Religion and Ethics Forum
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Free Willy on December 18, 2015, 05:03:29 PM
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Is the use of the term survivor bias popular because of survivor bias?
It's certainly seems to be edging 'm no methodology' towards non survival.
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Chunderer,
Is the use of the term survivor bias popular because of survivor bias?
It's certainly seems to be edging 'm no methodology' towards non survival.
No - it's just come up recently because it describes some bad thinking you're repeatedly attempting is all.
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Chunderer,
No - it's just come up recently because it describes some bad thinking you're repeatedly attempting is all.
Assertion.
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I think there is a question over whether YOU understand Survivor bias.
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I think there is a question over whether YOU (bhs) understand Survivor bias.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias
Since one of examples shown in the link has already been quoted by bhs it seems clear he's already got a much better grasp of it than yourself.
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Chunderer,
I think there is a question over whether YOU understand Survivor bias.
As you keep blundering into it I think the answer must be a "yes".
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Could someone state what Vlad is getting at here as survivors bias counts against his Christianity in that they can claim it is true because their faith has survived by chance.
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Could someone state what Vlad is getting at here as survivors bias counts against his Christianity in that they can claim it is true because their faith has survived by chance.
i thought the theory was that other ideas do not survive but that is hyperbole since ideas never die off. It assumes that all other ideas are overlooked or discounted because of lack of success. Such an assertion needs evidence surely for each time the religion is adopted. Does Hillside have this since the whole exercise of calling survivorship bias is to bypass evidence in favour of a general theory which is at best debatable.
It itself contains bias because it huffs on about planes getting shot down because they only studied planes which had been shot at but which didn't go down......yes I know..............surely a better example would be planes which don't fly not by chance
But because they are just not up to the job.
Survivorship bias is about making systems that work work better not about making them work in the first place. We can expect Hillside to continue to flog the dead horse though.
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Is the use of the term survivor bias popular because of survivor bias?
It's certainly seems to be edging 'm no methodology' towards non survival.
Popular? Never heard of it or heard anyone refer to it until now.
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i thought the theory was that other ideas do not survive but that is hyperbole since ideas never die off. It assumes that all other ideas are overlooked or discounted because of lack of success. Such an assertion needs evidence surely for each time the religion is adopted. Does Hillside have this since the whole exercise of calling survivorship bias is to bypass evidence in favour of a general theory which is at best debatable.
It itself contains bias because it huffs on about planes getting shot down because they only studied planes which had been shot at but which didn't go down......yes I know..............surely a better example would be planes which don't fly not by chance
But because they are just not up to the job.
Survivorship bias is about making systems that work work better not about making them work in the first place. We can expect Hillside to continue to flog the dead horse though.
The thing you claim about Hillside must stem from something from the past as he states nothing emphatic here and of which, therefore, I'm not certain of the discourse.
Lack of success (as you state it), as I understand it with regards to survivor's bias, is due to the process of being overlooked or left out of the picture, not because it has failed in anyway and is non-functionary and unusable, but because focus has been made on those aspects of the subject matter which are appealing and generally seen as being positive (which can be a bias process in itself). In effect this is saying that bad data has been missed out, for one reason or another, and, thereby, gives a 'rosier' outlook to things than they really are. This assessment of data etc. does not in itself give any validity or verity to the subject matter at hand, in the same way that postulating a logical form, though internally consistent, can't do this as it is only a grammatical structure.
I am guessing that survivor's bias may be being missed used in this discussion as it can't provide any validity to a subject which has to be done by other means.
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Could someone state what Vlad is getting at here as survivors bias counts against his Christianity in that they can claim it is true because their faith has survived by chance.
Do you have any evidence tht it has only survived 'by chance' Jack?
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Lack of success (as you state it), as I understand it with regards to survivor's bias, is due to the process of being overlooked or left out of the picture, not because it has failed in anyway and is non-functionary and unusable, but because focus has been made on those aspects of the subject matter which are appealing and generally seen as being positive (which can be a bias process in itself). In effect this is saying that bad data has been missed out, for one reason or another, and, thereby, gives a 'rosier' outlook to things than they really are. This assessment of data etc. does not in itself give any validity or verity to the subject matter at hand, in the same way that postulating a logical form, though internally consistent, can't do this as it is only a grammatical structure.
The problem, if JK is correct in his explanation, with using the survivor bias arguement in the context of Christianity is twofold. Firstly, as has often been pointed out here and elsewhere, Christianity as often been lost under the weight of Churchianity (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Churchianity; http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Churchianity) where church leaders have used the faith to promote tradition that fails to match Jesus' teachings over those teachings - so we can list events and institutions such as the Inquisition, slavery, the Crusades, the mistreatment of the environment and the poor in the hunt for ever greater personal and national wealth and apartheid. As such, the idea that has survived hasn't been the one on which the "focus has been made on those aspects of the subject matter which are appealing and generally seen as being positive (which can be a bias process in itself)".
Secondly, the very existence of many of the New Testament documents bears witness to the huge range of competing ideas that existed across the first century, often espoused by those who had never heard Jesus teach, or spoken with those who had.
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Do you have any evidence tht it has only survived 'by chance' Jack?
Do you have any evidence that JC will return?
Christianity has survived in name on only, I'll grant you that. Can you prove that your version is the exactly the same as the early Christians?
All empires think they will last forever but they never do.
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Do you have any evidence that JC will return?.
Non sequitur since it hasn't happened and it is a suggested future event.
You are alleging that Christianity has survived by chance......Got any evidence.
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Do you have any evidence that JC will return?
Yes, I do, but as I and others have pointed out elsewhere, that evidence is based on an understanding that reality isn't limited to the naturalistic, physical world that science works in.
Christianity has survived in name on only, I'll grant you that. Can you prove that your version is the exactly the same as the early Christians?
I think you'll find that it has survived in a great deal more than name only, JK. The fact that - despite the differences that do occur between denominations the core belief that salvation is through the death and resurrectin of Jesus that is common to all the main denominations suggests that this 'in name only' argument is pretty feeble.
All empires think they will last forever but they never do.
I'd agree, but then Christianity isn't an empire. It may have an impact of politics, but then it has an impact on just about every aspect of life.
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The problem, if JK is correct in his explanation, with using the survivor bias arguement in the context of Christianity is twofold. Firstly, as has often been pointed out here and elsewhere, Christianity as often been lost under the weight of Churchianity (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Churchianity; http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Churchianity) where church leaders have used the faith to promote tradition that fails to match Jesus' teachings over those teachings - so we can list events and institutions such as the Inquisition, slavery, the Crusades, the mistreatment of the environment and the poor in the hunt for ever greater personal and national wealth and apartheid. As such, the idea that has survived hasn't been the one on which the "focus has been made on those aspects of the subject matter which are appealing and generally seen as being positive (which can be a bias process in itself)".
Secondly, the very existence of many of the New Testament documents bears witness to the huge range of competing ideas that existed across the first century, often espoused by those who had never heard Jesus teach, or spoken with those who had.
And which one of those you choose to be the valid ones for you is based upon your confirmation bias. And how can you know what really does constitute the true Christian message, if it is a valid message and if there is one at all.
Ignoring the survivors bias in regard to the documents and thereby putting them all together in equal standing one if left with a mess of a message that makes no coherent sense at all.
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Non sequitur since it hasn't happened and it is a suggested future event.
You are alleging that Christianity has survived by chance......Got any evidence.
As you can not show or prove that your version of Christianity is that of the early churches and is only associated with it by name alone then one could call all the twists and turns that have eventually ended up with your particular version today, chance.
I heard some ridiculous claim that there are around 6000 protestant sects in the US. Who is to say which one twisted and turned into the right kind of Christianity? As for the Catholic church well at one time they were partying away that would have made some of the lighter porn today look saintly.
You tell me Vlad what wasn't chance with all these versions?
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Yes, I do, but as I and others have pointed out elsewhere, that evidence is based on an understanding that reality isn't limited to the naturalistic, physical world that science works in.
No, it is based on faith. The evidence you talk of was constructed 2000 years ago there is none of it today.
I think you'll find that it has survived in a great deal more than name only, JK. The fact that - despite the differences that do occur between denominations the core belief that salvation is through the death and resurrectin of Jesus that is common to all the main denominations suggests that this 'in name only' argument is pretty feeble.
But that is also in name only. People chanting the same thing for 2000 years doesn't make a fact or truth. Just means people are good at chanting!!! What is needed is for all Christians to live in those times and experience those events, fully immersed in the times, ethos and culture - everything else is gas and whimsy.
What you have is something of these times and this present day culture and events.
I'd agree, but then Christianity isn't an empire. It may have an impact of politics, but then it has an impact on just about every aspect of life.
I used the word empire in a broad sense. It is an empire in the sense it is trying to change everyone into what they are and to abide by their rules and customs, and to 'work for them' or their ideology.
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No, it is based on faith. The evidence you talk of was constructed 2000 years ago there is none of it today.
And what do you mean by "there is none of it today"? Jut because you haven't seen it or experienced it doesn't mean it isn't there.
But that is also in name only. People chanting the same thing for 2000 years doesn't make a fact or truth. Just means people are good at chanting!!! What is needed is for all Christians to live in those times and experience those events, fully immersed in the times, ethos and culture - everything else is gas and whimsy.
Whilst I would agree in part, JK - and there are millions of people who do live in "those times and experience those events, fully immersed in the times, ethos and culture" I would also suggest that, for all the advances that the West have made over the centuries, human nature is pretty well the same now as it was then. We simply live in a rather more formalised way; so that the rich get richer through government design as opposed to government disinterest; and the poor get poorer through the same mechanisms.
What you have is something of these times and this present day culture and events.
I used the word empire in a broad sense. It is an empire in the sense it is trying to change everyone into what they are and to abide by their rules and customs, and to 'work for them' or their ideology.
You mean, like every philosophy does. For instance, we are constantly being told by the Government, or Europe, or the World Bank, or the UN, .... that we must change our eating habits, or exercise habits, our work/home balance habits, ... because they believe that this or that new regime will be for our benefit.
As a Christian, I believe that what God offers humanity is a fulfilled and worthwhile existence based on what I believe to be the purpose of the natural world. You are at liberty to disregard that, but Christians don't force people to act in given ways - or at least they don't if they are following God's teachings as expressed by Jesus.
That is why I differentiate between Christianity and churchianity.
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As you can not show or prove that your version of Christianity is that of the early churches and is only associated with it by name alone then one could call all the twists and turns that have eventually ended up with your particular version today, chance.
I heard some ridiculous claim that there are around 6000 protestant sects in the US. Who is to say which one twisted and turned into the right kind of Christianity? As for the Catholic church well at one time they were partying away that would have made some of the lighter porn today look saintly.
You tell me Vlad what wasn't chance with all these versions?
I think you have been led to believe or at least there has been intent to lead to believe that any old religious narrative or doctrine will do and it's purely a matter of chance. That it has nothing to do with content.
I dispute that as being very much akin to saying the wright brothers just got luckier and it was pure chance that Icarus didn't start the age of flight.
I was even being fair about it. The definition of survivor bias is that the losers or those who don't survivor are overlooked when success is analysed. I called for a comparison between Jesus resurrectionism and Elvis resurrectionism. I am not therefore guilty of survivorship bias and the accusation was a red herring.
Full marks to you Jack for pointing out whether any ''success'' of Christianity was due to chance or whether there are other factors.
Asserting chance or survivor bias is intellectual laziness designed to head off any further investigation of whether the claim of chance or consumer pressure are indeed the explanation for the survival of Christianity.
The Wikipedia article suggests the contexts where survival bias has an effect. Religion is not there. Again by calling for comparison between Elvis resurrectionism and Jesus resurrection I demonstrate that I am the one free from survivorship bias.
I think allsorts of arguments are getting tangled and confused and conflated but hey, That's Bluehillside for you.
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And what do you mean by "there is none of it today"? Jut because you haven't seen it or experienced it doesn't mean it isn't there.
Evidence isn't proof, all it is is some form of data which can be in the form of someone claiming this or that but then there is a process of seeing if it is good, solid evidence which can be verified or not. That was my point, all Christianity has are these claims to faith which are nothing but rhetoric, which anyone could do, not solid verifiable data. Your most 'solid' evidence for your faith, which is decidedly 'gaseous', are you books/manuscripts of the Bible.
As for evidence of the none materialistic kind as I have pointed out above you don't really have any, none that will support your faith. As for me for having 'seeing' it; as you say, or not I have seen the phenomena of the Unconscious (i.e. of the Jungian school type) and it is from this that the secondary phenomena of religion stems from. Religion supervenes on the Unconscious and is merely symbolic. And you should also note, following this, that your approach to the evidence for your faith gives rise to every other religion that has shown its face on this planet whether extant today or defunct and no longer practiced.
Whilst I would agree in part, JK - and there are millions of people who do live in "those times and experience those events, fully immersed in the times, ethos and culture" I would also suggest that, for all the advances that the West have made over the centuries, human nature is pretty well the same now as it was then. We simply live in a rather more formalised way; so that the rich get richer through government design as opposed to government disinterest; and the poor get poorer through the same mechanisms.
"People do live in those time...." :o ::) You can only do that if you go back in time (and place) and be born into those days, 2000 years ago. No one can do that!!!
As for your claim of our natures being the same, it is about ideas, cultures etc. not the human nature in its more basic components. If it was that easy then we would have no trouble understanding ISIS and other cultures. This was more true in the past, because the internet etc. has homogenised our world more, and it was because of this that many wars started for the very fact of the differences and fears this creates. So you can have nearly absolutely no idea what it was like to live 2000 years ago or to understand how they thought or felt or perceived the world around them and themselves.
For example, people are living through a war in Syria today and even though you can see it on the news etc. you have no idea what it is like for them, even though it is happening in your life time. The only way you could really know what they are going through is to live in a war zone in your homeland, seeing your home and who life and culture being destroyed. Imagination and information is not enough only total experience of it is!!!
As a Christian, I believe that what God offers humanity is a fulfilled and worthwhile existence based on what I believe to be the purpose of the natural world. You are at liberty to disregard that, but Christians don't force people to act in given ways - or at least they don't if they are following God's teachings as expressed by Jesus.
That is why I differentiate between Christianity and churchianity.
That is your culture and community ethos, and that is as far as it goes i.e. all those claims of heaven's rewards, JC coming back etc. etc. is just tacked on to add that numinous quality that all cultures and societies tend to do because of our relationship with the Unconscious, that include the instincts and our human nature etc.
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I think you have been led to believe or at least there has been intent to lead to believe that any old religious narrative or doctrine will do and it's purely a matter of chance. That it has nothing to do with content.
I dispute that as being very much akin to saying the wright brothers just got luckier and it was pure chance that Icarus didn't start the age of flight.
I was even being fair about it. The definition of survivor bias is that the losers or those who don't survivor are overlooked when success is analysed. I called for a comparison between Jesus resurrectionism and Elvis resurrectionism. I am not therefore guilty of survivorship bias and the accusation was a red herring.
Full marks to you Jack for pointing out whether any ''success'' of Christianity was due to chance or whether there are other factors.
Asserting chance or survivor bias is intellectual laziness designed to head off any further investigation of whether the claim of chance or consumer pressure are indeed the explanation for the survival of Christianity.
The Wikipedia article suggests the contexts where survival bias has an effect. Religion is not there. Again by calling for comparison between Elvis resurrectionism and Jesus resurrection I demonstrate that I am the one free from survivorship bias.
I think allsorts of arguments are getting tangled and confused and conflated but hey, That's Bluehillside for you.
But the content (to the present today) is in part chance. It evolves over time from a given point, or specific content, but how it will end up at any given point is random due to the various twists and turns. People are then born into it and with varying degrees accept it as being the norm. Your Christianity is seen by you as the right Christianity because you were basically born into it in some manner; that is, you haven't taken on a version that never formed. But because of the twists and turns your Christianity isn't the original one of 2000 years ago but one that has evolved to fit in with changing times and cultural outlooks. Look at the gay marriage issue. Some Christians have accepted this others haven't but a 100 years or so ago it would have been a given to be wrong; no ifs no butts!!! This is Christianity in the act of evolution today and in a 100 years time or more most will accept it as being ok because our cultural times today is forcing the issue to be normal just as other issues in the past have given Christianity its various twists and turns.
The Wright brothers did what they did because of all the twists and turns in science before them that led to their attempts of flight. But if things had twisted and turned as they did then they wouldn't have done it and so they got to where they did by chance. Their success was not ordained and a given.
"I called for a comparison between Jesus resurrectionism and Elvis resurrectionism." - that argument could undermined your Christian faith, which further on you seem to acknowledge.
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Jack Knave wrote:
As for evidence of the none materialistic kind as I have pointed out above you don't really have any, none that will support your faith. As for me for having 'seeing' it; as you say, or not I have seen the phenomena of the Unconscious (i.e. of the Jungian school type) and it is from this that the secondary phenomena of religion stems from. Religion supervenes on the Unconscious and is merely symbolic. And you should also note, following this, that your approach to the evidence for your faith gives rise to every other religion that has shown its face on this planet whether extant today or defunct and no longer practiced.
Interesting stuff, Jack, although I'm not sure about 'merely' symbolic, since you could argue that humans are intensely symbolic animals. However, as you say, this argument partly explains every religion, although no doubt there are other factors. The anthropologist Scot Atran has some interesting stuff on how tribal religions 'carry' cultural information, e.g. they encode stuff like agricultural and hunting techniques, issues to do with fertility, survival of the tribe and so on. Presumably, industrialism gives a fatal shock to this kind of religion.
Christians tend to baffle me, when they want to say that their ideas are true and literally correct, and so on. Why not say that it's my set of symbols? I suppose it was meant to be universally applicable, which is obviously not correct.
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But the content (to the present today) is in part chance. It evolves over time from a given point, or specific content, but how it will end up at any given point is random due to the various twists and turns. People are then born into it and with varying degrees accept it as being the norm. Your Christianity is seen by you as the right Christianity because you were basically born into it in some manner; that is, you haven't taken on a version that never formed. But because of the twists and turns your Christianity isn't the original one of 2000 years ago but one that has evolved to fit in with changing times and cultural outlooks. Look at the gay marriage issue. Some Christians have accepted this others haven't but a 100 years or so ago it would have been a given to be wrong; no ifs no butts!!! This is Christianity in the act of evolution today and in a 100 years time or more most will accept it as being ok because our cultural times today is forcing the issue to be normal just as other issues in the past have given Christianity its various twists and turns.
The Wright brothers did what they did because of all the twists and turns in science before them that led to their attempts of flight. But if things had twisted and turned as they did then they wouldn't have done it and so they got to where they did by chance. Their success was not ordained and a given.
"I called for a comparison between Jesus resurrectionism and Elvis resurrectionism." - that argument could undermined your Christian faith, which further on you seem to acknowledge.
If you are saying Christian culture has changed to fit circumstance you are mistaking Christianity for culture. The central feature of Christianity is Christ and knowing him. That informs cultures but is never altered by them.
When the wright brothers decided to make a plane and not strapped wings to flap on themselves they were assured success. There was no chance about it.
Some things will always fly and somethings won't no matter what the breaks are.
Survivorhip bias is a new field and is not at all as Bluehillside described it.
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Some things will always fly and somethings won't no matter what the breaks are.
Survivorhip bias is a new field and is not at all as Bluehillside described it.
How would you describe it?
I wouldn't describe it as a field at all, and the phenomenon has been known of at least since the Second World War.
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It reminds me of the Texas sharpshooter fallacy, also known as the clustering illusion. (Guy shoots wildly at the side of a barn, and draws a target afterwards, to show how good he is).
The interesting thing about this example, is that the hypothesis is made after the information has been gathered. This easily leads to false clustering. A lot of historical explanations may be prone to this.
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How would you describe it?
I wouldn't describe it as a field at all, and the phenomenon has been known of at least since the Second World War.
First of all it is not the idea that things survive by pure chance.
Secondly it is the overlooking of things which do not survive by focussing on the success of that which survives at no stage was Jesus Resurrectionism put forward without suggesting comparison with Elvis resurrectionism. The accusation of survivorship bias was inappropriate.
Thirdly survivorship bias applies when the competitors for the status of survivor are similar or competing for the same thing and when they fail that's it ideas don't fail in the same way.
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It reminds me of the Texas sharpshooter fallacy, also known as the clustering illusion. (Guy shoots wildly at the side of a barn, and draws a target afterwards, to show how good he is).
The interesting thing about this example, is that the hypothesis is made after the information has been gathered. This easily leads to false clustering. A lot of historical explanations may be prone to this.
How would you describe saying x is the same as Y and then subsequently changing the definition of x to fit Y as the distinction between X and Y becomes apparent. e.g. God is as ridiculous as a leprechaun, But Leprechauns are funny little green clad irish men who live at the end of rainbows.........ah but leprechauns also have the same attributes as god therefore God is as ridiculous as a leprechaun........Is that Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy?
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First of all it is not the idea that things survive by pure chance.
Secondly it is the overlooking of things which do not survive by focussing on the success of that which survives at no stage was Jesus Resurrectionism put forward without suggesting comparison with Elvis resurrectionism. The accusation of survivorship bias was inappropriate.
Thirdly survivorship bias applies when the competitors for the status of survivor are similar or competing for the same thing and when they fail that's it ideas don't fail in the same way.
OK, I can see you are struggling.
Survivorship bias is when you try to draw inferences about entities but you only take into account the ones that are still around. My favourite example would be the way people always claim that music was better back in the Sixties, but they only remember the good music from that era.
As applied to Christianity: people sometimes survey all the extant religions and then claim some feature that only their religion has makes it unique and therefore True. But they ignore all the religions that have died out and that had the same features as their favourite.
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First of all it is not the idea that things survive by pure chance.
Secondly it is the overlooking of things which do not survive by focussing on the success of that which survives at no stage was Jesus Resurrectionism put forward without suggesting comparison with Elvis resurrectionism. The accusation of survivorship bias was inappropriate.
Thirdly survivorship bias applies when the competitors for the status of survivor are similar or competing for the same thing.
I don't think you are getting this, Vlad, since this point has nothing to do with anyone being resurrected - be that Jesus or Elvis (although why on earth you've dragged poor old Elvis into this beats me).
Try it this way - that Christianity has survived to date doesn't confirm the truth of core Christian claims (Jesus being divine etc) because there are other reasons for its survival, such as its role in political arrangements and the associated status and power which occurred during the latter days of the Roman Empire and has persisted ever since, although it is in decline (just like the Roman Empire!).
So far as I remember it was guys like Theodosius who were more relevant to this than Elvis (who may have been the better singer, though we'll never know).
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OK, I can see you are struggling.
Survivorship bias is when you try to draw inferences about entities but you only take into account the ones that are still around. My favourite example would be the way people always claim that music was better back in the Sixties, but they only remember the good music from that era.
As applied to Christianity: people sometimes survey all the extant religions and then claim some feature that only their religion has makes it unique and therefore True. But they ignore all the religions that have died out and that had the same features as their favourite.
Firstly Religion does not fit into survivorship bias studies since religions often do not have the same features as each other.
Your example doesn't make impact because it is merely a question of taste and preference. In the case of Christianity I would move that it is nobody's cup of tea but are forced to accept it's truths because of the strength of it's challenge to the ego.
Survivorship bias doesn't really have much going for it as an explanatory for anything.
In the UK would you say there is survivorship bias for secular humanism?
Finally I can still see you mistaking survivorship bias for The reason things survive.
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How would you describe saying x is the same as Y and then subsequently changing the definition of x to fit Y as the distinction between X and Y becomes apparent. e.g. God is as ridiculous as a leprechaun, But Leprechauns are funny little green clad irish men who live at the end of rainbows.........ah but leprechauns also have the same attributes as god therefore God is as ridiculous as a leprechaun........Is that Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy?
That seems quite different to me, since it predicts that, using a certain description of God, many other things are also described by it. I don't think the point is that God is as ridiculous as a leprechaun, but that leprechauns are predicted by accounts of the supernatural, along with an infinite number of other things. In other words, the descriptions are too powerful and are not constrained, and essentially, empty.
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I don't think you are getting this, Vlad, since this point has nothing to do with anyone being resurrected - be that Jesus or Elvis (although why on earth you've dragged poor old Elvis into this beats me).
Try it this way - that Christianity has survived to date doesn't confirm the truth of core Christian claims
Gordon, I think you don't know what the core Christian claims are. That is because you are guilty of survivorship bias toward Secular Humanism.
By all means prove me wrong by listing them here and now.
The idea that ideas survive through pure chance is as nonsense as saying mathematical equations survive through pure chance, or combinations of numbers survive through pure chance. An idea which is universal never dies nor mutates.
That you guys compare Leprechauns and spaghetti with God or sixties music with religion just shows how misinformed you guys are.
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It's not spaghetti, it's the flying spaghetti monster. This came up in relation to teaching intelligent design in US schools, when some critics argued that it was just as valid to teach the FSM. In other words, the FSM has no empirical validity, and can be argued into existence through all kinds of arbitrary means, just like intelligent design.
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The idea that ideas survive through pure chance is as nonsense as saying mathematical equations survive through pure chance, or combinations of numbers survive through pure chance. An idea which is universal never dies nor mutates.
Rubbish - many ideas take hold because they appear at the right time and the right place - so by chance they are able to perpetuate and take hold. Others simply vanish because they never had that good luck.
And the same applies for leading people as well as ideas.
You might want to read Malcolm Gladwell's 'Outliers' - a great book which explains why hard work isn't enough on its own to ensure success (whether of a person or an idea) but that good luck is also essential. He uses some great examples to show this, for example:
The fact that most high level sports leagues include players biased toward birthdays in one half of the year - why because at the earliest stage teams are based on year groups with (for example) a 1st Sept to 31st August cutoff. For the very young there will be a massive difference between a Sept born and August born child in the same 'year' and those older kids seem better and get the opportunities - pure luck of birth date.
That virtually all the successful corporate lawyers in 1970s New York were jewish from the same area and virtually the same age. Why because by luck they were born into a small generation (low birth rate), by luck were a generation who benefited from high quality public schooling in the 1940s, by luck they were excluded from the established 'WASP' legal firms and had to set up alone, by luck they were just at the right time and right place for major changes in corporation law that they understood in the 1970s and the established 'WASP' legal firms had ignored because they thought this kind of work was beneath them. So they cleaned up - virtually all the most successful being almost identical demographically, and the reason for their success - good luck. Had they been born 10 years earlier or 10 years later they wouldn't have been successful. Good luck abounds.
So how does this equate to the success of christianity. Well I think it benefitted from two major elements of good fortune, both of which relate to the Roman empire. First the presence of the empire throughout the Mediterranean and southern europe allowed people and ideas to spread in a manner that would have been impassible had there not been a unifying empire across that region. And secondly they hit lucky as just at the time when tiny pockets of christianity were becoming established through that empire, the need to deal with a slow decline in the empire by the 4thC meant that they encountered an emperor ripe for new ideas to try to reinvigorate the empire and stop the rot, and was receptive to the idea of a new religion.
Without either of these, and noting that christianity failed to take root in the place and time of its inception, then I doubt anyone would be talking about christianity today - and as with the Gladwell examples, both of these elements of good fortune for christianity were just luck.
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Rubbish - many ideas take hold because they appear at the right time and the right place - so by chance they are able to perpetuate and take hold. Others simply vanish because they never had that good luck.
No that is a case of Fitness, not pure chance.
Survivorship bias is about situations where competition has broadly an equal chance of surviving but gets through by chance and the survivors characteristics are mistaken for the real reason of success. It is a mistake in analysis. I don't think universal ideas are subject to such a process but interview candidates may be.
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Gordon, I think you don't know what the core Christian claims are. That is because you are guilty of survivorship bias toward Secular Humanism.
By all means prove me wrong by listing them here and now.
The idea that ideas survive through pure chance is as nonsense as saying mathematical equations survive through pure chance, or combinations of numbers survive through pure chance. An idea which is universal never dies nor mutates.
That you guys compare Leprechauns and spaghetti with God or sixties music with religion just shows how misinformed you guys are.
You seem to be in headless-chicken mode, Vlad.
This isn't really about resurrections, as you mysteriously suggested earlier when you threw Elvis into the mix with Jesus - it is to do with the bias that can occur where something that has survived is thought by some to confirm the 'truth' of whatever its details are just because it has survived.
So, where someone thinks that because Christianity has survived in organised formats for nigh on 2,000 years it means that its core claims (God, resurrected Jesus etc) are likely to be true but in doing so they fail to take into account other reasons for the survival of Christianity, such as I noted earlier. Put another way, that Christianity has survived whereas the worship of the Roman pantheon of Gods hasn't, when at one point they co-existed, does not imply than the Christian theistic claims are 'truer' just because Christianity has outlived the worship of Jupiter, Apollo etc - there are other reasons for this situation that don't involve core theistic beliefs.
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That virtually all the successful corporate lawyers in 1970s New York were jewish from the same area and virtually the same age. Why because by luck they were born into a small generation (low birth rate), by luck were a generation who benefited from high quality public schooling in the 1940s, by luck they were excluded from the established 'WASP' legal firms and had to set up alone, by luck they were just at the right time and right place for major changes in corporation law that they understood in the 1970s and the established 'WASP' legal firms had ignored because they thought this kind of work was beneath them. So they cleaned up - virtually all the most successful being almost identical demographically, and the reason for their success - good luck. Had they been born 10 years earlier or 10 years later they wouldn't have been successful.
yes but they were lawyers Davey.
Had they been juggling unicyclists I would buy that it happened by pure chance
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yes but they were lawyers Davey.
Had they been juggling unicyclists I would buy that it happened by pure chance
But their ability to become lawyers in the first place was down to good luck of time and place of birth.
have you actually read the book or just making ill informed comments as usual Vlad?
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You seem to be in headless-chicken mode, Vlad.
This isn't really about resurrections, as you mysteriously suggested earlier when you threw Elvis into the mix with Jesus - it is to do with the bias that can occur where something that has survived is thought by some to confirm the 'truth' of whatever its details are just because it has survived.
So, where someone thinks that because Christianity has survived in organised formats for nigh on 2,000 years it means that its core claims (God, resurrected Jesus etc) are likely to be true but in doing so they fail to take into account other reasons for the survival of Christianity, such as I noted earlier. Put another way, that Christianity has survived whereas the worship of the Roman pantheon of Gods hasn't, when at one point they co-existed, does not imply than the Christian theistic claims are 'truer' just because Christianity has outlived the worship of Jupiter, Apollo etc - there are other reasons for this situation that don't involve core theistic beliefs.
I would propose that Christianity had less chance of survival than loads of religions. I do think though that the 'survivor' you have identified is churchianity rather than Christianity although that only survives on christianity's coat tail and not the other way round.
I understand that what you are saying is because religions are all shit it is just a matter of fashion or chance that each survive.....Whereas Atheisms moves ahead because of it's central and wonderful truths.......But I disagree that that is survivorship bias but a reason for why things survive that I take issue with.
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But their ability to become lawyers in the first place was down to good luck of time and place of birth.
.....and not ability?
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Chunderer,
I think you have been led to believe or at least there has been intent to lead to believe that any old religious narrative or doctrine will do and it's purely a matter of chance. That it has nothing to do with content.
Pretty much - that's how survivor bias works. We tend to assume that winners are winners because of some inherent quality rather than because of a series of chance events along the way that the losers we don't see didn't get. The success of religions in which you don't believe should teach you that - if they're wrong, why did they thrive?
I dispute that as being very much akin to saying the wright brothers just got luckier and it was pure chance that Icarus didn't start the age of flight.
No you bozo - you're confusing cultural constructs (religions, language, morality and such like) with empirical data. Doh!
I was even being fair about it.
Blimey it really must be Christmas...
The definition of survivor bias is that the losers or those who don't survivor are overlooked when success is analysed. I called for a comparison between Jesus resurrectionism and Elvis resurrectionism. I am not therefore guilty of survivorship bias and the accusation was a red herring.
Doh! revisited. One caught the wind and thrived, the other didn't. That's how it works - start with lots of contenders and most will fail, but some won't. The mistake is to think that the few winners were necessarily better or more true, rather than that they happened to catch the breaks.
Full marks to you Jack for pointing out whether any ''success'' of Christianity was due to chance or whether there are other factors.
And Islam? Or Judaism? Or any of the countless other religions that had top spot at certain times and in certain places? What were the "other factors" that made the Norse gods the winners do you think?
Asserting chance or survivor bias is intellectual laziness designed to head off any further investigation of whether the claim of chance or consumer pressure are indeed the explanation for the survival of Christianity.
No, it's just a description of a common and well-described phenomenon that most people miss.
The Wikipedia article suggests the contexts where survival bias has an effect. Religion is not there. Again by calling for comparison between Elvis resurrectionism and Jesus resurrection I demonstrate that I am the one free from survivorship bias.
Please - stop embarrassing yourself. Nor are 99 other types of cultural construct there, but that doesn't mean that the phenomenon doesn't apply to them either. What do you think "examples" even means for Pete's sake?
I think allsorts of arguments are getting tangled and confused and conflated but hey, That's Bluehillside for you.
Er, actually that's Vlad for you. Stop tangling and confusing them and you might have a chance of grasping them.
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Chunderer,
Pretty much - that's how survivor bias works. We tend to assume that winners are winners because of some inherent quality rather than because of a series of chance events along the way that the losers we don't see didn't get. The success of religions in which you don't believe should teach you that - if they're wrong, why did they thrive?
No you bozo - you're confusing cultural constructs (religions, language, morality and such like) with empirical data. Doh!
Blimey it really must be Christmas...
Doh! revisited. One caught the wind and thrived, the other didn't. That's how it works - start with lots of contenders and most will fail, but some won't. The mistake is to think that the few winners were necessarily better or more true, rather than that they happened to catch the breaks.
And Islam? Or Judaism? Or any of the countless other religions that had top spot at certain times and in certain places? What were the "other factors" that made the Norse gods the winners do you think?
No, it's just a description of a common and well-described phenomenon that most people miss.
Please - stop embarrassing yourself. Nor are 99 other types of cultural construct there, but that doesn't mean that the phenomenon doesn't apply to them either. What do you think "examples" even means for Pete's sake?
Er, actually that's Vlad for you. Stop tangling and confusing them and you might have a chance of grasping them.
I'm talking about fitness. There are only certain things that fit....That's why Jewish Lawyers succeeded in the American legal profession rather than Jewish unicyclists. Your take on things would have lawyers and unicyclists competing on an even footing.
Your confusion is you think that religion as with morality and everything else with you is a matter of taste.
Your theory of why things survive just borrows a few ideas fro survivorship bias but allows you to slight not only religions or philosophies but also anybody making them. Another Hillside shuffle where the tactics are obvious.
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.....and not ability?
No because realising ability requires opportunity, and that was the key for this particular cohort - they, through massive good luck, had opportunity which the generation before them and those after didn't.
So the key point here was schooling and birthrate. In New York the birth rate virtually halved from 1919 through to 1935, but the city had invested massively in public schooling on the basis of the 1919 birth rate and continued to do so - so the 1935 born had massively greater resource spent on them through their schooling than those born earlier or later.
And then when time came to go to university the same luck was with them. Due to the exceptionally low north rate universities could not afford to be so selective so the kind of kids who wouldn't have had a hope of getting into University of Michigan or Columbia a generation earlier (or later) were able to get in. Sure they worked hard but the key was the good luck of being born at a time of low birth rate, when public schools were being very well funded and top universities were accessible.
Later their good luck was to be actually excluded from the establish WASP law firms and to become experienced (because they had to) in areas of law those firms shunned. So when corporation rules changed in the 1970s they were perfectly placed to clean up. The key being good luck - hard work and ability are all well and good, but without the luck they wouldn't have been successful.
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I'm talking about fitness. There are only certain things that fit....That's why Jewish Lawyers succeeded in the American legal profession rather than Jewish unicyclists.
I doubt you have read the book but what I am talking about is why jewish lawyers born in 1935 achieved success while those born in 1930 didn't, nor those born in 1940. The reason why 1935 is the key is due to the good luck of being born in that year for the reasons I suggested.
This has nothing to do with unicyclists.
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No because realising ability requires opportunity, and that was the key for this particular cohort - they, through massive good luck, had opportunity which the generation before them and those after didn't.
So the key point here was schooling and birthrate. In New York the birth rate virtually halved from 1919 through to 1935, but the city had invested massively in public schooling on the basis of the 1919 birth rate and continued to do so - so the 1935 born had massively greater resource spent on them through their schooling than those born earlier or later.
And then when time came to go to university the same luck was with them. Due to the exceptionally low north rate universities could not afford to be so selective so the kind of kids who wouldn't have had a hope of getting into University of Michigan or Columbia a generation earlier (or later) were able to get in. Sure they worked hard but the key was the good luck of being born at a time of low birth rate, when public schools were being very well funded and top universities were accessible.
Later their good luck was to be actually excluded from the establish WASP law firms and to become experienced (because they had to) in areas of law those firms shunned. So when corporation rules changed in the 1970s they were perfectly placed to clean up. The key being good luck - hard work and ability are all well and good, but without the luck they wouldn't have been successful.
Yes but you are guilty of survivor bias here because you have overlooked the Jewish unicyclists here and ignored any effort to explain their obvious lack of success in corporate law at this time.
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Yes but you are guilty of survivor bias here because you have overlooked the Jewish unicyclists here and ignored any effort to explain their obvious lack of success in corporate law at this time.
Nope - jewish unicyclists weren't successful for obvious reasons.
But neither were jewish lawyers born in 1930 or 1940, nor were christian lawyers born in 1935, yet jewish lawyers born in 1935 were - why because all the elements for success lined up, and many of them were down to the pure luck of year of birth.
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I doubt you have read the book but what I am talking about is why jewish lawyers born in 1935 achieved success while those born in 1930 didn't, nor those born in 1940. The reason why 1935 is the key is due to the good luck of being born in that year for the reasons I suggested.
This has nothing to do with unicyclists.
Why not.....Since your theory depends on so many counterfactuals, why not consider Jewish unicyclists?
In any case we are not talking about survivorship bias here which is something to do with the analysis of the example...........but reasons.
Unicyclists are critical here because they illustrate the role of fitness and the effort of entering the field as opposed to pure chance.
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Why not.....Since your theory depends on so many counterfactuals, why not consider Jewish unicyclists?
In any case we are not talking about survivorship bias here which is something to do with the analysis of the example...........but reasons.
Unicyclists are critical here because they illustrate the role of fitness and the effort of entering the field as opposed to pure chance.
Perhaps some of the more able children born to jewish families in 1919 became unicyclists rather than lawyers as the odds were stacked against them - had they been born in 1935 with the same ability they would have been able to become top lawyers for the reasons I described.
And to ask again - have you actually read the book.
We could use top ice hockey players born in Jan, Feb or March, or richest people ever (adjusted for inflation) and being born in the 1830s and being American.
Each one based on luck of birth year - or month of birth.
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Chunderingaboutheplaceagain,
I'm talking about fitness. There are only certain things that fit....That's why Jewish Lawyers succeeded in the American legal profession rather than Jewish unicyclists. Your take on things would have lawyers and unicyclists competing on an even footing.
Doh! revisited revisited.
That cohort of putative lawyers were a better "fit", but only in the sense that they happened to be in the right place at the right time. The generations before and after were just as intellectually "fit" as they were, but didn't have the lucky breaks of place and time that they had.
Your confusion is you think that religion as with morality and everything else with you is a matter of taste.
No, your confusion is in arbitrarily excluding religion (though presumably only your one) from the category of social constructs as prone to survivor bias as any other. Whether your choice of religion is a matter of "taste" is a different matter - the fact remains that lots of religions you think to be wrong have thrived and waned, and some of them thrive still. If you think that all of them did so by chance but only yours did so because of some inherent truth you're going to have to do some pretty fancy footwork to explain why.
Your theory of why things survive just borrows a few ideas fro survivorship bias...
Nearly. It's the mistake you attempted of assuming that the winner you like was the winner because of its inherent quality that is survivor bias rather than a borrowing from it. Countless religions have fallen away and a smaller number have thrived, just as you'd expect when survival and failure is largely down to dumb luck. What makes you think yours to be exempt from that phenomenon?
...but allows you to slight not only religions or philosophies but also anybody making them.
No doubt you'll be along soon with an example of this "slighting" then?
Another Hillside shuffle where the tactics are obvious.
No "tactics" - just some basic observation you fail to grasp and so cannot rebut.
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Firstly Religion does not fit into survivorship bias studies since religions often do not have the same features as each other.
And often they do.
Survivorship bias doesn't really have much going for it as an explanatory for anything.
In the UK would you say there is survivorship bias for secular humanism?
Clearly you still don't get it.
Finally I can still see you mistaking survivorship bias for The reason things survive.
Survivorship bias doesn't necessarily say anything about why things survive. Christianity survived for whatever reason - probably being at the right place at the right time, politically. You'd have to examine all the religions that didn't make it to find out if any of its articles of faith had anything to do with it.
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Survivorship bias is about situations where competition has broadly an equal chance of surviving but gets through by chance and the survivors characteristics are mistaken for the real reason of success.
How goes that not apply to Christianity?
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Chunderer,
Yes but you are guilty of survivor bias here because you have overlooked the Jewish unicyclists here and ignored any effort to explain their obvious lack of success in corporate law at this time.
Not very bright is it...
If, say, a mysterious illness has swept the US in the 1930s that wiped out non-Jewish trainee unicyclists then there would have been a crop of successful Jewish unicyclists because they'd be the ones you'd have heard of. That doesn't mean that they were inherently better - or more "fit" - at unicycling, but only that they appear to be so to you because you ignored the other 99% who never made it.
Now for "non-Jewish trainee unicyclists" substitute "religions that failed", and for "Jewish unicyclists" substitute, "religions that thrived".
Get it now?
Perhaps if you read up a little on survivor bias before posting again you'd be less prone to making the same mistake again?
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How goes that not apply to Christianity?
Surviving by chance is not the same as survivorship bias which is an error in analysing that success.
It also ignores Fitness and Niche amongst other things and even then I don't know that Darwinian evolution or natural selection is the total reason for the survival of ideas......For example are you prepared to say that science has survived merely by chance.......or that it is merely and Darwinianly evolved?
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I would propose that Christianity had less chance of survival than loads of religions. I do think though that the 'survivor' you have identified is churchianity rather than Christianity although that only survives on christianity's coat tail and not the other way round.
Don't be daft, Vlad, it is self-evident that Christianity has survived since we are talking about it in 2015 whereas as other religions that co-existed with it are defunct - it would be easy for current Christians to see this as confirmation that Christianity is therefore more 'true' than the alternatives - but that may be just bias if there are other reasons why Christianity has survived.
One of these may be the 'churchianity' you mention which gave Christianity power and influence both socially and politically, and it is this rather than the supernatural claims that is the key to its survival and will likely be the key to its decline as its influence wanes.
I understand that what you are saying is because religions are all shit
There is that too.
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Surviving by chance is not the same as survivorship bias which is an error in analysing that success.
Correct. Christians make an error in analysing the success of their religion by not surveying the other religions that didn't make it to see if they had the same attributes as Christianity.
It also ignores Fitness and Niche amongst other things and even then I don't know that Darwinian evolution or natural selection is the total reason for the survival of ideas......For example are you prepared to say that science has survived merely by chance.......or that it is merely evolved?
What alternatives have there been to science for explaining the World that did not survive?
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Correct. Christians make an error in analysing the success of their religion by not surveying the other religions that didn't make it to see if they had the same attributes as Christianity.
Any evidence?
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What alternatives have there been to science for explaining the World that did not survive?
yes, the French philosophical approach to science......a version of which has been suggested by Bluehillside's poster boy Sean Carroll who has suggested removing falsifiability from science.
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Any evidence?
How many Christians are aware that there were hundreds of messiahs around at the time of Jesus or thatChristianity was one of a group of mystery religions in the Greek world at the time. I'm pretty sure Hope (as an example) ignores all these other similar religions when he claims Christianity is unique.
You sometimes hear Christians say "only in Christianity does God assume human form, suffer death and then get resurrected" which might be true today but it was a common motif in the first century.
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yes, the French philosophical approach to science......a version of which has been suggested by Bluehillside's poster boy Sean Carroll who has suggested removing falsifiability from science.
That's still science though, isn't it.
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How many Christians are aware that there were hundreds of messiahs around at the time of Jesus or thatChristianity was one of a group of mystery religions in the Greek world at the time. I'm pretty sure Hope (as an example) ignores all these other similar religions when he claims Christianity is unique.
You sometimes hear Christians say "only in Christianity does God assume human form, suffer death and then get resurrected" which might be true today but it was a common motif in the first century.
1) If there were hundreds of messiahs Jeremy why are you a Jesus Myther?
Special pleading what?
2) Any evidence that Christians weren't or aren't aware of other messiahs......... when asked for evidence you just reasserted!
3) Christians are aware of other dying and rising Gods. That's why CS Lewis and others refer to Christianity as myth become fact.
Sorry to comprehensively have pissed on your bonfire Jez.
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Jack Knave wrote:
Interesting stuff, Jack, although I'm not sure about 'merely' symbolic, since you could argue that humans are intensely symbolic animals. However, as you say, this argument partly explains every religion, although no doubt there are other factors. The anthropologist Scot Atran has some interesting stuff on how tribal religions 'carry' cultural information, e.g. they encode stuff like agricultural and hunting techniques, issues to do with fertility, survival of the tribe and so on. Presumably, industrialism gives a fatal shock to this kind of religion.
Christians tend to baffle me, when they want to say that their ideas are true and literally correct, and so on. Why not say that it's my set of symbols? I suppose it was meant to be universally applicable, which is obviously not correct.
We are symbolic because of our relationship with the Unconscious - it doesn't have to be religious in nature to be so.
In the early days of tribes religion and culture were basically one and the same thing. It is only as the modern world approached that things became more differentiated.
"Presumably, industrialism gives a fatal shock to this kind of religion." - Not too sure what you are implying here. You could argue that Marxism is a kind of modern religion where we are the gods, or the leaders are - often referred to by psychologists as inflation or megalomania. Something had to fill the void left by Christianity as the central factor in society.
"Christians tend to baffle me, when they want to say that their ideas are true and literally correct, and so on. Why not say that it's my set of symbols? I suppose it was meant to be universally applicable, which is obviously not correct.
You could say the same about the US and the West's belief in its system of governing life. We all want to change other people to see the world the way we do - it's the tribal instinct.
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1) If there were hundreds of messiahs Jeremy why are you a Jesus Myther?
Special pleading what?
The word "Messiah" just means "anointed one". King David was a Messiah (if he existed).
Anyway, I'm not a mythicist. I think there was a founder of Christianity and I think he was executed. I wouldn't go much further than that though.
2) Any evidence that Christians weren't or aren't aware of other messiahs......... when asked for evidence you just reasserted!
No, you asked for evidence that some Christians don't survey the failed religions. All the messiahs running round is disputed fact (Josephus).
3) Christians are aware of other dying and rising Gods. That's why CS Lewis and others refer to Christianity as myth become fact.
CS Lewis is not all Christians. Can you name any of the other mystery cults around at the time?
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Good point about Marxism, Jack. It seems like secular eschatology really.
Yes, it's true that many people, religious or not, want to convert everybody else. I was thinking about the split in Christianity between symbolism and literal truth, but anyway, it's din-dins.
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That's why CS Lewis and others refer to Christianity as myth become fact.
I rather like the Narnia books (for sentimental reasons), but he is a bit of a numpty otherwise.
'Myth' cannot become 'fact' merely because people believe it. Myth is always myth, fact is always fact regardless of how many people recognise them to be as such. Sure people can come to recognise that which they once considered fact to actually be myth, likewise people can come to recognise that which they once considered myth to actually be fact - but that isn't about what they actually are, but about how they are perceived.
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If you are saying Christian culture has changed to fit circumstance you are mistaking Christianity for culture. The central feature of Christianity is Christ and knowing him. That informs cultures but is never altered by them.
But that simple process then sets up questions about how do you get to know him and from that relationship how do you live and conduct your life - and that is culture and ethics. Cultural norms will even state how you get to know him and so on. You can't escape it. What do you think caused the Reformation? Standard ways of doing things some being corrupt. The new ways created allsorts of cultures like the Anabaptists. Or the Puritans who said music and dancing etc. was not of God, all of which came from this alleged relationship with JC and God. And all this has shaped our world in one way or another - the twist and turns of life.
When the wright brothers decided to make a plane and not strapped wings to flap on themselves they were assured success. There was no chance about it.
But it didn't occur in a vacuum they were standing on the history that came before them and what they used had been developed by others - all the twists and turns of life.
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As applied to Christianity: people sometimes survey all the extant religions and then claim some feature that only their religion has makes it unique and therefore True. But they ignore all the religions that have died out and that had the same features as their favourite.
That's a good and pertinent one. Many of the features of the NT have ideas similar to other faiths and philosophies. The need for them to reject this and so make their faith unique is a typical tribal trait.
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I thought that early Christianity had its roots in Jewish apocalypticism, 'the signs of the close of the age' and so on. But this faded as the age did not close, so Christianity changed considerably from an end-time orientation to something quite different.
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I rather like the Narnia books (for sentimental reasons), but he is a bit of a numpty otherwise.
'Myth' cannot become 'fact' merely because people believe it. Myth is always myth, fact is always fact regardless of how many people recognise them to be as such. Sure people can come to recognise that which they once considered fact to actually be myth, likewise people can come to recognise that which they once considered myth to actually be fact - but that isn't about what they actually are, but about how they are perceived.
I'm pretty sure his understanding of myth differs from yours not least in the respect of the literary and historical expertise he had.
Having studied numerous myths he concluded that the New testament was reportage and what other religions were missing was Christ. He was saying that Christianity had particular unique elements. Now we have to ask ourselves if his view is right and yours is not an antitheists survivorship bias in favour of philosophical materialism.
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That's still science though, isn't it.
is it?
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I'm pretty sure his understanding of myth differs from yours not least in the respect of the literary and historical expertise he had.
Well perhaps we should use the dictionary definition - indeed the Oxford dictionary definition which, as an Oxford academic, I guess he would acknowledge:
Myth
1 a traditional story, especially one concerning the early history of a people or explaining a natural or social phenomenon, and typically involving supernatural beings or events: ancient Celtic myths | [ mass noun ] : the heroes of Greek myth.
2 a widely held but false belief or idea: the belief that evening primrose oil helps to cure eczema is a myth, according to dermatologists.
• a fictitious or imaginary person or thing. nobody had ever heard of Simon's mysterious friend—Anna said he was a myth.
• an exaggerated or idealized conception of a person or thing: the book is a scholarly study of the Churchill myth.
So, although 1 doesn't quite iterate is specifically there is a clear indication that the story isn't actually true. @ goes further to make clear it is a 'false belief' - therefore the notion that a false belief somehow becomes fact is a non-sense statement.
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Gordon, I think you don't know what the core Christian claims are. That is because you are guilty of survivorship bias toward Secular Humanism.
By all means prove me wrong by listing them here and now.
The idea that ideas survive through pure chance is as nonsense as saying mathematical equations survive through pure chance, or combinations of numbers survive through pure chance. An idea which is universal never dies nor mutates.
That you guys compare Leprechauns and spaghetti with God or sixties music with religion just shows how misinformed you guys are.
"An idea which is universal never dies nor mutates."
What do you have in mind here, as an universal idea? Example please.
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Without either of these, and noting that christianity failed to take root in the place and time of its inception, then I doubt anyone would be talking about christianity today - and as with the Gladwell examples, both of these elements of good fortune for christianity were just luck.
That's a good point. Did God fail?
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"An idea which is universal never dies nor mutates."
What do you have in mind here, as an universal idea? Example please.
Er the scientific method
Any moral argument
Any Divine argument
Anything which could if true apply to all men and women
Anything which could if true apply to the whole cosmos.......
........that sort of thing.
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But their ability to become lawyers in the first place was down to good luck of time and place of birth.
have you actually read the book or just making ill informed comments as usual Vlad?
Surveyors bias can include things like luck but it is not a fundamental aspect of it. It is to do with how data may be incomplete due to the unwarranted focus on certain specific data because it has in fact survived for the observer who because of their 'location' less favourable data is out of view.
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No because realising ability requires opportunity, and that was the key for this particular cohort - they, through massive good luck, had opportunity which the generation before them and those after didn't.
So the key point here was schooling and birthrate. In New York the birth rate virtually halved from 1919 through to 1935, but the city had invested massively in public schooling on the basis of the 1919 birth rate and continued to do so - so the 1935 born had massively greater resource spent on them through their schooling than those born earlier or later.
And then when time came to go to university the same luck was with them. Due to the exceptionally low north rate universities could not afford to be so selective so the kind of kids who wouldn't have had a hope of getting into University of Michigan or Columbia a generation earlier (or later) were able to get in. Sure they worked hard but the key was the good luck of being born at a time of low birth rate, when public schools were being very well funded and top universities were accessible.
Later their good luck was to be actually excluded from the establish WASP law firms and to become experienced (because they had to) in areas of law those firms shunned. So when corporation rules changed in the 1970s they were perfectly placed to clean up. The key being good luck - hard work and ability are all well and good, but without the luck they wouldn't have been successful.
That would be like claiming that by putting a million dunces through law school some of them would develop into brilliant lawyers.... ::) The ability had to be there in the first place.
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Nope - jewish unicyclists weren't successful for obvious reasons.
But neither were jewish lawyers born in 1930 or 1940, nor were christian lawyers born in 1935, yet jewish lawyers born in 1935 were - why because all the elements for success lined up, and many of them were down to the pure luck of year of birth.
All this would be survivors bias only if a wrong conclusion was made from this by opting for only part of the information in assessing why they were so successful. You seem to have analysed this correctly and therefore this has nothing to do with survivors bias.
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Er the scientific method
Any moral argument
Any Divine argument
Anything which could if true apply to all men and women
Anything which could if true apply to the whole cosmos.......
........that sort of thing.
The lines with 'if' are discounted as they can not be certain of containing any examples.
Morals are relative so can't be universal and divine stuff is obviously out as it is totally subjective.
So the number of universals would be rather small and would not impinged on survivor bias cases much and as such not really applicable to this argument. So I can't see why you included it?
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The lines with 'if' are discounted as they can not be certain of containing any examples.
Morals are relative so can't be universal and divine stuff is obviously out as it is totally subjective.
So the number of universals would be rather small and would not impinged on survivor bias cases much and as such not really applicable to this argument. So I can't see why you included it?
Your first point is meaningless since at least 1 thing either naturalism or a universe originating, and managed from beyond, or that we are all part of the divine has to be true and in science none has been established and remain ''ifs''
If morals are relative then morality is merely a game and I know you don't believe that.
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Chunderer,
If morals are relative then morality is merely a game and I know you don't believe that.
Of course morals aren't "merely a game" but, even if they were, then your argument for universal moral values is just a consequentialist one: "I don't like the idea that morality is merely a game, therefore...um...moral values must be universal".
Doesn't wash though.
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Chunderer,
Of course morals aren't "merely a game" but, even if they were, then your argument for universal moral values is just a consequentialist one: "I don't like the idea that morality is merely a game, therefore...um...moral values must be universal".
Doesn't wash though.
Come on Hillside you know the arguments relative morality, moral realism and moral irrealism, one is binding on us although intellectually not established.
Of course actions have consequences. Why do you chuck that in?
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Chunderer,
Come on Hillside you know the arguments relative morality, moral realism and moral irrealism, one is binding on us although intellectually not established.
You've tried this bizarre "binding" line before I think though as ever you've never managed to tell us what you mean by it, let alone to make an argument argue for it. Clearly though some aren't "bound" because they act differently. Either way, the point as ever was lost on you - that morals are a mix of the instinctive and the reasoned says nothing to the notion that they are "merely a game".
Of course actions have consequences. Why do you chuck that in?
Very, very, very stupid. Try again: you implied that morals must be universally objective because you don't like the idea (however wrong) that if they're not then they must be "merely a game". That is, you seem to think that universality is a function of your dislike for something.
Weird.
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Chunderer,
You've tried this bizarre "binding" line before I think though as ever you've never managed to tell us what you mean by it, let alone to make an argument argue for it. Clearly though some aren't "bound" because they act differently. Either way, the point as ever was lost on you - that morals are a mix of the instinctive and the reasoned says nothing to the notion that they are "merely a game".
Very, very, very stupid. Try again: you implied that morals must be universally objective because you don't like the idea (however wrong) that if they're not then they must be "merely a game". That is, you seem to think that universality is a function of your dislike for something.
Weird.
You've got the wrong end of the stick Blue.
All I am saying is that we are bound by whatever the truth is.
If morality is relative then it is relative for all, If it is real then it is real for all.
These are ideas that can ever become extinct because ideas do not.
Assent may wax and wane but these ideas are non perishable and confront everything that has ever or will have our capacities.
Your view of morality has difficulties....How can something pulled extra anally be taken so seriously and have the argument for superior arsepull made for it............How do we distinguish moral behaviour from plain behaviour.......My take on morality has difficulty because it is proving nigh on impossible to scientifically measure etc. but whichever is the actual truth that must be binding on all.
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Chunderer,
You've got the wrong end of the stick Blue.
I doubt it, but let's see shall we?
All I am saying is that we are bound by whatever the truth is.
Meaning what? What do you mean here by "truth" - ie, that which we can best reason our way towards as the most probably true given the available data and reasoning we can do, or some ultimate, universal, objective version of it that you think we can know by some undefined process?
And in what sense are we "bound" by it in any case? Even if you pick the most extreme example you can think of in the area of morality for example, someone could still behave differently if they were so inclined.
If morality is relative then it is relative for all, If it is real then it is real for all.
What thought are you trying to express here? By and large most of us share intuitive moral values - not killing our children for example - for reasons of evolutionary advantage, and we add to that reasoned positions (however imperfectly) on the specifics - about abortion for example.
So what? Call that "relative" if you like, but it doesn't alter the fact.
These are ideas that can ever become extinct because ideas do not.
Of course they do. Ideas can readily be forgotten and, once they have been, there's no guarantee that anyone else will have them at a future time.
Assent may wax and wane but these ideas are non perishable and confront everything that has ever or will have our capacities.
In English please.
Your view of morality has difficulties....How can something pulled extra anally be taken so seriously and have the argument for superior arsepull made for it............How do we distinguish moral behaviour from plain behaviour.......My take on morality has difficulty because it is proving nigh on impossible to scientifically measure etc. but whichever is the actual truth that must be binding on all.
And again, in English please. Insofar as I can unscramble the sentiment though, lots of things that are "relative" are nonetheless taken perfectly seriously. People seriously think the late Beethoven quartets to be great music for example, and Kylie's output to be less so. No appeal to some supposed universal standard of great music is needed for that, any more than an appeal to some supposed universal standard of moral rectitude is needed to decide that on balance not stealing is morally better than stealing.
Oh, and the difficulty with your "take" on morality isn't that it's "proving nigh on impossible to scientifically measure etc." at all - that's a secondary issue. Your real difficulty is that you have no argument to demonstrate that there's anything to measure in the first place. Your apparent distaste for the notion that morality is "relative" is not an argument for it being non-relative.
Apart from that though...
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Your first point is meaningless since at least 1 thing either naturalism or a universe originating, and managed from beyond, or that we are all part of the divine has to be true and in science none has been established and remain ''ifs''
But this has nothing to do with survivors bias, which is to do with how we view events in our lives and world, not the 'bigger picture' which we have no real way to acquire a clear overview perspective on which to make the assessment if a survivors bias has taken place. It's bad enough doing this in our own worldly events let alone into the 'spiritual' realm.
If morals are relative then morality is merely a game and I know you don't believe that.
Just because morals are relative it doesn't mean they are just a 'game'. It's all about context and the arena in which one is working. How large the field is that one is playing in is what makes it relative or not, and even so, beyond those restrictions understandings of difference can be catered for where applicable for those who aren't bigots. The areas where extremes go beyond the pail and may be seen as universal are small and are exceptions rather than the rule in the list of possible ethical positions on could take.