Searching for GOD...

[ProfessorDavey]

Yes the article offers an interesting analysis. I have read something similar to this idea from other sources:

To understand why people turn to Islamic political violence, another group of researchers have left aside the role played by ideas to assess the influence of economic and political factors. These studies do not state that ideas do not play any role in the radicalization process but that their influence is only contingent. In other words, causal factors leading people to adhere to some specific attitudes with regard to the use of violence are the same whatever the ideology they use to then justify these attitudes.

At the political level, the role of specific experiences in triggering radicalization received large empirical support. These experiences may be common to Muslims wherever they live or may only hold in certain social and political contexts. Overall, radical beliefs have been largely found to be associated with a perceived lack of legitimacy and justice of national and international politics. A study comparing Western European and Arabic Muslim countries showed that opposition to Western foreign policies is a key driver of respondents’ justification of political violence.44 In the same token, several analyses have pointed out that the approval and justification of terrorism are strongly correlated with anti-Americanism and with the perception that the foreign policies of Western powers.

This 2009 article on Yasir Qadhi soon after the attempted terrorist attack by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab while on board Northwest Airlines Flight 253, en route from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day, discusses the difficulty for scholars to openly discuss jihad because they might be arrested by the authorities. This means it becomes harder to have a frank discussion to dissuade young hot-headed US Muslim students from militant action:
 
Since 2008, more than two dozen Muslim-Americans have joined or sought training with militant groups abroad. They are among the roughly 50 American citizens charged with terrorism-related offenses during that time. These suspects are a mixed lot. Some converted to Islam; others were raised in the faith. They come from a range of socioeconomic backgrounds and have migrated to different fronts in their global war, from Somalia to Pakistan. Their motivations differ, but the vast majority share two key attributes: a deep disdain for American foreign policy and an ideology rooted in Salafiya......

During the months I spent in the insular world of young American Salafis, it became clear how pressing those questions are for many conservative Muslims who have come of age after 9/11. They have watched as their own country wages war in Muslim lands, bearing witness — via satellite television and the Internet — to the carnage in Iraq, the drone attacks in Pakistan and the treatment of detainees at Guantánamo. While the dozens of AlMaghrib students I interviewed condemned the tactics of militant groups, many share their basic grievances.

For an ultraconservative cleric like Qadhi, the picture is more complicated. Engaging in a detailed discussion of militant jihad — a complex subject informed by centuries of scholarship — risks drawing the scrutiny of law enforcement and, Qadhi fears, possible prosecution. If he were to acknowledge that Islamic law endorses the legitimacy of armed resistance against Western forces in Muslim territory, he could give a green light to the very students he claims he is trying to keep off the militant path. Yet by remaining silent, Qadhi says he is losing the credibility he needs to persuade them of his ultimate message: those fights are not theirs, as Westerners, to fight. “My hands are tied, and my tongue is silent,” he said.

Militant clerics abroad have filled the void, none more than Anwar al-Awlaki, the American preacher..... Awlaki has been linked to numerous plots against the United States, including the botched underwear bombing. He has taken to the Internet with stirring battle cries directed at young American Muslims. “Many of your scholars,” Awlaki warned last year, are “standing between you and your duty of jihad.”

For example there are young Muslim men who are acutely aware that US authorities and US imams supported the Afghan resistance against the Soviets and therefore consider it hypocritical for them to condemn armed resistance against US troops that are engaged in oppression.

One of Qadhi’s followers, a feisty 27-year-old New Yorker, compared his experience of watching bombs fall on Iraq to what other Americans might feel at seeing “California being ravaged day in and day out. How would you feel?” He said he understood why Qadhi could not speak expansively about the conflicts overseas. Even so, he asked, who has greater credibility: the cleric living comfortably in America or the militant “in the cave” who sacrificed everything for his beliefs? “One thing about Awlaki no one can deny,” he said, “this man is fearless.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/magazine/mag-20Salafis-t.html/

Morning VG - the nytimes article is behind a paywall so I can't read it unfortunately. Can you provide links to the other articles please.

The reason I found the research article (note not a piece of journalism) I linked to interesting is because it stepped beyond the rather unsophisticated one or the other editorial lines you often see. The first editorial line (often from right wing politicos) being that radicalisation is all about the religion, and specifically a violent tendency within islam. The other editorial line (often from muslim apologists) being that radicalisation has nothing to do with islam, but is all about politics and that the extremists are the least religious.

The research cuts through this and adds nuance - effectively it shows that both editorial positions are correct - but they apply to radicalisation in different places. So in muslim majority countries radicalisation appears to be associated with political struggle but also that those who are radicalised tend to be less religious in terms of practice and importance than moderates. The reverse is true in muslim minority countries where the key element to radicalisation is the religion itself and the radicalised tend to be more religious in terms of practice and importance than moderates, and (importantly) tend to show an increase in religious observance and importance in their lives that correlates with the radicalisation.

[Stranger]

And the mindless, thought-free repetition just goes on and on, and on and on, and on....

You put a lot of faith in your "logical impossibility" conclusion being derived from the presumption that the time related cause and effect events we perceive in material behaviour are applicable to all reality - even outside the realm of our material universe.

I've put the argument to you Alan, multiple times. It's not faith, it's just logic. Without time, nothing can do anything, including making choices, interacting, or exercising any control.

Once we have something that changes with time, we either have a deterministic system or we don't (hence randomness).

You have never once put forward anything remotely like a counterargument or pointed out anything at all that is a real contradiction with anything humans are capable of.

You need to open up your mind...

...to the bigger picture in which our ability to consciously control our thoughts words and actions can become a reality rather than an illusion.

Yet again for the hard-of-thinking: the role of consciousness and the extent to which it is in control is totally irrelevant.

If everything we do, think or say is derived from the conscious awareness emerging from material reactions, the only conclusion must be that conscious control is an illusion...

Drivel - and more dishonest misrepresentation. You are obviously terrified of actually thinking about the real argument. Why?

...but this forum contains ample evidence that such conscious control is a reality, not an illusion.

An idiotic claim.

You may claim to believe that it all happens in subconscious brain activity...

Yet again for the hard-of-thinking: the role of consciousness and the extent to which it is in control is totally irrelevant.

...but the act of belief itself is evidence of your own conscious control in being able to contemplate and drive your thought processes to reach that belief.

Another idiotic assertion.

Look, I offered a link to a free pdf book that could teach you the basics of how to present and address logical arguments, you've obviously ignored it, but here it is again, what can you lose by more understanding of logic?

Critical Thinking (pdf)

[bluehillside Retd.]

VG,

No I'm not. You are making the error of comparing 2 different categories.

No – the “categories” is just one category. “Improving” in this context just means “X produces more cured patients than Y”. It’s just counting.     

That's a very narrow definition of improved outcomes - whether a patient lives or dies - and is no way representative of the complexity of debate about what are improved patient outcomes. Medical ethics is a vast subject and your simplistic assertions do not compare like with like when it comes to comparing religious and non-religious ethics.

You’re missing it still. If the premise is “the most desired outcome is the greater number of cured patients” then all you have to do is you count them using each medical care model. Whether that should be the premise is another matter. Try to keep separate axioms from premises here.

Invalid comparison - you are comparing religious ethics with basic measurable outcomes such as whether patients live or die. It's an invalid comparison.

No it isn’t. You seem to struggle here with the difference between measurable outcomes and non-measurable ones. I’ll show you:

Premise 1: the goal is to maximise patient cure rates. Solution – count them.

Premise 2: the goal is to maximise the times I act as God wants me to act. Solution – ?   

Invalid comparison for the reasons given above.

Which I’ve corrected. The comparison stands – again, try not to confuse axioms with premises.

No it doesn't fail. See above.

Yes it does fail – see above.

What reasoning is there in the non-religious argument "because I want to"?

That’s not the argument. You’re trying to go nuclear again – faith claims and reason/evidence-based claims are not epistemically the same, no matter how much you may wish it so.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

You’re trying to go nuclear again – faith claims and reason/evidence-based claims are not epistemically the same, not matter how much you may wish it so.

I thought it was Sam Harris that was trying to go nuclear through his suggested pre emptive nuclear strike on Islamist regimes.

[Alan Burns]

Yet again for the hard-of-thinking: the role of consciousness and the extent to which it is in control is totally irrelevant.

Your conscious awareness is your window into the only reality you know - how can you claim it to be irrelevant?
Your conscious awareness is not only a window, it is the means by which you attempt to make sense of what you perceive.
Everything you know, everything you do, everything you say, everything you think - it all occurs in the ever present state of your conscious awareness.
I am told there is no "present" - but the present is where I exist, where I act, where I perceive, where I think.
To try to explain all this in terms of the unavoidable consequences of material reactions totally fails to come to terms with the reality of what we are and what we do, think or say.
I have no explanation for how the human soul works or how it interacts with our material bodies - I just know that it does more than can ever be conceived from the unavoidable consequences of material reactions alone.

[bluehillside Retd.]

VG,

Given that many religious people's arguments are a lot more sophisticated than "it's my faith" you've created a straw man.

No they’re not, so no it isn’t. All religions rely on “faith” to justify their claims – that’s what makes them religions rather than, say, philosophy or science. When theists do attempt reasons to justify their faith claims (which seems an odd idea to me, but there it is) at heart they always fall back on faith. Even if you do have some “sophisticated arguments” but have to throw in faith claims to fill the gaps, that doesn’t mean you have sound reasoning at all – the whole effort collapses the moment you insert “miracle happens here” into the chain of reasoning.       

An assertion you have not been able to justify as you still have not defined what privileging faith means and how it's any different to the non-religious justification "because I want to, because it feels good to me"

It’s an argument in logic: if two parties justify their respective actions with “but that’s my faith” why should either accept the other when they say “you’re wrong about that”?

“Because I want to” is a straw man I’ve corrected several times already.   
 

It doesn't make it much better for Harris to assert the moderate religionists are doing bad things with good intentions without any supporting evidence that they their actions are bad.

That’s called “whataboutery” (the fallacy of tu quoque), and it’s not true in any case. SH and others often reference things like blowing up ‘planes for their examples.   

The initial premise that moderate religionists' actions are bad is also unsupportable - it's just based on a subjective belief of what Sam Harris and like-minded atheists consider to be good or bad based on their personal preferences.

You’re still not getting it. Try to focus here: the argument is that, when nice person A thinks that faith is a more reliable guide to truth than just guessing, he disarms himself from criticising nasty person B who uses the same rationale for his actions. The “personal preferences” line is wrong for the reasons I keep explaining to you.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

Again one islamic regime has nukes. So your fevered conditions are met. According to you and Harris they want those virgins. When then in your paranoid mind do you think we should start the preemptive strike? For me, I think the islamic regime in question would be one of the last  to launch them our way.

Again: why do you think someone persuaded to fly full passenger ‘planes into crowded office blocks would hesitate to use nuclear weapons if he had access to them?

Now let’s say that you had impeccable intelligence that one such person (or regime) did have nuclear weapons. What would you do about it?

[Alan Burns]

Look, I offered a link to a free pdf book that could teach you the basics of how to present and address logical arguments, you've obviously ignored it, but here it is again, what can you lose by more understanding of logic?
Critical Thinking (pdf)

To perform any act of critical thinking, you need a means to consciously control and manipulate your thought processes in order to reach validated conclusions.  Such a means does not exist in the time related deterministic scenario where every moment is entirely determined by an unavoidable reaction to previous moments, and consciousness itself is just an emergent reaction to the endless chains of past cause and effect over which it has no control.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

Please don't link me with that bloke. I see myself as one of Harris' Religious moderates ''pushing everybody into the abyss''.
I have no truck with nuclear overkill just in case an islamic regime has nuclear weapons. He obviously forgot about the one that already has them.

Harris probably thinks that religion is what makes people do bad things. He obviously doesn't then include himself in that number. Where as I believe ALL have fallen short.

Harris is intellectually light years ahead of you. You should be flattered to be “linked” with him.

Secondly he thinks it justified to start a nuclear strike against Islamist regimes that gain nuclear weapons. That makes his views extreme.

Does he? Where does he say that?

[ProfessorDavey]

I see myself as one of Harris' Religious moderates ...

So who defines whether someone is a 'moderate' or an 'extremist'.

So Vlad you seem to want to self-define yourself as a moderate, although other people may well find some of your rants here pretty extreme, particularly your bizarre and negative impression of a tiny number of atheist that you tend to then project onto atheists in general, including those who post here.

So if you should be allowed to self-define as a moderate then, in the interests of consistency, so should Harris. So your views that he is an extremist would be moot if he considers himself to be moderate.

But in a broader sense we do need to think more about what elements define moderate and extreme, and surely this needs to be within a societal context. So is an extremist someones who's view lie at the extremes of the spectrum of views in broader society in general. Or is it someone who's views lie at the extremes of the spectrum of views within their 'tribe'. This is very important within a religious context, as there are many aspects considered mainsteam in (some) religions (e.g. clear discrimination on the grounds of sex, opposition to equalities for people on the basis of sexuality, opposition to freedom of choice on contraception/abortion) that are clearly at the extremes of the spectrum of views in for example UK society. So does that mean that a rank and file catholic who supports the orthodox teaching of the RCC on these matters is extremist (which would surely be the conclusion on the basis of broader society) or moderate, as their views may be fairly mainstream within their 'tribe' of the RCC.

[Stranger]

Your conscious awareness is your window into the only reality you know - how can you claim it to be irrelevant?

Seriously, are you really as dimwitted as your posts suggest or are you just not paying attention? It's irrelevant to the argument against your nonsensical, self-contradictory version of freedom.

It simply doesn't matter to the logic what role your conscious mind plays. You keep on trying to make this about "conscious control" as if that has anything to do with it - it simply doesn't. Is that really too hard a concept for you to grasp?

...the ever present state of your conscious awareness.
I am told there is no "present" - but the present is where I exist, where I act, where I perceive, where I think.

Mindless gibberish. I do not exist in "an ever present state", my thoughts develop over time.

To try to explain all this in terms of the unavoidable consequences of material reactions...

More dishonest misrepresentation.

...totally fails to come to terms with the reality of what we are and what we do, think or say.
I have no explanation for how the human soul works or how it interacts with our material bodies - I just know that it does more than can ever be conceived from the unavoidable consequences of material reactions alone.

Baseless assertions.

To perform any act of critical thinking, you need a means to consciously control and manipulate your thought processes in order to reach validated conclusions.

 

Such a means does not exist in the time related deterministic scenario where every moment is entirely determined by an unavoidable reaction to previous moments, and consciousness itself is just an emergent reaction to the endless chains of past cause and effect over which it has no control.

Logic-free, repetitive foot-stamping. 

Why are you so afraid of logic and learning anything? Why do you endlessly just repeat the same script that has failed and been pulled apart countless times before?

For goodness sake, it's like trying to have a conversation with a small child that just endlessly repeats what they want: "I want ice cream! I want ice cream! I want ice cream!".

[Alan Burns]

It simply doesn't matter to the logic what role your conscious mind plays. You keep on trying to make this about "conscious control" as if that has anything to do with it - it simply doesn't. Is that really too hard a concept for you to grasp?

Without conscious control, there can be no concept of logic.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Vlad,

Harris is intellectually light years ahead of you. You should be flattered to be “linked” with him.

Does he? Where does he say that?

He may be intellectually light years ahead of me but his morals stink, he is also pro gun and you and him share many of the same views. If we ran his record on race and intelligence on here do you think you would support him on that too?

[Stranger]

Without conscious control, there can be no concept of logic.

Irrelevant non sequitur.   

"Conscious control" is all but meaningless anyway and, as I've said many times (and you keep ignoring it), it simply doesn't matter what role our consciousness plays to the argument against your version of freedom. What's more, it's totally obvious that our conscious mind does not control everything about our reasoning. You cannot consciously decide what comes into your conscious mind next, that would be impossible.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

So who defines whether someone is a 'moderate' or an 'extremist'.

So Vlad you seem to want to self-define yourself as a moderate, although other people may well find some of your rants here pretty extreme, particularly your bizarre and negative impression of a tiny number of atheist that you tend to then project onto atheists in general, including those who post here.

So if you should be allowed to self-define as a moderate then, in the interests of consistency, so should Harris. So your views that he is an extremist would be moot if he considers himself to be moderate.

But in a broader sense we do need to think more about what elements define moderate and extreme, and surely this needs to be within a societal context. So is an extremist someones who's view lie at the extremes of the spectrum of views in broader society in general. Or is it someone who's views lie at the extremes of the spectrum of views within their 'tribe'. This is very important within a religious context, as there are many aspects considered mainsteam in (some) religions (e.g. clear discrimination on the grounds of sex, opposition to equalities for people on the basis of sexuality, opposition to freedom of choice on contraception/abortion) that are clearly at the extremes of the spectrum of views in for example UK society. So does that mean that a rank and file catholic who supports the orthodox teaching of the RCC on these matters is extremist (which would surely be the conclusion on the basis of broader society) or moderate, as their views may be fairly mainstream within their 'tribe' of the RCC.

You may be happy with a man who would make a preemptive strike on a nuclear islamist regime (just because of his impression) being called a moderate but I wouldn't. I don't think he is comfortable with moderation, that isn't his kind of world and he sounds as if he would be prepared to sacrifice lives to instigate a ''reasonable'' world.
 

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Vlad,

Harris is intellectually light years ahead of you. You should be flattered to be “linked” with him.

Gaslighting again, Hillside.

[Sebastian Toe]

I have no explanation for how the human soul works or how it interacts with our material bodies -

In that case, come back when you do have an explanation and maybe you will be able to pursued people that you might have a point. Until then........

[Alan Burns]

Irrelevant non sequitur.   

"Conscious control" is all but meaningless anyway and, as I've said many times (and you keep ignoring it), it simply doesn't matter what role our consciousness plays to the argument against your version of freedom. What's more, it's totally obvious that our conscious mind does not control everything about our reasoning. You cannot consciously decide what comes into your conscious mind next, that would be impossible.

Without the ability to consciously control and manipulate your thought processes, you could never reach any meaningful conclusions about the logic you keep quoting.

The irony is that the logic you quote is flawed because it denies you the ability to consciously manipulate and drive the thought processes needed to reach your conclusion.

[Stranger]

...the ability to consciously control and manipulate your thought processes...

"I want ice cream!" Why do you just keep on repeating the same inane nonsense phrase and ignore the reasons I've given as to why it really doesn't mean anything?

The irony is that the logic you quote is flawed because it denies you the ability to consciously manipulate and drive the thought processes needed to reach your conclusion.

"I want ice cream! I want ice cream!"

To the extent that "the ability to consciously manipulate and drive the thought processes" means anything at all (a very limited extent), the argument does not deny it.

I do wish you'd stop being so dishonest and repetitive. I mean, seriously, what's the point? Are you trying to give the impression that your faith has reduced you to a mindless robot, incapable of engaging with a rational argument, or even, so it seems, able to read and understand the answers you're getting?

[ProfessorDavey]

You may be happy with a man who would make a preemptive strike on a nuclear islamist regime (just because of his impression) being called a moderate but I wouldn't.

I think you've been asked to provide evidence for this claim, but haven't yet. I will reserve judgment until you do so as you have 'form' on making claims about Harris' views that you have been unable to evidence.

So we will wait for your evidence to back up your claim, but I would agree that supporting pre-emptive nuclear strikes is not a moderate opinion.

However I would also think that the following are also extreme opinions:

1. Opposing abortion under any circumstances
2. Opposing people's rights to use artificial contraception
3. Refusing to allow people of one sex to hold positions of leadership within an organisation.
4. Opposing the rights of some people to have sexual relationships and to marry on the basis of their sexuality

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Morning VG - the nytimes article is behind a paywall so I can't read it unfortunately. Can you provide links to the other articles please.

PD - the bits I quoted (in italics in my previous response) was mainly from your research article. Other stuff I have read addresses some of the points your article came up with.

There is a book called The Future of Islam, https://dl.tufts.edu/pdfviewer/s4655s47w/ng451t38s which examines Islam being associated with political violence. It raises the point that a lot of the Muslim countries experiences the brutality of 2 centuries of European colonial rule followed by independence, artificially created boundaries by the former colonial rulers to form nation states, followed by at least 40 or 50 years of authoritarian rule by monarchs or military leaders.

So this created a culture of authoritarianism, which would have an impact on the development of social and political perspectives, and it is in this context that political Islam has developed. European rule was not considered benign and the West has had a very violent history in the twentieth century, so the book makes the point that there is a secular bias and a blindness to the violence of European conflicts when looking at the violence of political Islam .   

A continuing problem is that when talking about religion, many people ignore the transcendent and transforming aspects of religion and see religion as an agent that necessarily retards change and development and is more prone to violence. Both this secular bias and a tendency to uncritically equate Islam with violence and as incompatible with the modern world have distorted our vision of the realities of the twentieth century.

If we look at mega-violence in the twentieth century, most of it has been done in the name of secular nationalism: the great wars were fought in the name of or defense of various forms of nationalism. Zbigniew Brzezinski, in Out of Control Global Turmoil on the Eve of the 21st Century has said that the twentieth century was the most violent in history in terms of death, destruction, and blood-shed. We need to take a look at what Brzezinski terms the "megadeaths" of the twentieth century, the 167 million people slaughtered as a result of the meta myths of Hitler, Stalin, and Mao; the wars fought in the name of nation states.

We need to remember that most of the mega violence occurred at the initiative of the West, not the Muslim world. Yet we're continuing to function within a context in which our gut reaction in terms of the future of Islam will be to think of Islam as prone to violence and necessarily incompatible with democracy, modernity, pluralism, and liberalism.

Yet, although they are very much a part of our society, Muslims are often not treated with the same parity as Jews and Christians. The impetus for the Terrorism Act was the Oklahoma City bombing of the FBI building. Muslims weren't involved in this massive terrorist act. Yet when our government reacted with legislation to the threat of terrorism, whom did they hit disproportionately? Arabs and Muslims. The Secret Evidence Act also excessively impacted Arabs and Muslims. Dr. Mazen AJ-Najjar, an academic from Tampa, Florida was recently freed after three and a half years in prison. Do you know why he was in prison? Nobody knew why he was in prison! His lawyers couldn't seethe evidence. And neither could he!

The reason I found the research article (note not a piece of journalism) I linked to interesting is because it stepped beyond the rather unsophisticated one or the other editorial lines you often see. The first editorial line (often from right wing politicos) being that radicalisation is all about the religion, and specifically a violent tendency within islam. The other editorial line (often from muslim apologists) being that radicalisation has nothing to do with islam, but is all about politics and that the extremists are the least religious.

The research cuts through this and adds nuance - effectively it shows that both editorial positions are correct - but they apply to radicalisation in different places. So in muslim majority countries radicalisation appears to be associated with political struggle but also that those who are radicalised tend to be less religious in terms of practice and importance than moderates. The reverse is true in muslim minority countries where the key element to radicalisation is the religion itself and the radicalised tend to be more religious in terms of practice and importance than moderates, and (importantly) tend to show an increase in religious observance and importance in their lives that correlates with the radicalisation.

Yes it showed that the socio-political context plays a decisive role in explaining the relationship between the Islamic faith and justification of terrorism. It also shows that people who are drawn to violent action might convert to or be drawn to a violent strand of radical Islam preached by certain clerics because that satisfies their inclinations to violence. From your article:

The rise in Islamic political violence hence seems to be fueled by the activism of Islamist groups whose ideology has a unique capacity to attract and mobilize radicalized people.54 Islamist groups are able to frame the demands of radicalized individuals, building a coherent and appealing meaning for the causes of their deprivation.55

The Roman Catholics came out well in your article. The results indicate that, compared to a Roman Catholic, a Muslim is 1.8 times more likely to justify terrorism, a nonreligious respondent is 1.5 times more likely to justify terrorism, and and Orthodox is 1.3 times more likely to justify terrorism.

Overall, we hence find that in 2008 Muslims tended to justify terrorism more than other religious groups, even though they shared this attitude with nonreligious people.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

VG,

No – the “categories” is just one category. “Improving” in this context just means “X produces more cured patients than Y”. It’s just counting.

Nope. You can't compare a situation where you are counting outcomes to a situation where you deriving ethics. The categories are different.

You’re missing it still. If the premise is “the most desired outcome is the greater number of cured patients” then all you have to do is you count them using each medical care model. Whether that should be the premise is another matter. Try to keep separate axioms from premises here.

Nope - you're still missing it. You keep comparing decisions made where there are objective measurable outcomes to decisions made about ethics where there are non-measurable outcomes.

No it isn’t. You seem to struggle here with the difference between measurable outcomes and non-measurable ones. I’ll show you:

Premise 1: the goal is to maximise patient cure rates. Solution – count them.

Premise 2: the goal is to maximise the times I act as God wants me to act. Solution – ?

Invalid comparison. If you wanted a valid comparison you would have to compare like with like e.g. how would a religious person maximise the times they act as God wants them to act vs how would a non-religious person maximise the times they are good.

Which I’ve corrected. The comparison stands – again, try not to confuse axioms with premises.

And I corrected your attempt at correcting me on that basis the comparison is invalid.

Yes it does fail – see above.

No it doesn't fail - see above.

That’s not the argument. You’re trying to go nuclear again – faith claims and reason/evidence-based claims are not epistemically the same, no matter how much you may wish it so.

Nope - not trying to go nuclear. No one here seems to be arguing that claims about what is moral or good is the same as arguments where you can count outcomes. 

[ProfessorDavey]

PD - the bits I quoted (in italics in my previous response) was mainly from your research article. Other stuff I have read addresses some of the points your article came up with.

There is a book called The Future of Islam, https://dl.tufts.edu/pdfviewer/s4655s47w/ng451t38s which examines Islam being associated with political violence. It raises the point that a lot of the Muslim countries experiences the brutality of 2 centuries of European colonial rule followed by independence, artificially created boundaries by the former colonial rulers to form nation states, followed by at least 40 or 50 years of authoritarian rule by monarchs or military leaders.

So this created a culture of authoritarianism, which would have an impact on the development of social and political perspectives, and it is in this context that political Islam has developed. European rule was not considered benign and the West has had a very violent history in the twentieth century, so the book makes the point that there is a secular bias and a blindness to the violence of European conflicts when looking at the violence of political Islam .   

A continuing problem is that when talking about religion, many people ignore the transcendent and transforming aspects of religion and see religion as an agent that necessarily retards change and development and is more prone to violence. Both this secular bias and a tendency to uncritically equate Islam with violence and as incompatible with the modern world have distorted our vision of the realities of the twentieth century.

If we look at mega-violence in the twentieth century, most of it has been done in the name of secular nationalism: the great wars were fought in the name of or defense of various forms of nationalism. Zbigniew Brzezinski, in Out of Control Global Turmoil on the Eve of the 21st Century has said that the twentieth century was the most violent in history in terms of death, destruction, and blood-shed. We need to take a look at what Brzezinski terms the "megadeaths" of the twentieth century, the 167 million people slaughtered as a result of the meta myths of Hitler, Stalin, and Mao; the wars fought in the name of nation states.

We need to remember that most of the mega violence occurred at the initiative of the West, not the Muslim world. Yet we're continuing to function within a context in which our gut reaction in terms of the future of Islam will be to think of Islam as prone to violence and necessarily incompatible with democracy, modernity, pluralism, and liberalism.

Yet, although they are very much a part of our society, Muslims are often not treated with the same parity as Jews and Christians. The impetus for the Terrorism Act was the Oklahoma City bombing of the FBI building. Muslims weren't involved in this massive terrorist act. Yet when our government reacted with legislation to the threat of terrorism, whom did they hit disproportionately? Arabs and Muslims. The Secret Evidence Act also excessively impacted Arabs and Muslims. Dr. Mazen AJ-Najjar, an academic from Tampa, Florida was recently freed after three and a half years in prison. Do you know why he was in prison? Nobody knew why he was in prison! His lawyers couldn't seethe evidence. And neither could he!
Yes it showed that the socio-political context plays a decisive role in explaining the relationship between the Islamic faith and justification of terrorism. It also shows that people who are drawn to violent action might convert to or be drawn to a violent strand of radical Islam preached by certain clerics because that satisfies their inclinations to violence. From your article:

The rise in Islamic political violence hence seems to be fueled by the activism of Islamist groups whose ideology has a unique capacity to attract and mobilize radicalized people.54 Islamist groups are able to frame the demands of radicalized individuals, building a coherent and appealing meaning for the causes of their deprivation.55

The Roman Catholics came out well in your article. The results indicate that, compared to a Roman Catholic, a Muslim is 1.8 times more likely to justify terrorism, a nonreligious respondent is 1.5 times more likely to justify terrorism, and and Orthodox is 1.3 times more likely to justify terrorism.

Overall, we hence find that in 2008 Muslims tended to justify terrorism more than other religious groups, even though they shared this attitude with nonreligious people.

Thanks - it was a long article and I'd not read it all, so apologies for not picking that some of your quotes were from it.

I think my main interest in the research was the differences in radicalisation dynamics between countries where islam is the predominant religion and those where it is a minority faith. And I guess too, that my main interest was in countries such as the UK and the notion of 'home grown terrorists' as I guess this feels very much closer to home, and indeed quite a number of the terrorist murders that have happened over the past 16 years have been very much 'on my patch'.

The research suggests that the political motivation for these radicalised people is much less important than the religious aspects - with the 'typical' profile being a person who is more religiously active than moderate muslims, considers religion to be more important than moderate muslims and probably has shown a very great increase in their interest and practice of islam alongside radicalisation. So perhaps a young man or woman who hadn't been much interested in the religion, even though likely brought up in a muslim family (or certainly a religious one) and who suddenly becomes very religious.

This does seem to fit with a lot of the anecdote, and where communities perhaps missed something. How often have we heard that so and so used to go out partying all the time but then started going to the mosque more and more. That should have set alarm bells ringing but I think too often this was seen as 'good' rather than 'odd'. To me a young person suddenly turning away from what young people tend to do (having fun) and towards something that young people often rebel from (being religious) isn't very normal behaviour for ... well ... young people.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

VG,

No they’re not, so no it isn’t. All religions rely on “faith” to justify their claims – that’s what makes them religions rather than, say, philosophy or science.

Yes it is. Your perception of religion is very simplistic therefore hard to take seriously.

When theists do attempt reasons to justify their faith claims (which seems an odd idea to me, but there it is) at heart they always fall back on faith. Even if you do have some “sophisticated arguments” but have to throw in faith claims to fill the gaps, that doesn’t mean you have sound reasoning at all – the whole effort collapses the moment you insert “miracle happens here” into the chain of reasoning.

Nope - you're making an unevidenced generalisation. When many religious people mention their faith they adopt arguments that are no different to philosophical beliefs about right and wrong.       

It’s an argument in logic: if two parties justify their respective actions with “but that’s my faith” why should either accept the other when they say “you’re wrong about that”?

“Because I want to” is a straw man I’ve corrected several times already.

No it isn't a straw man and no you haven't corrected it. If 2 parties justify their respective actions with "but I think it's the right thing to do" why should either accept the other when they say "you're wrong about that"?   
 

That’s called “whataboutery” (the fallacy of tu quoque), and it’s not true in any case. SH and others often reference things like blowing up ‘planes for their examples.

It's not the fallacy of tu quoque. I was referring to your claim that SH was arguing that people sometimes do bad things with good intentions and this does not make them bad people.

You’re still not getting it. Try to focus here: the argument is that, when nice person A thinks that faith is a more reliable guide to truth than just guessing, he disarms himself from criticising nasty person B who uses the same rationale for his actions. The “personal preferences” line is wrong for the reasons I keep explaining to you.

I can keep explaining to you where your arguments are going wrong despite you still not getting it - try to focus. You need to compare like with like. You have to compare arguments by religious people who rely on their faith with arguments by non-religious people who rely on their guesses of what is good or bad.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Thanks - it was a long article and I'd not read it all, so apologies for not picking that some of your quotes were from it.

I think my main interest in the research was the differences in radicalisation dynamics between countries where islam is the predominant religion and those where it is a minority faith. And I guess too, that my main interest was in countries such as the UK and the notion of 'home grown terrorists' as I guess this feels very much closer to home, and indeed quote a number of the terrorist murders that have happened are very much 'on my patch'.

The research suggests that the political motivation for these radicalised people is much less important than the religious aspects - with the 'typical' profile being a person who is more religiously active than moderate muslims, considers religion to be more important than moderate muslims and probably has shown a very great increase in their interest and practice of islam alongside radicalisation. So perhaps a young man or woman who hadn't been much interested in the religion, even though likely brought up in a muslim family (or certainly a religious one) and who suddenly becomes very religious.

This does seem to fit with a lot of the anecdote, and where communities perhaps missed something. How often have we heard that so and so used to go out partying all the time but then started going to the mosque more and more. That should have set alarm bells ringing but I think too often this was seen as 'good' rather than 'odd'. To me a young person suddenly turning away from what young people tend to do and towards something that young people often rebel from (being religious) isn't very normal behaviour for ... well ... young people.

The idea of becoming more religious needs to be picked apart though. I was under the impression that the research showed that there are so many different interpretations of religion. Certainly Gallup polls have shown that Muslims in different regions have different definitions of Jihad, with those who are in the Middle East defining it in militaristic terms rather whereas those outside the MIddle East define it as a personal moral struggle.

So rather than "religion" in general, it's a particular interpretation of religion that appeals to a violent individual as it is framed in a way that appeals to their violence but is also packaged up in a religious interpretation where people dress a certain way, and go to a place where these radical violent ideas are expressed e.g. it could be a particular mosque or it could be a website, and gives them a sense of direction, a sense of belonging, a sense of identity that they were lacking before possibly because of the socio-political context of their circumstances e.g being part of a minority group that feels under attack.

I watched a documentary on former KKK members and a lot of the reasons why they went down that path seems to echo stuff I have read about why violent Muslim extremists go down the route of violence https://www.pbs.org/independentlens/blog/reformed-racists-white-supremacists-life-after-hate/