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Penn (of Penn & Teller) and I believe

seayakin

Graduate Poster
seayakin
Joined
Nov 30, 2003
Messages
1,437
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5015557

"Believing there is no God means the suffering I've seen in my family, and indeed all the suffering in the world, isn't caused by an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent force that isn't bothered to help or is just testing us, but rather something we all may be able to help others with in the future. No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."

I heard him read his statement on NPR and waas struck by the clarity and rationalism of his statement (and dare I say eloquence).

Any others see this?
 
Damn, I love those guys.

If you haven't, read his book, Sock. You'll never read anything like it.
 
seayakin said:
"Believing there is no God means the suffering I've seen in my family, and indeed all the suffering in the world, isn't caused by an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent force that isn't bothered to help or is just testing us, but rather something we all may be able to help others with in the future. No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."
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Not to nitpick, but [nitpick] the statement's a false dichotomy. Belief in God doesn't prevent anyone from helping anyone else. Mainstream religious thought accepts medicine, medical research, all forms of scientific inquiry, and any attempt to relieve or prevent suffering, through ethical means.

If people need to give purpose to their suffering by believing in God, fine. That doesn't prevent them from taking aspirin or working to make buildings better suited to earthquakes.

There will always be suffering of one sort or another, and not all suffering is physical. You want to give it meaning by believing in God? Your choice. You want to believe it's not part of some master plan? Your choice. It has little direct bearing on what you do about it.
[/nitpick]
 
I don't see it as that way, David. I see it as a personal statement of someone's faith, not nessicarily as the way that he thinks how other people should.

It's a personal affirmation of his own faith, not the instructions on how other people should act.
 
Yet he's very outspoken about it. If it were strictly private, he wouldn't be announcing it on national radio. If he doesn't think others should agree with him, he should just leave the subject alone. The minute he has his views broadcast all over the place he invites criticism. I'm happy to oblige, being the crotchety, ill-tempered crank that I am.

I share his misgivings about all things woo, and a healthy distaste for much of modern religion. But I call it as I see it, and the citation above contains a logical fallacy.
 
David Swidler said:
Not to nitpick, but [nitpick] the statement's a false dichotomy. Belief in God doesn't prevent anyone from helping anyone else. Mainstream religious thought accepts medicine, medical research, all forms of scientific inquiry, and any attempt to relieve or prevent suffering, through ethical means.

If people need to give purpose to their suffering by believing in God, fine. That doesn't prevent them from taking aspirin or working to make buildings better suited to earthquakes.

There will always be suffering of one sort or another, and not all suffering is physical. You want to give it meaning by believing in God? Your choice. You want to believe it's not part of some master plan? Your choice. It has little direct bearing on what you do about it.
[/nitpick]
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He didn't create a false dichotomy, you did. He stated the consequences of his own belief system. That doesn't neccisarily mean that all other beliefs systems different then his own have the opposite consequences.
 
David Swidler said:
Yet he's very outspoken about it. If it were strictly private, he wouldn't be announcing it on national radio.
Click to expand...

Is the media intended just for proselityzing, or can it also be used for staking out your own ground? Does "private" have to mean "secret"?

The minute he has his views broadcast all over the place he invites criticism.
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Does erecting a fence around your property inherently invite and permit encroachment? Will others respect your property rights if you don't publicize the boundaries, or make known your willingness to defend them?
 
CaptainManacles said:
He didn't create a false dichotomy, you did. He stated the consequences of his own belief system. That doesn't neccisarily mean that all other beliefs systems different then his own have the opposite consequences.
Click to expand...

Please note the last line of the quote:

"No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."

For the statement to have meaning, its opposite must be false. So here goes: "God means the possibility of less suffering in the future." Is that false? I claim not, as my first post stated. Belief in God is irrelevant to the amount of future suffering.

Beady said:
Is the media intended just for proselityzing, or can it also be used for staking out your own ground? Does "private" have to mean "secret"?
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Of course not. But he can't expect people who spot flaws in his argument (or idiots like me who think they spot flaws) to just let it slide.

Beady said:
Does erecting a fence around your property inherently invite and permit encroachment? Will others respect your property rights if you don't publicize the boundaries, or make known your willingness to defend them?
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Who's encroaching? He staked a claim, and I pointed out what I think are flaws in the claim. Feel free to demonstrate how those flaws don't exist.
 
David Swidler said:
Who's encroaching? He staked a claim, and I pointed out what I think are flaws in the claim. Feel free to demonstrate how those flaws don't exist.
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The existence of flaws is irrelevant. If they exist, they are his and he appears comfortable with them.

Are you insisting that his personal position is flawed out of some perceived duty to point out flaws, or are you purposelessly exercising a right merely because you can? Is it concern for others, or ego?
 
May I request that in the future, you make your thread titles more descriptive? More detailed titles allow us to more easily decide which threads to read and to more easily find those threads months from now.
 
David Swidler said:
Belief in God doesn't prevent anyone from helping anyone else.
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Yep' that's a false dichotomy alright.. Where did you get it ?



Did you bother to read the article ?

I believe the opposite of:

"No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."

Would be:

"Some God means the possibility of more suffering in the future."

Which is exactly how Penn's statement seems to have been intended...
 
I very much enjoy Penn's essays at the P&T website. Some are incredibly moving, and all show that he puts a great deal of thought to his public statements.

That said, I was dissappointed with his essay here. I will have to read it again in a day or so to reconsider...perhaps I simply expected better because I am so fond of his other writing. This was simply not my favorite of his essays.
 
the nitpicking

I'm gonna go one step further and say that religion often times does prevent people helping others.

It's been said, and I agree, that many times Christianity (and Islam) has been used to keep the oppressed down.

For example, slaves brought to the U.S. from Africa were coerced to convert to Christianity and forbidden to teach their children any other religion. Christianity let them believe in a heaven they would go to if they were good. A payoff after death made them much less likely to revolt. If there was no afterlife, and this is it, then they would have been much more aggressive about changing their lives.

If there is no justice in the afterlife, we must fight for justice now. Otherwise we can rest and let God sort it out.
 
seayakin said:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5015557

"Believing there is no God means the suffering I've seen in my family, and indeed all the suffering in the world, isn't caused by an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent force that isn't bothered to help or is just testing us, but rather something we all may be able to help others with in the future. No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."

I heard him read his statement on NPR and waas struck by the clarity and rationalism of his statement (and dare I say eloquence).

Any others see this?
Click to expand...
I see a hurt person acting out in accordance with the suffering he's experienced. There is more pathos here than eloquence, more rationalization than rationalism. I too am a P & T fan, and I do not engage in shodden freude (sp?) or taking joy in the pains of others. But the statement "No God means...less suffering" well... something there just doesn't add up.
 
David Swidler said:
Please note the last line of the quote:

"No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."

For the statement to have meaning, its opposite must be false. So here goes: "God means the possibility of less suffering in the future." Is that false? I claim not, as my first post stated. Belief in God is irrelevant to the amount of future suffering.
Click to expand...

You are correct, for that statement to be true, that opposite must be false, but the opposite statement would be "No god means there is no possibility of less suffering in the future". Your insistence that saying "no god means the possibility of less suffering" implies "the belief in any god eliminates the possibility of less suffering" is without merit. Consider a similar statement "this road will take you to town". Does that imply "any other road will not take you to town"? Again, for there to have been a false diachotomy, he would have had to have made some statement about only two possibilities existing, but he only made statements about his own beliefs. You are running under the assumption that there are only two possibilities, and then using that to accuse HIM of creating a false diachotomy, which is a bizzare thing to do.

It's like me saying "Everything David has ever said is an appeal to authority. I know this because obviously everything he's said must have been told to him by someone else. Even if he provides good reasoning for his arguements, ultimately it's just an appeal to authority". It's barely comprehensible.
 
David Swidler said:
Not to nitpick, but [nitpick] the statement's a false dichotomy. Belief in God doesn't prevent anyone from helping anyone else. Mainstream religious thought accepts medicine, medical research, all forms of scientific inquiry, and any attempt to relieve or prevent suffering, through ethical means.

If people need to give purpose to their suffering by believing in God, fine. That doesn't prevent them from taking aspirin or working to make buildings better suited to earthquakes.

There will always be suffering of one sort or another, and not all suffering is physical. You want to give it meaning by believing in God? Your choice. You want to believe it's not part of some master plan? Your choice. It has little direct bearing on what you do about it.
[/nitpick]
Click to expand...


I think you may be misunderstanding Penn's own (I think) misunderstanding of belief in god. If, as he seems to assert, belief in god means belief that god is the author of suffering, then his statement is not a false dichotomy, since it stands to reason that an omnipotent God who causes suffering will not likely tolerate our attempts to diminish his work.
 
OK, I see it now. My bad.

Nevertheless I disagree with his assessment. One can make a cogent argument for belief in God achieving the same result.
 
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