And people really really resist and resent this message Like a lot of people say they're atheists and believe in the basic tenets of materialism and evolution but they don't get what that really means They still talk like an Intelligent Designer set all this up for a reason
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Like... it's not a fair game you're intended to be able to win The challenge of living a good life is not a good faith challenge, with rules and a referee so that it's doable if you work hard and don't cheat and figure out the correct solution It is completely not that
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When I was a teen I was really into Christian apologetics, which is largely based on just refusing to think certain thoughts because they hurt A lot of it was this argument from perversity, what
@AlexandraErin calls the Shirley Principle "Oh, no, surely not"1 reply 1 retweet 47 likesShow this thread -
A big argument for the existence of God is this circular thing about the argument from desire or argument from need The idea that if human beings desire something, like a relationship with their Creator, such a thing must therefore exist and be possible
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That it would be perverse, cruel, just WRONG to give people a desire for something that doesn't exist and therefore can never be fulfilled Well, why the fuck not? The only reason to believe such a thing is impossible is believing in God in the first place
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It is, in principle, trivially easy to imagine a desire for something that doesn't exist and can't be satisfied - a desire for a three-sided square, a desire to be simultaneously hot and cold, a desire for the comfort of being loved without the terror of being known
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You could easily program a robot that wants there to be a three-sided square and spends eons trying to stick three 90-degree angles together and never actually succeeds and therefore is always unhappy and always will be unhappy It sounds more like the human condition than not
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So I mean this family discourse "It's built into the way human development works: we all start as helpless babies, we need some adult or group of adults to have absolute power over is to survive, and those adults will have a profound effect on our psyche" Okay and that's bad
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"But it's natural and inescapable!" Doesn't make it not bad "If it's the way we evolved to develop then it means we have no choice but to find a way to grow up this way without trauma and regret" Just cause you have no choice but to do it doesn't make it possible
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Replying to @arthur_affect
Sure but by this logic healthcare is “bad” because it’s merely the best we can do, and are forced to find ways to do, due to unfair natural reality. But with healthcare we talk about how to make it better, more accessible, more equitable, not just slamming it as an institution.
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Parenting *creates* the need for parenting (or, I guess, conceiving and birthing children creates the need for parenting) The "need" filled by parenting disappears instantly the day, one way or another, the last human child is born
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Replying to @arthur_affect
...yes? Well I guess unfreeze me when we get to that point and we’ll sort out what comes next
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