Just went live today here: http://journeyintopodcast.blogspot.com/
A few months ago, I lent my voice to an audio production in progress. I just got word that it has finally finished production and went live today. I haven’t even listened to it yet. I play the part of a villain in Pt. 1 of “Cyberpunk”. Enjoy!
Yup, you read right, atheists have better sex. Believers don’t generally behave any better than atheists (and often behave worse, as you can read elsewhere on this blog), but atheists have less guilt.
Read about it here.
Best quote:
However, there was some good news for religious groups. People who had lost their belief and became atheists reported a significant improvement in sexual satisfaction.
Last night, my philosophy book club met and discussed our most recent read, The Moral Landscape by Sam Harris. I thought I’d record a few of my general impressions about it here. I’m happy to discuss specifics with anyone who cares to engage.
What Harris Got Right
Creeping Dark Ages. I think it is hard to argue with Harris that as a society, and as an American society in particular, we have gotten much too irrational, delusional and superstitious. We have let people who take their religious beliefs too seriously get a disproportionately powerful voice in modern discourse and public policy. Moreover, in the name of being inclusive, respectful and polite, we have undermined the ability of those with a more level-headed and reasonable approach to argue against the forces of ignorance and primitive superstition.
The overwhelming evidence is clear: religious people are no more moral that non-religious people. There is even very compelling evidence to suggest that the non-religious actually behave considerably better than religious people (essentially, beating them at their own game, without requiring any mumbo-jumbo, indoctrination, or kow-towing to rituals like prayer or attendance at church).
Defining Morality. Furthermore, if one wants to define what counts as ‘moral’ in this context, it is worth noticing that morality starts with our intuitions about what is right and wrong, and is only afterwards backed up by written moral codes. Most of us have an innate sense that doing certain behaviors is wrong, regardless of whether or not proscriptions against such behaviors appear on any stone tablets. That fact is backed up by neurological research, both in breakdown cases (if people can’t tell right from wrong without a list we consider them ill) and also in ‘positive’ examples, where we can see the function of moral behavior in the brain by observing fMRI data.
The question then becomes, how do we decide what to do in cases where there is moral dilemma, where the moral outcome of our actions is likely to be counter-intuitive, or where there is disagreement?
Multiculturalism Doesn’t Cut It. One possible answer to the problem of disagreement is to claim there is no disagreement: all answers are right, so long as we allow for a changing context. That seems to nicely undercut the problem. However, that isn’t the complete answer either. Not only does it necessarily create (by definition) a double standard (or ‘multi’ standard) which promotes an us-versus-them mentality, it also doesn’t jive with our intuitions. It just can’t be right that mutilating children’s genitalia or poking out their eyes is the right thing to do, no matter what meaning structure your culture has built up around it. The argument in favor of multiculturalism suggests that this complaint is simply lacking in a sophisticated and sympathetic understanding of a culture and its practices, but the counter argument is that it is all well and good to maintain a broad acceptance for everything EXCEPT those cases of harm that seem overwhelmingly obvious to us. If we allow our own moral intuitions to be so intensely insulted, have we really achieved our goal of maximum acceptance, or have we simply abandoned all capacity to be moral by abandoning our own intuitions? The resolving mechanism, Harris suggests, should be one which seeks to be an objective arbiter between all perspectives, one which makes careful attempts to be truly meta-cultural in its view.
Religion is Not the Answer. The religious answer to all such challenges is that the final word on all conflict should be answered by sacred texts, which are also supposed to be meta-cultural. But sacred texts are notoriously NOT meta-cultural, and are furthermore, notoriously open to variegated interpretation, despite the insistence of religious authorities to the contrary. Indeed, religious authorities would need neither to exist nor insist if the answers were obvious.
Since neither multiculturalism nor religions can be relied upon to come up with good answers, particularly in cases of conflict, Harris argues that we ought to rely on our best mechanism of objective discovery to help. That mechanism is science.
In describing how science would go about this task, Harris utilizes the notion of human ‘well-being’ (a concept that is probably meant to replace earlier philosophical concepts such as ‘The Good’), and makes a compelling comparison between human well-being and human health. Although neither health nor well-being can be strictly defined, he admits, they are essential. In any case, science is our best bet for discovering ways to maximize either one.
What Harris Got Wrong
Crossing Swords. First of all, I’m not sure I fully approve of the pitched battle approach Harris takes. Those that have read my other posts or have seen me fight tooth and nail to win my arguments might wonder at such a move towards moderation, but bear with me. You see, the feeling one gets from Harris’ approach here and elsewhere is that he is arguing for a kind of extreme atheistic, secular fundamentalism in reaction to religious fundamentalism. He seems to want to fight fire with fire.
That is fine as far as it goes, however, he’s forgetting what both Richard Dawkins and Dan Barker have both admitted: it is difficult to debate with moderate, liberal Christians, because we share so much in common. While I have no problem alienating others if they are truly and completely in the wrong, I don’t think moderates are as much in the wrong as fundamentalists. I think fundamentalism of any stripe is overstating your case. If someone has gotten a ‘C’ on the test, it doesn’t automatically mean they deserve a failing evaluation overall for being incapable of getting an ‘A’. Just as in Harris’ own evaluation of free will, it might be pointless to react with an extremely punitive attitude towards believers, because there, but for the vagaries of genetics, environment and chance, go you.
Complexity Problem. Second, I’m not sure he truly gets past the combinatorial explosion problem of consequentialism. Let me unpack that a bit. He admits that his view of morality is consequentialist in that he regards the actual resultant outcomes of behavior driven by a moral system as being essential to its evaluation. It’s not quite as simple or blunt as ‘the ends justify the means’, but that might help you grasp the gist. (In fact, his view is quite nuanced, and recognizes that any particular mode of obtaining maximum well-being might be considered wrong despite careful investigation, even if only because there is some deeper, better well-being to be obtained as a result of avoiding it.)
Unintended Consequences. However, he does not adequately address, I think, the problem of unintended consequences. Nor does he address the fact that scientific endeavors can be culturally, economically and personally biased. (I myself don’t really worry a whole lot about these latter items in general, because I think there are a lot of correctives to deal with them, but it should be addressed). In both instances, these are examples of how failing at being sufficiently complete in attempting to calculate ideal outcomes can yield to some pretty horrible outcomes. Harris’ apology for this is to rely on his comparison with human health. Just because we cannot completely define or predict ideal human health, it still doesn’t mean we can’t say anything at all about it, nor do we fail to attempt to pursue it with all gusto. That is certainly the right attitude, but I think the stakes are higher when we are talking about an entire moral system.
Eugenics Example. Perhaps this is a cheap shot. Certainly I complained about it as such when I read about its use as a counter-example in the review of Harris’ book by The Nation, but nevertheless, I think it has a variety of merits as an illustration so I’m going to use it anyway: Consider the case of eugenics. Eugenics is the notion that the health and well-being of human societies will be increased if we take the same approach to human reproduction as we do with animal husbandry. That is: if we choose the apparently strongest, healthiest, smartest examples of humanity and let them reproduce, but prevent those who do not meet our standards from reproducing, eventually, the human race will be comprised primarily of the strong, healthy and smart people.
At various times in history – most flagrantly in Nazi Germany, but also up to and including the present day – a significant minority have taken this view of human reproduction as an obvious consequence of evolutionary theory. Insofar as people accept this proposition without modification or sophistication, it is seen as scientific. It is also very counter-intuitive from each person’s perspective to think that they themselves might be disallowed from having children because they fail to be ‘good enough’ to do so. However, from the perspective of most people living in modern America, this entire notion seems preposterous, not to mention utterly and obviously wrong and unethical.
The reason why I use it as an example, then, is that it is just this sort of seemingly scientific theory that people fear when they think of a science of morals – especially a science of morals that is willing at times to break with our intuitions about morality, or make itself superior to those intutions. What if some kind of theory similar to eugenics emerged from morality science?Morality science might create a new Frankenstein that future people would regard as inhumane, but present scientific moralists might find perfectly acceptable. What if such policies became widely promulgated throughout society before they were recognized as wrong, and once promulgated, very difficult to reverse? The trends, infrastructure and traditions created by promulgating such policies run deep. Look at how difficult it has been to eradicate racism. It has even been difficult to eradicate cigarette smoking.
OK, Yes, If Not Science Then What? Now don’t get me wrong. I know for a fact that if we attempt to use the moral ‘reasoning’ of other systems for making our determinations of morality, such as religious ones for instance, we are just as likely (and probably even more likely) to make huge mistakes like the eugenics mistake. The Bible still codifies within its pages rules that insist the residents of neighboring countries are fair game as slaves, apostates deserve summary execution, and misbehaving children are also subject to the death penalty. Clearly, religions haven’t come up with fail-safe formulas for correct morals either.
Overstating the Case. My point here is not that Harris is completely false, but that like a religious fundamentalist, his insistence that science is necessarily good enough on its own isn’t the whole story; his view might not represent the complete fullness of wisdom on the issue.
The Problem of Candide. My third and final objection might be the most damning, I fear. As Harris himself admits, there are a lot of counter-intuitive facts about humanity and well-being. He uses the example of the science of choice. While most of us tend to think that more choices are better, there is an upper limit on the number of choices that most people find optimal. The presence of too many choices can be overwhelming and anxiety-producing, not to mention time-wasting.
Champion Mind and the Placebo Effect. However, Harris ignores other counter-intuitive effects that are found, for instance, in the science of sports performance. There is the phenomenon know as ‘champion mind’, whereby people who compete with otherwise identically qualified counterparts in sports will be more likely to win consistently, simply because they believe (delusionally?) that they are better than their peers. Another counter-intuitive phenomenon is the placebo effect, the phenomenon whereby people are consistently more likely to heal from diseases when they are given sugar pills they believe to contain medicine, when compared with counterparts who are given nothing (people who are given actual medicine generally heal better than placebo recipients, but placebo recipients sometimes heal better than people given nothing).
The Grand Unified Kludge. Why do I bring up these phenomenon? Because it is important for us to imagine the following scenario: Let us imagine that American society accepts Harris’ suggestion wholesale. The day after tomorrow, we renounce all of our superstitions, and cede all moral high ground to the aims of science. All the money that previously went to churches is now redirected to the new Department of Homeland Morality, a scientific agency of the government whose job it is to fully investigate the proper moral situation for all of America. A massive set of studies is immediately undertaken.
Now let us imagine that 50 years have gone by. Thousands upon thousands of studies about morality have been conducted, their results collected and tabulated. A grand computer model of societal morality has been commission and all 50 years worth of results are fed into the computer. As millions of Americans wait with bated breath to obtain the results of all the research, watching on the streaming video beamed wirelessly to their optical head-up display implants, the computer finally produces the results in natural language. The results are these: “Human society is better off if human beings are able to maintain 17.35% delusional beliefs.”
Perhaps it is true that, given some adjustments which will swing the pendulum back from our current state of too-high dependence upon superstition, we are otherwise already living in the best of all possible worlds. What if that’s true? What if scientific investigation reveals that human functioning is optimized for just a little bit of self-lying? Maybe, among the many evolutionary trade-offs that went into the careful balancing of the complex human brain, some inevitable ‘fudging’ occurred?
Hell, name a single system in the human body that is NOT a massive kludge. What makes Harris so certain that some kind of moderation, when it comes to human delusion, is not the answer?
Conclusion
Note that moderation, as always, is a tricky ground. It’s a razor’s edge, with slippery slopes on either side. To illustrate this, imagine how it is that we might allow, in good conscience, a moderate level of delusion to influence our very high stakes policies about war, nuclear proliferation, global climate change, health policy, and so on. (We know that right now, there are high levels of delusion influencing these policies; can we justify even ‘some’ when we think that ‘none’ is the best amount?) This is a tough one to answer. Even if we accept that our best attempts to remove all delusion will still be imperfect approximations, and even if we were to accept that on balance, a certain level of tolerance for delusion allows the smooth functioning of society, how do we really, in practice, make specific, high stakes decisions on that basis…in good conscience?
I don’t know that a solid answer is forthcoming to this question.
It is tempting to throw such things to chance, to accept the results of the coin toss, the goat entrails, or the tea leaves – to outsource the responsibility for high stakes decisions to imagined entities that are felt to be both highly qualified and beneficent in situations where we ourselves feel overwhelmed. And yet we cannot do this, because we see that the outcomes are often disastrous, and stay with us for hundreds and thousands of years.
Perhaps our answer for now is to withhold from answering. Perhaps a greater tension needs to develop before we can decide. If that is indeed the case, then we should thank Sam Harris for doing his part to increase the tension, by providing an equal and opposite reaction to the position of the fundamentalist believer.
Recently, my sister had occasion to spend some time with one of America’s more well-known celebrities with Asperger’s Syndrome, John Elder Robison. She encouraged me to learn more about him. When she mentioned him, I was already eager to get some more knowledge, since I’m working on a story where the protagonist has Asperger’s and so I was curious to get more of the ‘inside scoop’, so to speak, on life with Aspberger’s.
Asperger’s Syndrome is an often debilitating genetic condition on the autism spectrum that frequently hinders a person from recognizing social or emotional information.
So how would one get such an ‘inside scoop’ as I was after anyway, since the challenges people with Asperger’s face include learning about, recognizing, expressing and dealing with emotions? The ‘inside’ world is exactly the problem.
As it turns out, there is some traction to the issue. As Robison himself expressed, folks with Asperger’s do have the same feelings as everyone else, it’s just that their feelings might be triggered by different things than most of us come to expect and their feelings might get expressed in uncommon ways.
Robison’s life story is fascinating a full of drama. As a young high school dropout, he designed sound systems and exploding guitars for the band KISS. The equipment was so effective and successful, it was hired out to other bands between tours! After that job, Robison went on to help design award-winning toys. He finally ended up starting an auto shop for fine cars before learning about his own diagnosis, which came as a result of interaction with a client. Being trained – I should say, largely self-taught – as an engineer, Robison took up the problem of systematically overcoming his disability with gusto.
I recommend checking out the following video, delivered at Google, where he talks about some of these things in person. He’s so well spoken and such a sympathetic fellow, it’s hard to believe he has any disability. This is not to say that I doubt he is honest. His condition comes through in tiny ways here and there. However, his relative normalcy is a great testimony to the success of his capacity to overcome his disabilities. (Note that Robison has written two books and they are mentioned in the video):
Okay, so if you’re into social media and you haven’t heard of EmpireAvenue yet, you’re living under a rock. Styled not entirely unlike various Zynga and Zynga-like games people play on Facebook, like Farmville, Mafia Wars, Vampire Wars, etc. EmpireAvenue purports to have actual, real world (well, sort of real world) value.
You see, the website/app/game/time-vampire connects to the APIs of your various social media (to date: Facebook, Facebook Fan Pages, LinkedIn, Flikr, YouTube and since it is so damn meta-everything, itself), and tracks your activity on said networks. The more you post and get comments, etc., the more value you gain. Oh I forgot to mention you can add blogs… and the one you’re reading is no exception.
In addition to this outside measurement, it also includes a stock-market component, so that people can buy and sell one another’s representational reputation. I mean this thing is so abstracted it’s like the derivative of a derivative’s great-grand-cousin’s thrice removed coon hound.
Having said all that, it is actually also pretty darn fun. Apparently, I’m not the only new addict.
The word is out on whether this is a flash-in-the-pan trend, or whether its ‘real world’ tie ins will make it a fixture.
In the meantime, there are some excellent tips available from internet geek veteran, Chris Pirillo (of Lockergnome fame): http://chris.pirillo.com/my-empire-avenue-strategy-and-tips/
Oh by the way, if you are interested in signing up, I’d appreciate it if you let me send you the invite, or click here. It’ll be worth it for both of us in terms of points. (I can quit any time I want, no, really).
One last thing: since were talking about meta-self-referentiality here, and since I’m now motivated to link and cross-post all of my various social media accounts with the cool tools available (such as ping.fm) to maximize my earnings on EmpireAvenue, this blog post you are reading might actually be the first step in a huge cascade of nested social media posts that cross-reference, re-post and re-tweet each other so incestuously that it brings down Facebook, Twitter and the entire Internet. Just sayin’.
Posting another ‘bookmark’ here. I’ve cited this article frequently and want to have easy access.
It demonstrates that the theory of religion as having a positive influence on people’s behavior is objectively false.
Here is the study: http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Note that the Kripke Center is NOT biased against believers. It’s mission:
The Kripke Center is dedicated to facilitating scholarly activity in the areas of religion and society. Special attention is given to promoting understanding between and among faith communities, including especially Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The Kripke Center’s primary audience is the academic community, but its scholarship and services are available to all who seek them. The Center is named in honor of Rabbi Myer and Dorothy Kripke.
Yet the study points out:
In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion in the prosperous democracies…The most theistic prosperous democracy, the U.S., is exceptional, but not in the manner Franklin predicted. The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developed democracies, sometimes spectacularly so, and almost always scores poorly. The view of the U.S. as a “shining city on the hill” to the rest of the world is falsified when it comes to basic measures of societal health.
The following passage was a part of a Facebook conversation I wanted to capture because I thought it would be worth developing further. I’d like to thank Rich Carlson for initiating the discussion (with a criticism of ‘happiness’) and for his contributions to it. I’d also like to acknowledge that my views of neuro-biology and consciousness are heavily influenced by a recent reading of Antonio Damasio’s book Self Comes to Mind: Constructing the Conscious Brain as well as many works by Daniel Dennett, V.S. Ramachandran and others.
From a neuro- biological perspective, it seems that ‘good’ feelings are concomitant with increased 1) homeostasis; 2) drive satisfaction (sex drive); and/or 3) damage control (endorphin release upon injury).
Our ability to visualize the future and set abstract goals for the achievement of at least 1) and 2) (and in the case of masochists and jocks, 3), is part and parcel with our ability to fiddle with the reward/punishment system. We can think something through, visualize an abstract goal, assign ‘meaning’ to that goal and then upon achievement of that goal, experience reward – whether or not it actually improves our homeostasis, fulfills a (primitive) drive or controls any damage. Most creatures are stuck with the ability to experience reward only upon the achievement of pre-programmed goals. We can interactively set our own, based upon learning and environmental input (including our most powerful environmental input, culture).
Thus for humans, unlike other animals, it can seem like a good thing to deprive ourselves of food, hold our breath, or become abstinent.
This wide-open field of possibilities can leave us feeling confused and anxious about how we go about generating our values, and probably accounts for the entire history of philosophy. Philosophical questions might, on this viewpoint, be summarized as: “What are the best goals?” or “How do I figure out what to do with my time?”
This anxiety drives people to all kinds of extremes in order to leave the painful state of anxiety (which might be called extreme unhappiness). As such, I think it generates lots of unnecessary, unhelpful and regrettable behavior. Examples of that include the formation of religious explanations for grand, over-arching sets of goals (‘the purpose of life’) on the one hand, and on the other hand, the formation of elaborately neurotic meaning systems totally disconnected from the well-being of the person.
I personally find comfort in ‘grounding’ my values in this neuro-biological perspective. I’m willing to admit that this move may be just as much a fantasy as the religious perspective (and the fact that it serves to alleviate my anxiety sort of suggests that), but it does seem to me to be a little better than systems of meaning connected to propositions with zero falsifiability.
So bringing it all back around… I think that the ‘happiness’ state was, at one point in evolutionary history, actually the best, most desirable and most ‘right’ state for any creature – given that the only ability to respond to the environment was a pre-programmed set of responses. Considering the fact that we are creatures capable of foreseeing the future and thus foregoing current pleasure in the acquisition of greater future pleasures (or even greater future imagined pleasures that may never actually come to pass or be experienced), then the question is a lot more contingent and dependent.
Perhaps it might be said that whether or not our happiness is a ‘good’ depends heavily on the quality of the meanings we assign to our goals. A suicide bomber may experience the greatest ecstasy of his life in the moment before he destroys himself, believing that he has achieved the greatest of all possible goals. Or, the politician/policy-maker might experience a deep satisfaction from having averted catastrophe in the lives of billions by saving them from the effects of anthropogenic climate change.
I consider it possible to determine which of these individuals ‘deserves’ their happiness as a result of scientific investigation into the validity and veracity of their goals.
Do you know any new-age nonsense-mongers that make paranormal claims? How about someone who wants to talk ‘quantum’ without knowing what they are talking about? Here’s an excellent opportunity to get them to put up or shut up.
James Randi has literally set aside a million dollars (and proves it by posting his growing account balance), to get such people to demonstrate their paranormal … whatever. It is called the James Randi Educational Foundation One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge.
I really have to hand it to this guy for providing us with such an effective and powerful tool for the cause of reason and science. His effort has at least two major effects:
First, it shuts up the nonsense claim that information about ‘real’ paranormal phenomena cannot be widely disseminated because a lack of popularity or acceptance makes it underfunded. Now, if you can demonstrate it, you will have a million dollars to get your message out. I assure you, advertisers will line up to accept your money – right after Oprah invites you on her show. If they are willing to advertise all the stuff on late night TV, they will certainly advertise your groundbreaking discovery.
Second, since most people cannot sneeze at a million dollars, it really calls the bluff of anyone who pretends that they have something real when they actually do not. It’s pretty hard to say, “Well, I’d demonstrate it, but I really don’t need that million dollars – I’m above all that.” Really? Really? How about using the money for charity, then? Starving children? Are you above that, too?
So please, if you know any hot air wind-bags – and let me tell you, being the moderator/organizer of a philosophy meetup group puts me directly in the cross-hairs of a lot of them – please tell them to put up or shut up with the use of this gift to humanity from the James Randi Educational Foundation.
Thank you James Randi!
Nobody ever believes me on this one, because it’s just too convenient. But, the links are there if you are smart enough to find them…
You see, there are some folks who want to brag about the fact that meditation raises levels of telomerase.
“The take-home message from this work is not that meditation directly increases telomerase activity and therefore a person’s health and longevity,” Saron said. “Rather, meditation may improve a person’s psychological well-being and in turn these changes are related to telomerase activity in immune cells, which has the potential to promote longevity in those cells. Activities that increase a person’s sense of well-being may have a profound effect on the most fundamental aspects of their physiology.”
Aha! But no so fast! Telomerase is not merely associated with “a person’s health and longevity”, but also with cancer. No wonder you don’t want the effect of ‘directly increases telomerase’ to be the ‘take-home message’! If you read the Wikipedia article I referenced above, it discusses the link between telomerase and cancer at length.
With the activation of telomerase, some types of cells and their offspring become immortal, that is, their chromosomes will not become unstable no matter how many cell divisions they undergo (they bypass the Hayflick limit), thus avoiding cell death as long as the conditions for their duplication are met. Many cancer cells are considered ‘immortal’ because telomerase activity allows them to divide virtually forever, which is why they can form tumors. A good example of cancer cells’ immortality is HeLa cells, which have been used in laboratories as a model cell line since 1951.
[Interesting side-note: NPR did a story based on a new book about HeLa cells and their relationship to bio-ethics. HeLa cells came from a particular person, Henrietta Lacks, who died of cancer. Her cells, however, live on and on in labs all over the world.]
But I first discovered the link between telomerase and cancer in an article about Harvard scientists reversing the aging process in mice. It works great in mice to reactivate telomerase that’s been genetically deactivated, but not so much in humans:
Repeating the trick in humans will be more difficult. Mice make telomerase throughout their lives, but the enzyme is switched off in adult humans, an evolutionary compromise that stops cells growing out of control and turning into cancer. Raising levels of telomerase in people might slow the ageing process, but it makes the risk of cancer soar.
So you see that perhaps the braggadocio expressed by the folks at UC Davis was a little premature. Because what might actually happen is that meditators are increasing their risk of cancer.
In any case, none of this surprises me. People have been desperately trying to justify why meditation is not a total waste of time for probably hundreds of years. It’s just that now, people with a spiritual / metaphysical agenda are trying to associate their nonsense with science, because science has rightfully earned our trust and respect, and they want that trust and respect without actually earning it. It’s when these increasingly ridiculous studies come out trying to do anything they can to make a tenuous and stretched link between facts and magic that I have to laugh, and I hope enough people are laughing with me and not taking the nonsense seriously. Look out for more of these studies, as they will continue to appear with greater frequency.
You see, science, like technology, empowers people. Unfortunately, it empowers the maladaptive, the delusional, the fanatic, etc. as readily as it empowers everyone else. Thus, as the crazies in our society become more educated and facile with the tools that can be used for good, they will unfortunately also use those tools in the attempt to forward their own agenda, however silly, dangerous or wasteful.
Eric J. Blommel's Personal Blog, Such As It Is
