Time for skeptics to grow up?!

[Puppycow]

I don't know .... Sylvia Browne seems to be doing just fine. So does the pope ...

Taking advantage of other people's superstitions can be profitable. Being superstitious yourself, usually less so.

 

[Puppycow]

Hmmmm, I don't know. I don't really see it. When you say superstition breeds poverty, do you mean poverty literally, understood as a financial status, or do you mean poverty of mind? If you meant the first, could you illustrate please?

I'm not saying I don't agree, I just don't see it.

Definition of superstition: An irrational belief -- i.e., one held in spite of evidence to the contrary -- usually involving supernatural forces and associated with rituals.

How could this lead to literal financial poverty? Well, the believer could waste a lot of time, energy and money on the superstition at the expense of productive economic activity. And the most productive economic activity involves thinking. People may waste money on quack medicines or shamanic rituals. To be sure, there are certainly some superstitious rich people, but fewer scientists will be superstitious, and science is a big creater of new wealth.

 

[dann]

Here we have a failure to understand economics. This is Marxist ideology, not critical thinking. This sort of thinking when put into practice has resulted in massive famines in the Soviet Union, China and North Korea. An ideology that fails to understand human nature cannot produce a society that is livable by humans.

But the other famines were Capitalist, right? And they died because of Capitalisms brilliant understanding of human nature, right?

We also have 35 million Americans who, every single day, live in poverty in America (…) We should talk about lifting these Americans out of poverty, because it is wrong to have 35 million people living in our country, living in poverty every single day. (…) We have children in a country of our wealth going to be bed hungry. We have children who don't have the clothes to keep them warm. We have millions of Americans who are working hard every single day for minimum wage, living in poverty in America. http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/01/19/elec04.prez.edwards.tran/index.html

Just another commie lie! Where would we be if capitalism did not understand human nature so well?

 

[CFLarsen]

Puppycow,

People who believe in Sylvia Browne only have themselves to blame?

 

[Puppycow]

Puppycow,

People who believe in Sylvia Browne only have themselves to blame?

No. They can blame Sylvia too.

 

[dann]

Actually, capitalism is about number 3, creating wealth, not 1 and 2. Capitalism is how new wealth is created.

Capitalism means that the stuff produced by workers etc. does not belong to them, it belongs to the owner of the company they work for. Why do you seem to believe that the products belong to the people who produce them? Are you some kind of anarchist?

There are three ways to acquire wealth: you can be given it, you can take it, or you can produce it. The first two depend on others to produce the wealth. Only the third way creates new wealth, and this way requires rational thinking. The first two do not require rational thinking (the second one requires a certain sort of self-interested antisocial rational thinking, but leave that aside) but won't reduce poverty overall.

But you are right about production as the only new source of wealth. It’s just a pity that even as it is being produced, it belongs to somebody other than the guy who produces it. It belongs to the other guy who had him produce it. And you’re also right when you say that this does not reduce poverty. It is actually the capitalist way of causing it!

 

[CFLarsen]

No. They can blame Sylvia too.

They share the blame, then.

What do you suggest we do with those who seek Sylvia's "services"?

Since they are to blame (but share the blame with Sylvia) for their own situation (being exploited by crooks like Sylvia), should we help them at all?

 

[Prometheus]

My wife is Congolese, and she informs me that:

1) The sense of family duty in Congo is so intense, that it can ONLY be trumped by an accusation of witchcraft. The families in question are living in crushing poverty and they have to make very difficult choices; if they just don't have enough to feed all the children in a large extended family then this superstition is the only way they can make the heart-rending choice to exclude the child of a cousin from their care without bringing down the wrath of their neighbors upon the rest of their family.

2) The current president of that country derives his entire powerbase from the uneducated and superstitious, generally from outside the capital city. When he came to power, one of his first acts was to clamp down on education and torture, harass and kill university students. In terms of available natural resources Congo is one of the wealthiest countries in the world, but the superstition/ignorance enabled power structure is keeping all of that wealth out of the hands of the population at large.

It seems to me that skeptics are simply putting their talents to use exactly where they should be on this particular issue. Ignorance/superstition and poverty/oppression are intimately connected, and they feed off of each other. Both sides of the equation need action, but skeptics are much better equipped to address the former directly than the latter.

 

[dann]

1) The sense of family duty in Congo is so intense, that it can ONLY be trumped by an accusation of witchcraft. The families in question are living in crushing poverty and they have to make very difficult choices; if they just don't have enough to feed all the children in a large extended family then this superstition is the only way they can make the heart-rending choice to exclude the child of a cousin from their care without bringing down the wrath of their neighbors upon the rest of their family.

Well put, Prometheus! This was the point I made one year ago, but unfortunately many people were unable to grasp it: The Africans don't want to abandon their (or their cousin's) children, and superstition is not what makes them abondon the kids, but since they cannot support them, they feel compelled to come up with an excuse for doing so. And sometimes - but not always, as other quoted examples showed, so your "ONLY" is a little exaggerated - the excuse is found in superstition.

 

[Prometheus]

dann,

Things are getting more and more desperate over there, so I don't doubt that people grasping for any excuses they can find. On the other hand, I don't think it's just an excuse. The superstition is genuinely believed by a lot of the people there--that's why it works as an excuse. While the real motive might be economic, at least some of the people doing this really believe the accusations they're levelling.

Oddly, it's the Christian missionaries who are most active in trying to stamp out belief in witchcraft. (My woo is better than your woo!).

My wife also tells me that it works two ways: sometimes people are accused of practicing witchcraft, but it's also common for the (mostly Christian) city-dwellers in Congo to denigrate rural people for believing in witchcraft rather than for practicing it, and that city families wanting, or needing, to shed themselves of the responsibility to care for rural cousins will sometimes use this instead.

To me, the notion that one can be ostracized either for being a witch or for believing that witches exist lends more creedence to the argument that the real motive is economic also.

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

Please answer my question, Ron Tomkins! "What makes you think that it is?"

What's the big deal about why do I think that? I have my reasons to think that. What you wrote gave me the impression that that's what you think. I never claimed that I was 100% positive that that was your claim. Obviously that's not what you think. Will that make you happy? I was wrong, I got it. Now what is your claim then? In other words, when you say stuff such as

"Why is it so hard for many skeptics to notice that poverty and misery breed superstition, an insight which makes it very obvious how to go about fighting superstition if you actually want to do away with it in an efficient manner? Or do they really believe that these children would be so much happier if they were starving without the added insult of being called witches?"

1) What makes you believe skeptics are unaware of this?
2) What is that thing or action that skeptics are not taking in order to better treat such problem?

 

[Slimething]

In a way you're right, Slimething. Your failure to understand my opening post might imply that you'd be happier reading something completely different. It may not be what I wrote, but at least you're able to grasp it.
That other people's strawmen aren't better than yours is a problem that shouldn't concern you.

Are you ready to define what you regard as poverty yet, or are you still in Humpty Dumpty - Land?

 

[Puppycow]

Capitalism means that the stuff produced by workers etc. does not belong to them, it belongs to the owner of the company they work for. Why do you seem to believe that the products belong to the people who produce them? Are you some kind of anarchist?

But you are right about production as the only new source of wealth. It’s just a pity that even as it is being produced, it belongs to somebody other than the guy who produces it. It belongs to the other guy who had him produce it. And you’re also right when you say that this does not reduce poverty. It is actually the capitalist way of causing it!

If you eliminated private property he wouldn't own it either, would he? What have I said that suggests anarchy? The guy (singular) who produces it? Most products in a modern economy are produced by cooperation among many people. If you want to produce something all by yourself, you can do that, and you will own it. I choose to sell my time to a company in exchange for money. I do part of the processing of the products that my company produces. I am very good at one part of the process and can add more value that way than if I tried to do every step myself, including sales. The result is that I make a lot of money doing something pretty easy, Going into business for myself would be harder and probably less lucrative in my case. All the tools and space I use are provided by the company. All I have to do is learn my job and do it to the best of my ability.

 

[Puppycow]

They share the blame, then.

What do you suggest we do with those who seek Sylvia's "services"?

Since they are to blame (but share the blame with Sylvia) for their own situation (being exploited by crooks like Sylvia), should we help them at all?

If you are a skeptic you already know how we help such people. We expose people like Sylvia Brown so that anyone willing to listen to a skeptic can learn that it is a scam.

If people continue to believe after that, it's unfortunate, but they can't say nobody told them.
There is a proverb about this: You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.

 

[Puppycow]

But the other famines were Capitalist, right? And they died because of Capitalisms brilliant understanding of human nature, right?

Just another commie lie! Where would we be if capitalism did not understand human nature so well?

I would like to call your attention to part of the article you linked:
http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/summary_0199-36844_ITM

Over the past few decades social psychologists have demonstrated that once individuals have committed themselves to a belief they are likely to find the evidence in its favor to be convincing, and disconfirming evidence to be unpersuasive. And this is apparently as true for scientists who pride themselves on their objectivity as it is for ordinary citizens, and as true for the ordinary citizen as it is for the fire-breathing zealot single-mindedly devoted to a patently irrational cause. Even weak or equivocal evidence in favor of a proposition to which one is emotionally committed is likely to seem salient, vivid and persuasive. And having given oneself over to that belief, it is often all but impossible for the believer's mind to be changed, no matter how strong the countervailing evidence. Robert Wright has nicely summed up the power of this cognitive disability that seems so central, and ultimately destructive, to the human condition:

The proposition here is that the human brain is, in large part, a machine for winning arguments, a machine for convincing others that its owner is in the fight--and thus a machine for convincing its owner of the same thing. The brain is like a good lawyer: given any set of interests to defend, it sets about convincing the world of their moral and logical worth, regardless of whether they in fact have any of either. Like a lawyer, the human mind wants victory, not truth; and, like a lawyer, it is sometimes more admirable for skill than for virtue. (1)

Please reconsider your commitment to Marxism in the above context. I think that you are simply trying to win the argument here, not find the truth.

I'm not advocating Ann Rand's version of Utopia, but something more like modern Denmark, the UK, USA Singapore, Japan, or other modern developed welfare states which harness the creativity of entreprenuers and efficiency of markets to increase wealth.

 

[Slimething]

I'm not advocating Ann Rand's version of Utopia, but something more like modern Denmark, the UK, USA Singapore, Japan, or other modern developed welfare states which harness the creativity of entreprenuers and efficiency of markets to increase wealth.

dann's a real fan of Castro's Cuba. Why he hasn't moved there is anyone's guess. No internet but, otherwise, a paradise or so he says. Still, good to get back home to heat in the winter and electricity, huh, dann? But, oh that Fidel, he sure has one great thing going there!

 

[dann]

On the other hand, I don't think it's just an excuse.

Nor do I!

The superstition is genuinely believed by a lot of the people there--that's why it works as an excuse.

Exactly! I never meant to imply that they had a mere instrumental attitude to their religion: They are indeed true believers, but in this context they refer to their religion as an excuse for actions that they themselves would not ordinarily condone. The JREF fundamentalists, however, try to make it appear as if religion were the cause of this deplorable behaviour, which is, in fact, caused by their inability to feed their children. This is what makes the Time to Grow Up sneer so cynical.

While the real motive might be economic, at least some of the people doing this really believe the accusations they're levelling.

I agree. It is much easier to live with the idea that the child you abandon is a witch - if only you are able to persuade yourself that it is so.

 

[dann]

dann's a real fan of Castro's Cuba. Why he hasn't moved there is anyone's guess. No internet but, otherwise, a paradise or so he says. Still, good to get back home to heat in the winter and electricity, huh, dann? But, oh that Fidel, he sure has one great thing going there!

As usual Slimething prefers strawmen and hyperbole to solid arguments. Let's ask him to provide us with a quotation where I say that Cuba is a paradise! Just one, please!

I have been on the internet almost every time I was there. And I receive a lot of emails from ordinary people in Cuba, but only a minority have easy (= affordable) access to the internet.
This problem may be fixed when a new cable connecting Cuba with Venezuela helps circumvent the American blockade/embargo of Cuba, but even so it is a poor country where you would not expect everybody to be able to afford a computer of their own.

Well, the world is a nice and orderly place when you see it through the glasses of Slimething's fundamentalism: Poor people abandon their children due to religion, and Third World countries are poor due to religion ... or maybe due to communism ... as if every child in Guatemala, Honduras, Congo or Afghanistan is on the internet on a daily basis ...

If I had the choice between the Danish and the Cuban winter this year, I'd prefer the latter, I think. Swimming in the ocean on January 3 is something I'll have to dream of this year in the cold, dark Danish winter, but unfortunately I cannot afford it this time! I'll have to make do with central heating, which is a very poor substitute.

And to those of you who haven't followed this thread from the beginning: The logical next step in Slimething's line of 'reasoning' at this stage will be to accuse me of being poor, unemployed, and “living off others”.
See: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=2232734#post2232734
Slimething: “dann has no money. (…)It is fairly obvious that dann is living off others. (…)dann has been told to grow up and get a job himself several times too many.“
Now I guesshis suspicion has been confirmed! the reason why he cannot go is that his Nanny Bush won't let him ...

And now I’m not just an unemployed bozo, a poor simpleton, a commie living off others etc. Now I’m also a Castroist! Unfortunately I know very little about the guy. He is/was well-known for making hour-long speeches, but so far I haven’t read (or heard) a single one of them. I’ll look them up and add a suitable quotation to my sig line if I can find any!

 

[dann]

I'd consider a rational aim the narrowing of the poverty incidence (if you can define poverty in functional terms) to the 2.5 - 4 sigma region under a standard bell curve, rather than this woo induced sound byte of "eliminate poverty." The definition of "what poverty is" changes with political motivations for redefinition.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=2224033#post2224033

 

[Slimething]

Dann, are you going to define "poverty" or not? Stop wasting our time if you are not, OK?