 cycles per second.

Interference happens when two waves of the same or very similar frequencies bump into each other. This might happen when the signals from two radio stations, both broadcasting at 89.7 megahertz from different cities, bump into one another. “The shape of the waves changes linearly, they add to and subtract from one another,” says Dimitrios Pantazis, director of the Magnetoencephalography (MEG) Laboratory at MIT’s McGovern Institute. As a result, songs become static.

But, says Pantazis, since their frequencies are so wildly different, brain waves don’t interfere with radio waves. Even if that was the case, brain waves are so weak, they are hardly measurable at all. For comparison, says Pantazis, “the magnetic field of the earth is just strong enough to move the needle of a compass. Signals from the brain are a billionth of that strength.”

Here's an even more obvious untruth from commenter Vinny:

Yeah, Vinny, this atheist is going to provide what you consider a "lame argument" to refute what you said. In other words, TRUTH.

Again, it took me about one minute to find a Snopes piece that debunks the ridiculous idea that people can survive only on sunlight. Actually, people have died because they held this belief, so it is no joke to further promulgate this dangerous falsehood. And just as obviously it is impossible to live only on water. Excerpt:

Although claims of “breatharians” surviving and thriving pop up every few years, we were unable to find any evidence contradicting the body of science demonstrating humans require water and food to stay alive. It’s possible the couple profiled by The Sun in June 2017 both genuinely made and believed their own claims, but we found no proof the impossible assertion was actually true. When tested, purported breatharians such as Jasmuheen failed to last more than a few days without food and water. 

Sungazers are closely akin to Breatharians. Again, there is no evidence that people can live on either only sunlight or water, or sunlight and air.

Vinny, next time you feel like posting a crazy comment, head to Google and check out what the reality-based community has to say about your notion -- especially if you're advocating something that can kill people.

Nasty criticisms of me from some "spiritual" RSSB defenders

I find it entertaining to see how supposedly "spiritual" followers of Radha Soami Satsang Beas, the Indian organization headed up by a guru that I was a member of for 35 years, can write such wonderfully insulting comments about me.

I'm sharing some recent comments below, along with my response in italics.


These are great comments -- don't get me wrong about that -- but they pale in vehemence, profanity, and stream of consciousness verbosity to comments I've received previously and published on my I Hate Church of the Churchless blog.

------------------------------------------

Believer in Humanity said:

Brian Hines is the most egotistical person in the world. He became dead against the RSSB when his book was not printed by Dera. His ego was so much hurt. He will never let this truth out. He is a big time fame and attention grabber. He pretends though opposite...I closely know and have seen his actions first hand. The best thing we can do to him is IGNORE HIM. It is said that ignoring anyone is the best insult you can do to him. Let us not fell in his trap. If we all ignore him. He gets unsettled. He tries to find something to trigger news and get attention

Wow! I'm the most egotistical person in the world?! Thanks for the honor, but have you spent much time watching my country's president, Donald Trump? I humbly need to claim second place. Also, it was a mutual decision to have Return to the One published by myself, not RSSB. (Plug: click on that Amazon link to buy it.) Regarding me wanting to get attention, thanks for writing your comment, which I'm using to help get more attention. 

 

Naresh said:

Mr. Brian, You don't know and you will come to know in the coming days that you are an Idiot. By reproducing the text what Bombay Blonde has posted, you have acknowledged this. There is no wrong doing in conducting business by borrowing money from close family members. You have crossed your limits. It seems you are an aged person, please get your head examined.

Oh, I know that I can be an idiot. Just not all the time. A couple of days ago my car wouldn't lock after I'd parked it. I kept trying for about a minute, then realized I'd left the auxiliary power on while listening to the radio. I did indeed feel like an idiot. Regarding loans to family members being wrongdoing, read this Bloomberg story. You'll find that loans to the Dhillon family came from companies controlled in whole or part by members of RSSB, which led to "crushing debt" that helped destroy the Singh brothers business empire. Lastly, I do get my head examined at an annual physical exam. So far I've been able to correctly answer the senior citizen questions, like what my name is and where I live.

 

Gurdish Kaur said:

U r really sick and need to go psychiatrist .Mind ur own buisness and don't spread remours about dera .Ur bad statements can't harm anything.so get well soon.....Best wishes...

 

Thanks for the concern about my mental health. I'm married to a retired psychotherapist, so I figure that my wife will let me know if I become truly mentally ill. Of course, all wives sometimes think that their husband is crazy, so I'm not counting this as a mental illness, just a byproduct of marriage.

 

REVENGE said:

If only I could be the owner of hell, what splendid plans I'd come up with for the writer. I wouldn't stoop as low as you have but just remember KARMA. One day things unimaginable will happen to you and you will wonder what wrong did I do and then all of a sudden you will remember this, just know Karma fucked you hard.

 

I'd love to know more details about what sort of hell you envision for me. Suggestion: since I'm a liberal who detests Donald Trump, being forced to wear a red Make America Great Again cap and listen for eternity to Trump's campaign speeches would be a hellish punishment. 

 

Varinder Singh said:

You all are asshole stupid .you have no idea what you are doing

Well, right now I feel like I know that what I'm doing is writing a response to you telling me that I have no idea what I'm doing. But maybe this all is illusion, maya. Which would be far out!

sanjeev said:

Pigs are writing such poor attention seeking articles without having done any proper investigation. Idiot foreigners are writing such useless articles based on rumours.

 

Hey, I've got to stand up for my country! I'm not an idiot foreigner, I'm a proud idiot American! By the way, rumors sometimes are true. That's why the RSSB guru should authorize an independent audit of the Beas Trust and the Dhillon family finances. That way rumors could be dispelled. Or, maybe, confirmed.

 

Sonal said:

Total Rubbish...These people r making rumours of Rssb ...RSSB is as clean and pure as God itself...

 

Interesting argument. Not sure if it would stand up in a court of law. And what if God doesn't exist?

 

Akanksha said:

Now what good can u expect when Dirty people starts judging and blaming others who are doing good. Rssb is a class in itself. By writing a mere rubblish article what do u want to prove?? Just grow up.

 

I take a shower every morning and a bath every night. So I'm quite clean, mostly. Regarding growing up, I keep waiting for that to happen. I'm almost 70, so I'm beginning to doubt that's going to occur. But on the bright side, I'm pleased that I'm still growing, not stagnant.

 

Nidhi said:

Were u ever a follower, you Brian Hines? You are clearly KAL you should change your name to SATAN. You are the weakest human being who did have the strength to continue on the path so left it and start blaming and shaming the guru to hide your own weaknesses. They say the path is for the 'Soormas' and definitely not for swines like you. You are a bunch of weaklings and spineless swines. As I said before as well wait for your time to be over you will have to pay for your karmas and believe me you will not be able to carry their load. May God give you the toughest punishment ever.

 

Gosh, now I've gone from being a plain idiot to SATAN. Well, I guess that's a promotion. Sort of. And, yes, I was initiated by Charan Singh in 1971, through his representative Roland deVries. I meditated every day and followed the vows to the best of my ability for 35 years. I did a lot of seva for RSSB, including writing three books on the organization's behalf, serving as sangat secretary for many years, giving satsangs, and doing security seva at several of Gurinder Singh's visits to North America. Does all this count for anything with God, or am I still going to get "the toughest punishment ever"? Like, more than what Hitler or Stalin got? Yikes!

 

New one:

dharam said:

mr. Brian you have crossed the limits in writing abusive language. i request you to remove abusive language and picture from your blog immediately. i would like to narrate a story to u. some persons called 'bear' to some sangat asking for parshad in the congregation of a sikh guru and they had to be born as bears and again they were liberated from the species of 'bear' by the next guru.hope u might understand. i remind u there is heavy punishment by the God for the pain givers and criticisers of saints as per gurubani which is like bible. and thes press reports or other reports cannot be said as true or conclusive.and you better mind your business for sake of your soul.

 

I think bears are quite adorable. But I'm thinking more of Pooh Bear, than a grizzly bear. Do I get a choice of what sort of a bear I'll be reincarnated as? And is a panda a kind of bear? Being a panda would be OK. I'm a vegetarian, and I could learn to like bamboo shoots -- especially if I was a panda. Theological question: can both the Gurubani, which I assume is the Adi Granth Sahib (which I've read), and the Bible both be true? Me, I doubt it. In fact, I don't think any holy books are true, which is why I'm not afraid of anything happening to my soul, because I don't believe I have one.

 

Another new one, an email:

from Shivkumar B, Bathjia: 

In indian mythology there was one so called powerful person who had 7 heads. He was proclaimed as God. He tried to flirt with Sita wife of God. Not only he lost 7 heads he lost his entire family n his kingdom was reduced to Ashes.  How many heads you have? Your fate will be similar.  Your time starts now. Let us see how u protect yourself.

Hmmm. So Indian mythology says God cuts off someone's seven heads, destroys his family, and reduces his kingdom to ashes because he tried to flirt with the wife of God.  Seems like overkill, to put it mildly. Myths like this one is why I don't believe in God, who sounds a lot with the judgmental violent God of the Old Testament. In answer to your question, I have one head. I'm not going to do anything special to protect myself, because I'm not afraid of speaking truth to power -- even if the (mythical) power in this case supposedly is God.

Also, if someone flirted with my wife, my likely reaction would either be to ignore this, or to say to the guy (or gal), "Hey, you've got good taste, but this is my wife." I wouldn't want to behead them. So this seems to show that I've got more love, compassion, and self-control than whatever mythical God is being talked about in the "Sita" story.

 

----------------------------

UPDATE: Jesse just left a Church of the Churchless comment that explained India's crazy (to me) laws about offending religious sensibilities. I've copied in a portion below. But I'm an American. We're fortunate to have a First Amendment that protects free speech. And the state where I live, Oregon, has an even stronger statement about free speech in our state constitution. So people who live outside of the United States need to remember that we can say whatever we want about religions.

 

For those who don't know, in India, it is illegal to criticize other religions. The law talks about "hurting the religious sentiments of others" or something (IPC 153) , and crazy religious riots are almost a daily happening there, literally, because people are too emotional to hear blasphemy. I've had conversations even here with people from India and they've used those words "hurt my religious sentiments." This is why you see here everyone who is freaking out is saying Brian has no right, he's slandering, it's illegal etc. Because they developed a culture where critique is not allowed and it is illegal where they live, because they want it to be. Mobs shut cities down regularly over words they don't like. What we have in the west called "free speech" simply doesn't exist in many other parts of the world, and people who don't have this mindset will almost never convert to it, nor will their kids.

 

It's interesting that the United States rarely, if ever, has violence involving either religious speech, or anti-religious speech, whereas India does. Sure, India has its own unique religious history, marked by a lot of religious hatred.

 

Still, free speech is a very good thing, and India needs more of it.

 

When people feel like they can't express themselves honestly ad directly, frustrations simmer. That's why I was so pleased to see that India's Supreme Court has legalized gay rights. It must have been tough for gays in India to feel like they are a genuine part of their country, when the laws discriminated against them.

 

Blog commenters have different styles of making their point

People are different. This is a truism that bears repeating, because we all tend to think that other people think like us. After all, the only mind we're directly acquainted with is our own.

And even that mind we know only imperfectly, since most of what goes on in our cranium happens subconsciously, with only the tip of the iceberg of our psyche rising into conscious awareness.

After fifteen years of blogging, which has entailed reading many thousands of comments on my posts, I continue to be intrigued by the various ways people use to make a point about something.

Following is an off-the-top-of-my-head of some of the commenting styles I've observed. 

Now, obviously one person might use various styles from time to time, or even in the same comment. And I'm not claiming that any style is more right or wrong than the others, or should be preferred. These are just various ways of communicating. 

I'm going to use subjects addressed by this blog as examples of the commenting styles, because, duh..., I'm posting on this blog.

The Logician. This style aims at producing an iron-clad set of reasons for believing this or that. A commenter who favors The Logician tends to write lengthy comments, because it takes quite a few words to lay out the case for why such and such is true.

A drawback is that apparent in Aristotle or Plato: logic takes us only so far in understanding the world, or other people. So just because something makes sense, doesn't mean it is true. All the logical arguments in the world for the existence of God don't total up to evidence that God exists.

The Relativist. But some people don't accept that objective truth exists. Along with "deconstructionists," they consider that truth is a cultural invention, with even science falling prey to subjective biases. So they elevate subjectivism, especially their own subjective experience. If something is true for them, why, it must be true for everybody. The downside is that this perspective applies to others also, which makes it tough to find common ground.

And if we accept that everyone's experience is equally valid, the door is left wide open to crazy ideas, conspiracy theories, and unfounded theories. Sure, it is possible that Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Lao Tzu, the Vedas, and so on all are talking about the same spiritual reality,  but this requires that the revelations of every religion somehow fit together, even though they clearly don't.

The True Believer. A person using this style doesn't attempt to convince others of what they believe. They simply repeat a dogma over and over, because it is just so damn obvious that it must be believable. With little or no room for doubt in their mind, they can't understand why others don't see the marvelous truth that's lying right out there in the open.

However, what is obvious to one person is obscure to another. And when two or more True Believers try to talk to each other, it's like ships passing in the night if they believe in different things. No connection is possible when, say, the absolute truth of the Bible is contrasted with the absolute truth of the Koran. 

The Poet. This is a more appealing version of The Relativist. Someone using a style of The Poet embraces a creative vision of reality that is hard to pin down, since it relies more on soft imagery than hard concepts. They try to get their point across indirectly, subtly, creatively. 

There's a lot to like about a poetic sensibility, especially when we're dealing with something that can't be pinned down in other ways. A five thousand word essay isn't going to capture how someone feels about entering a Gothic cathedral, but a hundred poetic words could come much closer. But if I want to know something objective, like why my computer isn't working, poetry isn't going to be of use.

The Scientist. Someone taking a scientific perspective believes that objective reality exists, and that it is possible to come to know this reality through careful observation, experimentation, reasoning, and such. They (correctly) consider that most human progress has been attained with the aid of modern science, so like to use it whenever possible. Skepticism is a big part of being scientifically minded.

But as the saying goes, to someone with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Taken to extremes, a scientific world view can downplay alternative ways of looking upon reality. And it is possible that while science works for knowing many things, at the farthest edges of time and space the scientific method may face insurmountable roadblocks, which also is an argument against applying it to religious and mystical questions.

The Nihilist. A person with this style isn't prone to commenting on blogs, thankfully, so I've rarely encountered one. Basically they're The Relativist on steroids. Not only is there no objective truth, there's barely any subjective truth, because reality is so empty of anything meaningful, there's no reason to give a shit about anything.

On the positive side, though there's little to be positive about concerning pure nihilism, a small dose of existential despair can be an appealing antidote to simplistic feel-good narratives. I am both embarrassed and pleased to admit that I've ordered a copy of "My Beautiful Despair: the Philosophy of Kim Kierkegaardashian."  These sample revelations in the Amazon book description helped make the sale:

– I have majorly fallen off my workout-eating plan! AND it's summer. But to despair over sin is to sink deeper into it.
– Obsessed with protecting your skin, lips, hair & face from the sun? Close the cover of the coffin tight, really tight, and be at peace.
– I like my men like I like my coffee: a momentary comfort in the midst of all my suffering.
– What is the operation by which a self relates itself to its own self, transparently? Selfie.
– What if everything in life were a misunderstanding, what if laughter were really tears? Scared LOL!!
– Glamour, menswear, top hat…I stick my finger into existence, and it smells of nothing.
– I took my cat Mercy to the groomer, to brush out the dreadful tangled confusions of its existence.
– I’ve been going to bed a little bit earlier each night, to get a taste of death.

Tips for my Typepad blog visitors who are having a problem with comments

Some visitors to this Church of the Churchless blog have problems with leaving a comment on a post. Usually this is due to the comment being identified by Typepad, my blogging service, as "spam."

When this happens, I need to approve the comment after checking the spam section of the blog's comment file. I try to remember to do this daily, and when possible, several times a day.

Just realize that sometimes I'm away from my computer for quite a while, so I'm unable to check the spam section. And sometimes I forget to do this, being busy with other things. Rest assured that I should find a wrongly-identified spam comment within a day or two, and publish it.

Here's some tips and observations about leaving a comment:

Best to log-in with a Typepad account. I suspect that logging in with a Typepad account makes it more likely that a comment will be published smoothly. I have to do this myself when I want to leave a comment. This is the first option shown in the "Post a comment" box when you click on "comments" at the bottom of a post.

Here's a link that should lead to the page where you can create a free Typepad account. If the link is broken, just click on the Typepad icon in the "Post a comment" box. Here's what the page looks like. Note that you can choose what name to have displayed. I'm pretty sure that this doesn't have to be your real name, if you're concerned about confidentiality.

Or, log-in with another account. As shown above, you also can log-in with a Facebook, Twitter, Googgle+, and a number of other accounts. As noted above, this should increase the chances that a comment will be published smoothly, since your identity will be confirmed. 

Don't try to publish a comment repeatedly. A few commenters on this blog try to publish a comment repeatedly after Typepad doesn't publish it. This leads to numerous repeated comments in the spam section. This makes it more difficult for me to check the spam section, since I have scroll through what sometimes is a long list of lengthy comments wrongly identified as spam to look for other valid comments.

And every time I click on "publish," the spam page refreshes, so to find another wrongly identified comment I have to scroll through a bunch of repeated comments that I've already looked at.

So the lesson, as noted above, is to log-in either with a Typepad account, or one of the other accounts.This should decrease the chance that a comment is correctly identified as spam.

I suspect that when someone tries to repeatedly publish a comment, the Typepad commenting software will consider this as an increased sign that the comment is spam, but I could be wrong about this. Still, if a comment doesn't appear the first time, doing the same thing again probably won't make the comment appear.

Make sense with your comments. I rarely unpublish comments. This only happens if a spam comment makes it through the spam filter; if a comment is nonsensical; if a comment is in a foreign language; or if a comment crosses the line into an excessive personal insult or profanity (very rare, thankfully).

Here's an example of a comment that I unpublished because it couldn't be understood: "will use his phantasy MUST BE will lose his phantasy which = with it's ups"

Let me know if you've followed these tips and still can't post a comment. Send me an email via the link in the right sidebar, describing in as much detail as possible what you did in attempting to post a comment. I'll share that info with Typepad support staff and hopefully they can figure out what the problem is.

"Your mind is the perfect epitome of religious fanaticism"

I admire thoughtful, rational, well-reasoned put-downs of religious fanatics. That's why I'm sharing a marvelous comment on a recent post by "Appreciative Reader" that totally destroys the credibility of another commenter, "D.r."

The whole comment is well worth reading as a great example of how to respond to religious bullshit. But my favorite part of Appreciative Reader's comment begins with the one-sentence paragraph, It occurs to me that you may be wondering why I’m wasting so much time with you.

I really resonate with the last part of the comment. It makes so much sense, I'll repeat it here:

But I come now to the third and most important reason of all, and that is : it is important that fanatics like you are everywhere called out and held to scrutiny and even, when appropriate, to ridicule. A very large portion of the world’s misery is due to fanaticism; and if we don’t immediately step on fanaticism the moment it raises its ugly head, then we are indirectly facilitating the growth of the cancer of fanaticism.

Every time that fanatics like you open your mouth to pour invective and ridicule on other people’s sincerely held faith while at the same time blithely claiming respect for your own pet delusions, every time that fanatics like you pollute rational and courteous discourse with your malicious and discourteous proselytizing, if we can immediately and firmly call out your bullshit (even if we personally are not necessarily being targeted), then we will have contributed in some small way towards making the world a slightly saner and safer place.

Here's the full comment from Appreciative Reader.

Quote D.r : “I contradicted myself there.”

No shit you contradicted yourself there! “There", indeed! You say that as if that is the one single contradiction that you’ve made, and which single instance I now point out to you. Your contradictions, friend D.r, are truly legion! My longish comment to you, addressed to you in that other thread, was a compendium of sorts of a whole host of them. All clearly documented and clearly demonstrated.

I refer to Open Thread 11 : go back and refresh your memory if you wish by re-reading the unbelievable comments you have posted there. After reading that comment of mine (addressed to you, and posted on January 29), what you do is to abjectly, cravenly, throw your hands up in surrender, eschewing even the barest pretense of rationality, eschewing even the appearance of critical thinking ; you retreat entirely from that particular discussion without showing any signs of having even understood what was being said to you ; and you respond there, instead, with some out and out non sequiturs, plucked out of thin air.

What is one to think of someone whose comments appear practically half-witted when the discussion moves to their own faith, their own beliefs and their own irrationalities ; and who, paradoxically, suddenly turns around and writes sharp and intelligent comments, all awhirr with critical thinking, when examining the irrationalities within others’ belief systems? As has happened here again and again and again?

Take these short responses you’ve made to me, right here on this thread:

I tell you clearly in so many words that, basis your repeated protestations, I no longer think you’re trolling, that I do not, repeat DO NOT, think you’re trolling ; to which you respond by complaining that I’m trying to show you up as a troll! God above, man, can you not READ? That’s, like, textbook strawmanning!

Then you go on to say : “I don’t put down other people’s faith or experiences” -- and, amazingly, astonishingly, go on, in that very same sentence, to say “I simply point out that meditation is dangerous and leads to delusions”, by which you mean, as is clear from your other comments, you mean not to highlight dangers (real or imagined) in this endeavor, but to imply that all of those whose experiences are predicated on meditation are deluded.

It is but a short step from there to, for instance, describing Jim Sutherland as mentally deranged, and, to take another instance, to peremptorily dismissing the heart-felt and sincere personal observations of Manjit, which he was kind enough to discuss here specifically on my request.

(And here’s the thing : if some out-and-out atheist were to do this sort of thing, I’d call them plain-spoken to the point of being obnoxious, but nevertheless consistent ; and especially in a “Churchless” blog their plainspeak, although perhaps unkind, may not really be out of place ; but for someone that claims that God “touched” them, for someone who solemnly claims they’ve actually had visions of God, for such an out-and-out apparent nut job to try to so peremptorily and rudely dismiss other people’s experiences, while continuing to gibber on about their own experiences and pet beliefs, that is … well, words fail me as I look on the grotesquely unhinged mentality that can make such comments in all earnestness.)

Here’s another gem from you : ”I do put down atheists though and I don't give a crap what you or anybody else thinks about that. I have zero respect for atheism. I hope you understand.” Well, I’m afraid I myself don’t have an overabundance of respect myself for people who do not treat others with respect. Even when such disrespect is not necessarily directed at me personally. I hope you understand!

And then, finally, you round off your comment here to me with that perfectly absurd gem of a non sequitur, where you say to me “I’m still not convinced that you aren’t an atheist”. That’s breath-taking, the sheer irrelevance and absurdity of that last nonsensical non sequitur.

And in that original sentence I quoted in my first comment addressed to you here (where you say that you can tell the real from the fake, etc), while your premise itself appears to have been mined from some deep dark recess within your own physiology, nevertheless that premise is yours ; and you seem unable to comprehend that single-line premise that you yourself hold, and what that premise, coupled your well-documented past conduct on here, says about the nature of your own experience. (Hint : that word, “fake”! Per YOUR standards and basis YOUR thinking, basis YOUR premise, not mine!)

#FacePalm!# ------ How can someone be so consistently bipolar in their commenting, alternatively apparently half-witted (when talking about their own beliefs, seemingly unable to parse simple sentences) and then, next moment, suddenly all razor-sharp and rational and logical (when talking about others’ belief systems)? I’d mentioned schizophrenia only in jest in my previous comment, but perhaps you do need to go get yourself tested!

Anyway : This discussion with you, across threads, was singularly unprofitable, but at least it was, in retrospect, not without some entertainment value! God knows I’ve tried to reach out to you more than once, including right here on this thread, despite your absurd and often obnoxious commenting on here! I’ll know better henceforth than to risk my sanity by trying to engage with you any further on this subject!

It occurs to me that you may be wondering why I’m wasting so much time with you.

I was just now about to press the “Post” button, when that same question occurred to me : why, I found myself asking, have I wasted so much time thinking about you and talking of you? It’s an interesting question in itself, because I generally like to keep well away from the bickering that is so common in Internet forums. I think the answer is, apart from the entertainment (which after all is only fleeting), I think in a weird sort of way, getting to interact with you was an instructive process.

Your mind is the perfect epitome of religious fanaticism.

What passes for thought with you, where this subject is concerned, is classic : my own religious delusions are gospel truth, to be respected and revered, and anyone who doubts the authenticity of my spiritual experiences and my religious faith is wholly wrong and misguided ; and what is more, others with their own spiritual experiences and religious thoughts and beliefs are also equally misguided ; and both these categories of people are fair game for peremptory dismissal as well as unprovoked rudeness and insults.

Logical rational thought have no place where my pet delusions are concerned; and yet, where others’ cherished beliefs are concerned, logic is a sound tool, as long as it can be used to swat those beliefs down. That’s you in a nutshell, D.r, when it comes to this particular subject : fascinating, isn’t it?

Your tragedy is, you’re born in the wrong time and the wrong place. You’d fit right in, had you been born some four to five hundred years ago (or earlier). I’m sure getting to live during the Inquisition would be your idea of heaven. Had you been born in those times, you’d get to not only insult those who don’t share your delusions, you could even end up physically hurting them by snitching about them to the authorities.

Even in present times, had you been born in, say, Syria, even then you’d probably fit right in with some of the folks there (always provided your delusions were of the Islamic variety, as opposed to the Christian variety). How do you like that idea, incidentally : I may have just now charted out the perfect calling for you : as long as you’re prepared to junk your current delusions and to embrace the One True Faith (Islam) and the One True God (Allah), you can always book a one-way ticket to one of those places that you read about in the papers, and you’ll find yourself in the company of your spiritual brothers, people who think exactly like you do.

Incidentally: I’m usually a stickler about being just as courteous online as I am in real life. But being less than perfectly polite with the likes of you is fine, at least at times. Jesus may have advocated turning the other cheek : but I am personally fine with reciprocating in some measure the rudeness of those who are gratuitously contemptuous of and discourteous to others. It is as good a means as any of keeping people like you in check.

Anyway: I was talking, in the latter half of this comment, about why I’m spending so much time on you. I’ve listed two reasons already. The first was entertainment (albeit of very questionable taste). The second was instruction about how the mind of the religious fanatic works.

But I come now to the third and most important reason of all, and that is : it is important that fanatics like you are everywhere called out and held to scrutiny and even, when appropriate, to ridicule. A very large portion of the world’s misery is due to fanaticism; and if we don’t immediately step on fanaticism the moment it raises its ugly head, then we are indirectly facilitating the growth of the cancer of fanaticism.

Every time that fanatics like you open your mouth to pour invective and ridicule on other people’s sincerely held faith while at the same time blithely claiming respect for your own pet delusions, every time that fanatics like you pollute rational and courteous discourse with your malicious and discourteous proselytizing, if we can immediately and firmly call out your bullshit (even if we personally are not necessarily being targeted), then we will have contributed in some small way towards making the world a slightly saner and safer place.

Open Thread 12 (free speech for comments)

Since preachy comments are continuing to show up on posts I've written that have nothing to do with the topic, on Tuesday I'm going to start deleting those comments if they aren't in an Open Thread -- like this one.

Leave a comment on this post about anything you want to talk about. I'll try to remember to always have an Open Thread showing in the Recent Posts section in the right sidebar. If one isn't showing, I've added an Open Threads category in, naturally, the Categories section. So you can always find an Open Thread that way.

Starting Tuesday, comments on other posts need to be related to the subject of the post, or they will be candidates for deletion. So an Open Thread is the place for pro-religion remarks and whatever. 

Back in 2015 I wrote "No preachiness" reminder for commenters. Click on that link to learn what is acceptable as a comment on a post other than an Open Thread. 

Look, every day I check out a bunch of web sites and blogs, mostly about news and politics on the local or national level. I enjoy reading comments on stories or posts. But it's irritating when people leave a comment about something totally extraneous to the subject of the story or post.

For example, comments on a story in our local newspaper about a City Council decision may veer off into But what about Hillary Clinton's emails??!! This isn't dissimilar from me writing a blog post about free will and finding that in comments people are praising their guru, or God.

Check out the name of this blog: Church of the Churchless. With an emphasis on churchless.

If you're religious, that's fine. Just keep in mind that if you went to a blog called Best Tips for Grilling the Perfect Steak, and you started extolling the virtues of vegetarianism in a comments section, the blogger would be justified in saying to you, "Hey, your comments are off-topic."

So I urge you to think for yourself and stay on-topic when you leave a comment on a blog post. Don't just regurgitate some religious dogma or say something unrelated to the post. Again, those sorts of comments belong in an Open Thread. 

Please keep comments on-topic

Reminder: as noted in Open Thread 11, comments on a post need to be related to the topic of a post. Don't veer off into using a comment as a way to preach about how wonderful your chosen faith is, or talking about some other subject. It's irritating for a reader of a blog post to click on comments, then find a bunch of irrelevant comment conversations. Use an Open Thread to talk about whatever you want (there should be an Open Thread showing in the Recent Posts section in the right sidebar). 

Open Thread 11 (free speech for comments)

It's been a while, but Open Thread has been resurrected. This blog has been getting comments that don't fit with the topic of the post in which the comment was made.

So here's another Open Thread (previous OTs are still open, of course). Leave a comment about anything you want to talk about. I'll try to remember to always have an Open Thread showing in the Recent Posts section in the right sidebar.

Comments on other posts need to be related to the subject of the post, or they will be candidates for deletion. So an Open Thread is the place for pro-religion remarks and whatever. 

Back in 2015 I wrote "No preachiness" reminder for commenters. Click on that link to learn what is acceptable as a comment on a post other than an Open Thread. I'll also copy in that post below for easy reading.

 

 

"No preachiness" reminder for commenters

Ah, how soon they forget. Some preachy-prone commenters on this blog have been asking, "Dude, where's my comment?"

Unpublished, guy or gal. Guess you've forgotten my post of a few months ago about a new commenting policy.

Starting today, I'm going to be less accepting of publishing comments that include a lot of preachy religious dogma.

Some people have been using comments on my "churchless" posts as an opportunity to share their irrelevant (to the post) religious beliefs. 

They might make a passing brief reference to something I said in the post, then launch into a lengthy description of how great this-or-that religious belief system is.

From now on, I'd like those commenters to do the reverse: use your personal critical/logical thinking skills to make some cogent observations about the content of the post, with maybe a brief reference to their religious beliefs.

I mean, it's fine to say "I'm a Christian" or "I'm a follower of Sant Mat."

But this is a freaking churchless blog! I don't want to publish comments filled with Christian or Sant Mat dogma. There's plenty of other blogs and web sites where religious true believers can share that stuff.

For example, I just wrote about the mystery of existence. Comment away on this post if you want.

But say something about the freaking mystery of existence -- not something like, "God created everything" or "Just meditate at the eye center and you'll know."

I look upon blogging as much more of a conversation, than as a free speech forum. If a group of people is talking about some topic, it is discourteous and disruptive to burst into the conversation by saying something completely irrelevant.

Though this happens on the Internet all the time, I don't want it to happen here.

Sharing fresh, creative ideas is great. Just make them at least somewhat relevant to the topic at hand -- what's been written about in a blog post.

New Church of the Churchless comment policy

Time for an experiment with comments on my blog posts. I'm scientifically minded. I enjoy trying something different and seeing how it works out.

Starting today, I'm going to be less accepting of publishing comments that include a lot of preachy religious dogma.

Some people have been using comments on my "churchless" posts as an opportunity to share their irrelevant (to the post) religious beliefs. 

They might make a passing brief reference to something I said in the post, then launch into a lengthy description of how great this-or-that religious belief system is.

From now on, I'd like those commenters to do the reverse: use your personal critical/logical thinking skills to make some cogent observations about the content of the post, with maybe a brief reference to their religious beliefs.

I mean, it's fine to say "I'm a Christian" or "I'm a follower of Sant Mat."

But this is a freaking churchless blog! I don't want to publish comments filled with Christian or Sant Mat dogma. There's plenty of other blogs and web sites where religious true believers can share that stuff.

Don't get me wrong: comments add a lot to my blog posts. I enjoy reading them, as do other visitors to this Church of the Churchless blog. 

Comments just shouldn't be a mindless repetition of some religious dogma.

Think for yourself. Write about how you feel. I don't mind an irrelevant personal comment nearly as much as an irrelevant comment filled with preachiness.

Best of all, of course, are thoughtful comments related to the subject of a blog post, because most people who read the comments on a post expect this to be the case.

I find it boring, for example, when I see a bunch of comments on a newspaper story that have nothing to do with the story. Some people are just using the ability to comment to blab on about some favorite subject, or gripe. 

Can't resist some churchless thanksgiving's

OK, I give up.

I've tried my best to resist the onslaught of thankiness here in the United States. Today is Thanksgiving, a national holiday. It has something to do with being thankful (obviously), but even Wikipedia can't explain the origins of what often is called Turkey Day.

For my wife and me, it's Wheat Gluten Day, as we're about to put a meatless Celebration Roast in the oven. We don't celebrate Thanksgiving in a traditional fashion. However, there's nothing wrong with keeping "thanks" part of the day.

So, that's what I'll do: say thanks to those who visit this blog and leave comments on the posts.

The Church of the Churchless gets about 700-800 page views a day, with about 350-400 unique visitors. That means a lot to me. I'm grateful to be able to communicate in some fashion with that many people -- even if some simply take a glance, think "not for me" and head off to another thread of the vast worldwide web.

I've been blogging away here for a bit over six years. Sometimes it seems like there's nothing more to say, yet whenever I sit down at my laptop to compose a post, I find that there is.

Because I keep changing, learning, exploring, wondering, questioning, spurred on in some fashion by every comment or email that comes my way.

Whether I agree, disagree, or am neutral about what someone else says, his or her ideas wend their way into my psyche, adding to the ocean of information that my brain churns away on -- largely outside of my awareness.

Eventually fresh ideas and intuitions bubble up to the surface.

So I never (well, hardly ever) get tired of writing stuff for this blog. I can't really tell in what direction my philosophical and meaning-of-life inclinations are heading. What matters to me is the feeling of movement, a sensation that I'm not standing still.

Whether someone else calls this progress or backsliding doesn't matter to me, just as whether anyone applauds or denigrates your own way of living life shouldn't matter to you -- so long as you're satisfied with your choices and aren't purposely hurting others in the process.

Often I use the Google search tool in the right sidebar to find a post that I'd written years ago. Reading through it, I'll continue on into the comments and find that some people who are commenting on this blog now were Church of the Churchless visitors way back when.

"Cool," I'll think.

It's rare that a comment is left on this blog from someone I know personally. More precisely, physically. Because I do feel that I know many commenters personally. We've just never met face to face, only mind to mind.

Over the years I can sense changes in these people, whom I think of as friends in a very real cyberspace way. Like me, they're on their own journey, looking for fresh meanings and better ways of relating to the world.

As with my other friends, I may disagree with them on this or that particular subject.

What's much more important is the common ground we stand on: a commitment to non-dogmatic truth-seeking, spiritual independence, and respect for the mystery that remains when the light of human knowledge is laid against the much larger darkness of reality beyond our understanding.

Every day I learn something through this blog. Thank you, Church of the Churchless visitors, for making that possible.

Must be troll time

Merry Day after December 25. This must be Troll Day in the United Kingdom, where some nameless person (if I didn't name him BleedingObvious), is busily posting childish comments in my name, "Blogger Brian." 

I've deleted them and have turned on comment moderation. Sorry for the inconvenience. 

Commenting policies

I've put together a page describing Church of the Churchless commenting policies. (Link also at left of top bar above). Please read, and have fun in the comment playground -- just obey the rules.

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:

(1) How reliable is the source of the claim?
(2) Has the source often made similar claims?
(3) Have the claims been verified by another source?

And the first three items in Carl Sagan's Baloney Detection Kit are:

(1) Wherever possible there must be independent confirmation of the facts.
(2) Encourage substantive debate on the evidence by knowledgeable proponents of all points of view.
(3) Arguments from authority carry little weight (in science there are no "authorities").

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.

Open Thread 5

Here's another Open Thread (previous OTs are still open, of course). Leave a comment about anything you want to talk about. From now on comments on other posts need to be related to the subject of the post, or they will be candidates for deletion. So an Open Thread is the place for miscellany and whatever. Feel free. No personal attacks on other commenters (or me), please: criticize a message, not the messenger.

Open Thread 4

Here's another Open Thread (previous OTs are still open, of course). Leave a comment about anything you want to talk about. From now on comments on other posts need to be related to the subject of the post, or they will be candidates for deletion. So an Open Thread is the place for miscellany and whatever. Feel free.

Jerk leads to temporary comment moderation

I'm temporarily going to comment moderation on this blog, where I approve comments before they are published, because Neut er all (a.k.a. Walker, JAP, etc.) has been posting comments under other people's names -- tAo, Catherine, Robert, others, including me, Blogger Brian.

I can tolerate insults and attacks on me, but not when they involve other people. Since I have a life apart from blogging, I can't delete identity theft comments as soon as the jerk posts them.

As I've said before, I've been reluctant to go to comment moderation because I want comment conversations on this blog to be as easy to engage in as possible. But posting comments under someone else's screen name is over the top.

Another example: Neuter/Walker/JAP is using my email address on other web sites.

Here's the churchless lesson.

This guy almost certainly is a devotee of Radha Soami Satsang Beas, the organization I used to be an active member of. The RSSB guru wouldn't condone this behavior. Nor would any decent person.

But fundamentalism makes people believe that any action can be justified in the name of their god. This is a great example of why churchlessness is the way to go: you don't want to end up like this true believer, trying to steal people's identities and stop honest discussions on this blog.

I need to consider what to do to protect visitors to this blog from having fake comments posted under their name. Until then, I'll stick with comment moderation.