The language of Religion, What can we do about it?
Offline This is something that has been worrying me for some time now. I've noticed how the language we use can effect the way we think about things. Words like 'fate' 'faith' 'destiny' 'sin' and many others litter our language as artifacts of our ancestors superstitious and animistic ways of thinking. I don't think it's quite enough to simply put away ones theology, it's also the programming that came with it. Now, I don't want to start sounding like Scientologists with their "SP's" or or their "Clears", but I think it's time to weed out the rest of the damage that assuming the existence of a God being has done. Of course I am not sociologist or linguist, but if I can get Stephen Pinker on this that would be great.
To go beyond your limits you must first find them.
- Login to post comments
I think the difference there (between your proposition and Scientology) would be that you seem to want to reduce the jargon in discourse, as opposed to adding to it (which has the effect of increasing the mysticism and prestige). I agree. I think transparency would clear up a lot of things. "Sin", for instance, is ill-defined, but very powerful as a concept. It seems to universally carry people into suffering. People behave exactly the same, with the exception they wallow more in their perceived errors. That's pretty sad.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Certainly, I think sin could be a whole other topic on it's own. The word sin has to be one of the worst words we could ever, as atheists and agnostics, continue to use. I think morality should be justified only by it's usefulness, not by some kind of abstract substance you have to wash off your skin with the blood of Christ or the Holy Sauce of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
To go beyond your limits you must first find them.
If you think about it,christianity is solely based on sin,not salvation.Without sin,there wouldn't be salvation, or most religion. The fact that we managed to come up with a concept so powerful that even without a shred of proof millions are slaves to it,is a testament to the power of words. Too bad it couldn't have been used on something constructive.
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Argument from Sadism: Theist presents argument in a wall of text with no punctuation and wrong spelling. Atheist cannot read and is forced to concede.
Sin as a concept is even one the religionists struggled with (and failed in defining, or at least squaring with the idea that its definition emanates from a divine source).
Once the concept was introduced that sin itself is atoneable, a big feature in christianity but common to most religions, then the need arose to start grading "sins" on a scale of severity. Of course once they did that then they acknowledged that "sin", whatever divine moral authority they think might have ordained it, was simply that which all societies had always understood as a crime against moral standards - a very much more human thing and one moreover that underlies the concept of "crime" as we understand it today and the easily understood principle that crime itself is gradeable.
But if I read your original post correctly then you are complaining about the almost subliminal use in everyday language of phrases and words that have no real meaning except in a religious context. I would argue that a lot of this terminology has sufficiently distinct semantic meaning to infer that the opposite is the truth - it is the religionists who have "hijacked" perfectly proper terms semantically (if sometimes a liitle vague in meaning) to their own ends. By using them as an atheist I am simply claiming them back, dusting them off semantically, and setting them back to their original job.
And besides - even blasphemy, a concept that has almost no value whatsoever outside of a religious context, has had its uses. Thanks to centuries of its application I can, as an atheist, shout JESUS FUCKING H CHRIST! when I hit my thumb with the hammer and (though not at the time) offer a little vote of thanks to generations of the delusioned for imbuing such a quirky and semantically impoverished set of phoentics with such virulent expression of anguish, anger and excruciating pain.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
The word 'sin' is a good example. In original meaning, it's something like to 'miss', I mean, the word itself reputedly originates from a Hebrew word of this sounding and meaning. I've read it somewhere and not only once. 'Sin' is thus nothing more or less than literally a mistake, not a sure ticket to hell, unless you join the cult of sky daddy.
(any expert's opinion here?)
Also, using the argument that "we're all sinners" by some theists is often meant as "you're no better than me" and "you need to join the cult of sky daddy just like I did".
(my grandma is a bit like that, though she's also one of local elder worshippers of some neighbouring hag, her family, her living room, and she spreads the Word of Mrs. P., which is an awful heap of gossips about every thing Mrs. P. ever said, did, or her daughter said or did. My grandma probably wants to convert us to hear the God's Word and Mrs. P's Word.)
Beings who deserve worship don't demand it. Beings who demand worship don't deserve it.
"Sin" has had even a more tortuous haul semantically through the history of language than that, Luminom.
It originated as a Proto-Indo-European expression "es-ont" which literally (in English) means "it is true". It is the equivalent therefore of "fair cop guv" or "damn you, Columbo, yes it was indeed I!" and infers not only a transgression but that the perpetrator acknowledges guilt of a crime. It contains no indication of the severity of the crime, nor of the punishment (if any) the crime merits. It is simply a statement of confirmation that a transgression has occurred and that the perp knows it.
Most importantly, it has absolutely nothing to do with religion, unless of course the community agrees that it should. Here in Norway, for example, where christianity came relatively late and long after the basic language still in use had been established, the word "synd" which is now used as the direct translation is used much more frequently simply to indicate any bad thing (such as "aw shit, it's raining today - that's a synd"
.
Their word for "truth" - sannhet - shares the same etymological root incidentally, and retains much more of the semantic character of the original expression.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
I just about barf every time I hear "a person of faith" as a way to justify not using logic or reason.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
I often substitute the word "superstition" - ie "a person of superstition ", "superstition based funding", etc.
Matt Shizzle has been banned from the Rational Response Squad website. This event shall provide an atmosphere more conducive to social growth. - Majority of the mod team
I've started trying to weed out jargon words from my vocabulary. As I've said many times before, we have adequate words to describe things without using poorly defined religious words. The big ones for me are wonder at science, and faith. We don't need to say that we have a "transcendent" or "spiritual" experience when we are awed by a scientific concept. We can say, "We are overcome with awe," or "We feel insignificant compared to the immensity of such and such," or something like that. We can describe our feelings with words that have concrete meaning.
With faith, it's simply a matter of substituting "belief." Instead of saying, "I have faith that such and such will happen," I say, "I firmly believe..."
It's just a matter of starting to use precise words. They're all there. We don't need any new ones. Dictionaries and Thesauruses are our friends.
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
http://hambydammit.wordpress.com/
Books about atheism
"Faith" is a word with a concrete meaning, and has nothing to do with religion per se. If one keeps faith in something or someone then one is persevering in the belief that something or someone has the potential to be right. It is a concise and necessary word in English since it transcends a simple statement of "belief" but implies loyalty to that belief also. One can see why religionists like to use it, but it has infinitely more (and better) applications than their use of it to declare loyalty to the concept of invisible super-beings who control everything.
Which brings up "transcendent". That is a word that simply needs to be claimed back from the religionists who use it all wrongly, or at least very sloppily. To be transcendent, and for the word to have meaning at all, then the subject of the sentence requires to be juxtaposed implicitly or overtly against that which it renders inferior. A "transcendent experience" is so vague as to mean practically nothing. An "experience that transcends in terms of happiness (sadness, wetness, stupidity etc) all others I have had" is how it must be used to retain clarity. The most important thing to remember however is that the word is rarely used, even when used properly, in an objective manner. It states a subjective view, often simply a personal opinion. For that reason alone religionists should themselves be wary of using it, since it opens up the possibility that they are admitting they could well be wrong. Not that that ever stopped them before of course ...
"Spiritual" is one that an atheist should never use, I agree. Since it is an adjective based on a concept that is essentially superstitious it merely indicates a poor grasp of vocabulary on the part of its user.
Oh, and no one should be "awed" by a scientific concept anyway. Since the word blends the concepts of reverence and fear with respect and wonder it should be applied only to something or someone that invokes you to praise it, shit your pants over it, feel inferior to and fail to comprehend fully, all at the same time. When applied to the Law of planetary Motion or a General Theory of Relativity therefore it is something of an overstatement and akin to the hyperbole favoured of hairy super-being believers et al. "Bloody impressed" works for me just fine.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Correct me if I'm wrong,but I thought belief was above faith? That is, faith is belief without any evidence , while belief is based on evidenve.
ie, christians have faith in god,since they have never seen him.
I believe my chair will hold based on previous experience and the general design and purpose of chairs.
You seem to be saying the opposite?
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Argument from Sadism: Theist presents argument in a wall of text with no punctuation and wrong spelling. Atheist cannot read and is forced to concede.
As the religious person uses it you are probably right, but strictly speaking whether belief or faith is based on evidence is immaterial. An unfounded belief is atill a belief semantically, just as a justified faith in something is often down to the fact that it's based on sound evidence.
But I tend not to see "faith" and "belief" as semantically higher or lower than each other. When used correctly they have two distinct meanings, as you say, but they differ really in terms of expressing the relationship one has with a belief, not in the strength or validity of that belief.
You can well believe that your chair will hold based on prior evidence. And you can also keep faith with that belief based on exactly the same evidence. The latter statement has transcended the first, but only in terms of expressing loyalty to the belief you hold. Simply stating that belief did not imply the same thing.
What the religionist does of course is to deftly sidestep the whole issue of "justification with evidence" in their use of both terms in any case, and simply laps it up therefore when his opponent gets himself into semantic knots deciding which word implies the stronger meaning. They are two words, with two meanings, and their use by a religionist still doesn't get him "off the hook" with regard to explaining just why he chooses to believe or have faith in what he does. His big cop-out of "well, it's not a belief, it's a faith" is no cop-out at all since one holds faith in something one believes in, and the onus is still on him to explain on what evidence that belief is based.
Apologies for "he" and "him" in the above to imply "one person", by the way. I can do the he/she thing when it suits but draw the line with himself/herself - it's too bloody long to write every time!
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Weeding out the jargon from religious discourse would be nice. It would be nice to weed out all jargon. Unfortunately, you have to have your interlocutor agree to drop the use of jargon and with the religious that is not easily done, if it can be done at all. Religions tend to be defined within the context of their jargon and this suites them because the words they use are connoted as having a particular meaning, but those connotations are usually as vague and untouchable (excuse the metaphor
) as the words' meanings. The only effective way to deal with the jargon is to force your interlocutor to define it and to continue to define it within the context of your discussion until you have distilled the word to exactly what that person feels (and that person will really only have a feeling of it, the nature of the word and all) the word to mean. By that point any argument they were making usually falls to pieces and if they arrive at their definitions and are still consistent, consistency does not equate with sound logic and they are still beaten. If you happen across a person who has carefully worked to define the words before entering into a discussion and dissembling is not required their arguments have historically, every single one of them ever, failed. Even spectacularly.
My point is, removing the jargon would be useful only to anyone outside of the religion, but it may be as useful as having the jargon in place. Just look at the jargon that sustains Christianity, it would be an enormous obstacle to even begin to remove and Christians have no incentive to do that. That the jargon is there, however, does not dissuade nor does it present itself as an obstacle, not exactly, to anyone in a discussion of Christianity. When they shrink from counter arguments or remain vague or withdraw it is not a win for them it is a pathetic escape back into the ambiguity that defined their faith in the first place. While they may see it as a comfort and safety everyone knows that in there is a world of ignorance and that the person so engaged is actively deluding herself. I think, rather, that the jargon makes it easier to destroy the arguments of the religion and showing the irrational and childish retreat of the religious from genuine inquiry and debate proves only to widen the gap, they both long to vanish and wish to remain, that separates their belief from reality, the irrational from the rational. Let them have their jargon, their words are as vacuous as their faith.
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
Well, as a fan of exact use of language and a hater of its abuse, be it by religious people or anyone else, I do not go along with the "let them have their jargon" mentality - and especially when that "jargon" is actually the wilful misapplication of genuine words. Abusers should be confronted, and at every turn.
So, the next time a religionist speaks of his "faith", correct him. He means "blind faith", "unsubstantiated faith", "illogical faith", or maybe even "stupid faith" depending on how subjective you want to get with him. But don't let him away with corrupting such an innocuous and innocent word! Explain to him that "sin" means "truthful admission of guilt" and has nothing whatsoever to do with punishment. Remind him that a "saviour" with no visible evidence of having saved anything (or even that anyone was in difficulties when he claimed to have saved them) is a presumptuous use of the word in the extreme (ie. a lie). Spell out the uncomfortable truth that "religion" (despite St Augustine's admirably cheeky attempt to invent an etymology for it that would accord with his own delusion) originated in a term meaning to "read again", and was used to indicate a state of constant revision of one's principles, not one of adherence to dubious tenets believed to have been set in stone. Tell him his "hell" has all but disappeared from modern bibles since more exact translations of the Hebrew word for "grave" and the Greek term for "unseen" were found, and that the Nordic people would probably like to have their term for "underworld" back, since according to their own mythology it served a very different, and less vindictive, purpose than what christians have been doing with it. Invite him to invent new words to express all these things which he does so imperfectly with these "stolen" English words, and then ask him to provide one shred of evidence that there is a factual basis behind even one of them so that anyone should be bothered remembering them and adding them to their vocabulary.
If he says he can he's a liar.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Don't proscribe language use. I cannot abide by proscriptivists. Your use of etymology is interesting, but wholly inappropriate. The etymology you describe has very little to do with the reality of the word as it is currently used, it doesn't even affect the definition of the word now and no etymology can; it only describes how a word has been used and from when and even where the word came. When a person uses a word she means exactly what she means, even when it can't be easily discerned because of the nature of that word. Read my post again. I suggest distilling ambiguous words to the meaning our interlocutor believes them to have and arguing there, along the way they are typically defeated. In other words, let them have their jargon because it certainly doesn't help them. It does not help to tell someone that 'sin' means 'truthful admission of guilt', because it simply doesn't, not for them and not in any meaningful way presently. What someone means when they say sin will invariably be different from someone else's belief about the meaning of that word in the context of religion and in this case it is a good thing. The inconsistency amongst the religious when it comes to defining their beliefs insulates their faith, as I suggest, and exposes the laughable vulnerability of it as well. Even when they are consistent, they have historically failed to defend themselves intellectually anyhow.
What you suggest is unnecessary and an inappropriate use of etymology; it is only a device for describing how a word has been used and from when and where it came not for proscribing usage presently. Further, any proscriptive application of language is bound to fail miserably; don't harp on about exact use, it very simply doesn't exist as you suggest and I find the thought of 'abusing' language contentious, no impossible. If you mean someone using language to mislead people it is a very different thing from abusing language (which I'm not sure I can even fathom) because the only 'abuse' of language I can think of are the employment of fallacies which are rather an incorrect application of logic both formal and informal.
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
Then it's time it did.
You're talking like a defeatist (or worse, a religionist)!
But seriously, why not challenge people to say what they really mean and stop hiding behind obfuscation and sloppy speech? I personally don't give a damn if every christian on the planet thinks they agree on the semantic interpretation of sin (they don't) or hell (they don't) or even god (they don't there either). If I get into conversation with one and I present a more accurate definition than they do it's not my problem - it's theirs, to explain to me why their highly subjective and inaccurate use of the language is necessarily anything I, or anyone else, should pretend to go along with.
They've had two thousand years of making everything up as they go along, even language. It's time to at least reclaim some of it back!
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Tim for what to what?
No defeatism going on here and I hope others here can vouch for my not being a religionist, however you mean that.
I suggest you do just that. Read my post.
I agree with you.
And I suggest you do not go along with it, but rather allow them to go along with it while leading them to the inescapable fact that when they define their subjective and inaccurate usage they usually have to abandon their irrationality at which point they run away from the argument. It happens on these forums hourly. Read mephi's thread or a number of other theists' threads here.
I don't disagree with you, but I really think it's misguided to proscribe language use.
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
Nobody said anything about proscribing anything (that's the bit that gets me thinking you're a closet religionist - they love that mentality). I'm talking about getting real, just as you are. And for me that includes accurate speech, and if necessary forcing people to use it - at least if they want to talk to you about something important. I find it particularly effective in dealing with hose poor eejits who try to "convert" me to their particular delusion. Brainwashed as they are into not contemplating that they might even conceivably be wrong, and geared up as they are for challenges on that score centered on their so-called "faith", they do tend to run off the rails a bit when confronted with evidence that they are completely wrong, even if it is linguistically.
What's really funny is when they then try to continue in the same vein using more exact language. They can't.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Exactly, I'm glad we agree.
Prescriptivist (I apologize for usually writing the term incorrectly) is how a linguist defines someone who is not descriptivist. The terms essentially delineate two different approaches to language education and language use in the way I'm using them. The two are not always mutually exclusive depending on how we're talking about them. Telling people how to speak or what words to use would be prescriptivist and ascertaining why people are speaking a certain way or what words they use would be descriptivist. This is really a very brief description and only a very simplified way of understanding these terms and certainly there are more and broader aspects to both.
For the purposes of this thread when I said you were prescriptivist I meant that you wanted to force people to use language a particular way and I do disagree with that. I rather like leading people to define their language use themselves and to explain what they mean when they are being vague, you call that forcing, but it's simply the way any discussion has to proceed if you're to have a discussion at all (all terms must be defined or agreed upon). I find that such reflection, on the part of the religious, usually causes people to realize how dishonest they're being when they talk about their faith. Often, however, and on here nearly always, the people retreat from the reality once confronted with it. Such dishonesty is typical and if I had so deluded myself as they have I am sure I would turn tail and hide in my compartmentalization. Perhaps they don't realize at that point that while their faith is intact within their own brain they have lost all credibility without it.
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
Seems I have to begin with getting my fellow atheists to differeniate between prescribe and proscribe. Ah well, no one said it wasn't going to be anything but an uphill struggle.
On your second point, why wait? If they're vague tell them they're vague and threaten not to continue the discussion (what's the point?) until they get less vague.
Really, it works. I've even woken a few people up to the fallacies they subscribed to that way.
Having said that, if you're from the USA then I can understand your reservations. Obfuscation and imperfect use of language enjoys a huge tolerance in the US that it doesn't elsewhere, where it is generaly associated with waffle (and the disorganised brain required to produce it). There's no point, you might think, in going after the religious offenders if everyone else is at it as well. But hey, I go after them too, believe me!
Let's between us stamp out fuzzy expression - it's a backdoor into all our consciousnesses (but NOT consciences) for the god nuts!
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
I don't get it.
And I'm not American. I'm fairly sure my profile says specifically that I don't live in the United States. That's probably why I don't get it.
Edit: My profile, in fact, says no such thing. You'll have just have to trust me then, which really is the same as trusting my profile... even though it doesn't agree nor disagree with me. To prove it I spell centre and colour and practise just like I have within this sentence. I don't believe any American would willingly do that and I promise there is no one holding a gun to my head.
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
Sorry - I was going by your hair in the photo. Your practise of getting the centre bits of colour right should indeed have alerted me to your non-US status!
Incidentally - since we last misunderstood each other I had an interesting experience (in Norwegian) on the train into work today. The gentleman to my left began an animated and loud conversation with the gentleman on my right about the goodness of god, the holy spirit, and just about any other cliched manifestation of superstition one could ask for from the christian perspective. Oblivious to my presence jammed between them, it seems, both were in voluminous and complete agreement that god had enriched their lives, solved their problems, given them the spiritual equivalent of a hard-on and bestowed upon them good vibes, good luck and good thoughts aplenty.
"But not fucking good manners, I notice." Said I with the appropriate volume and as much indignant hatred in my tone as I could muster.
Both stopped immediately. The pretty girl sitting across from me smiled in my direction and silently clapped her hands.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
That is awesome.
nice, manners cost extra!
That made me laugh.Jeus only died for your sins,not manners people.
Couldn't Atheists give them a treatment of their own medicine? Just ignore them when they use those words. GO blah blah blah. They show just as much respect when we talk about proof and evidence. Why give them the benefit of acknowledging their words even mean anything.
Ridicule is really what you're talking about and you are right that much of the garbled semantics and misappropriated language that the religious are inclined to be fond of and use so much is worthy of little else.
But ridicule as a response with a view to invalidating such claptrap (or advertising just how invalid it already is) doesn't work in the sort of one-to-one situations that I and others have described on this thread (and many other threads here), precisely because the speaker one is countering has no sense of the ridiculous. If he did then he wouldn't be talking the crap that he does. Your response of "blah blah blah", being crude and direct in its statement, would be simply taken as an unwarranted insult and proof - to them - that the atheistic viewpoint is little more than garrulous, thoughtless and insensitive rudeness.
That particular direct approach therefore backfires in that the religious nutcase, correctly assessing that his "views" have a cogency greater than yours (but only because you yourself spoke even worse gibberish), decides on that basis with even greater misplaced certainty that he is right.
I prefer a more oblique approach, something that depends above all on not being lured into a conversation/discussion set within my opponent's parameters - which are, as you say, simply absurd anyway. If my principal offence taken is that my antagonist has just been plain rude or presumptuous or arrogant or dumb (and sometimes one finds all four rolled up in one with these people) then - religion aside - I tell them that I find their behaviour unacceptable. One can gauge just how to express this depending on the mentality or intelligence of the target. Some take a gentle hint, some need to be told to fuck off, some need to be hit over the head several times with a dead fish - they're all a little different.
If they insist on engaging me in a theistic "debate" (normally a monologue) I challenge them to define themselves and the words they use. If they cannot explain to my satisfaction what "god" means, for example, (and many can't surprisingly - giving out instead highly subjective interpretations badly expressed) then I tell them there is no point talking further since they obviously haven't a clue what on earth they're prattling on about. If they can get past that hurdle they have wandered anyway into the realm of semantic interpretation, something I normally know more about than them, where "god" as the concept they have just utilised is as much an allegory for human failure as it is anything positive they wish to believe. The clever ones know they have "lost" the argument at that point. The thick ones simply play themselves into the trap of accepting that their god has equal validity with any imaginary personification in just about any context, a very human invention. Both feel mildly ridiculous - which is how I like to leave them. If they haven't the good grace to admit how ridiculous they feel I simply revert to gentle hint, instruction to go forth and multiply, dead fish etc.
Directly ridiculing them would have simply inflated their umbrage, their ego, and their incorrect assumption that their "views" were valid.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy