Meet Massimo Pigliucci

This is from a few weeks ago, but he wrote about it now being 30 years in the US for him.

A few thoughts I pull from that, having long followed him, and been stimulated by discussions philosophical and beyond on various websites and locations of his.

I've always thought of myself as a bit Europeanish, and his take on generalizations in temperament confirm that, in that I too have a sort of (muddled) optimism for the short term, but more worries about the longer term. I told him on Twitter that, per Yenta the Matchmaker's "oy we muddle," that Judaism (in Europe! I don't know about America) reflects similar ideas, or so it seems.

Many fellow Americans halfway confound me in this way, in fact. So does the attitude of "joining" as described first by de Tocqueville, even as Americans at the same time exulted about, and worked to further develop, "rugged individualism."

Back to other thoughts about Pigliucci.

One main point is his "seeking."

Raised Catholic, but apparently not too much more than a "C and E Catholic" (think about the top two religious days), he eventually moved to secular humanism. But, he wanted something "structured," so after moving more into philosophy, became what I'll call a Neo-Stoic. It's "neo" in the sense that surely for Massimo, and I think that for most devotees, it's been denatured of things like the Logos as a literal metaphysical entity.

I will confess that, 30 years ago, within Christianity, I had an eye for Stoicism. Today, things like behavioral psychology have shown me that human nature is far more irrational than Stoicism would have us believe. Quantum mechanics has shown the same about the universe lacking anything close to a quasi-logical structure, too. We've talked about this. I'm not the only one with a different take than him. But the talks have always been friendly.

It's also interesting to find that he was looking at Buddhism, too. I've noted strongly and repeatedly in these pages that Buddhism is, indeed, a religion. To make it not one takes a lot more denaturing than does Stoicism, and it's then arguable that what you have isn't Buddhism anymore. To be honest, Massimo, that one surprised me to the point of being semi-stunned.

Now, something that would call itself (neo) Stoicism could "denature" itself as much as what some people call (wrongly) Buddhism, by tossing out not only an actual Logos, but the idea of an ordered universe in general and a semi-rational humanity in particular. That said, I would no more call that Stoicism, even with a "neo," than I would call what Robert Wright, Stephen Batchelor and BuJews peddle Buddhism. You're really more in the vicinity of a personal psychology adapted from cognitive behavioral therapy or rational emotive therapy. Why not just call it such? (I could accept RET as a psychologically based "structure," but CBT comes off as ... too Stoic-like, especially without an "E"!)

Massimo did note back, via Twitter, that others than Wright (and Batchelor) for that matter, have made denaturing Buddhism a project. True. But, I think he may recall that I've carefully used adjectives, for sayings like "Buddhistic" or "Buddicizing" humanism or whatever. I haven't been fully accurate on parallels elsewhere, but Christian humanists don't claim to be peddling a truly non-religious philosophy of life, either. So, in that sense, I haven't been INaccurate on language either.

Finally, one small side note: A fair amount of people who believe in elements of pseudoscience aren't necessarily religious, or at least not driven primarily by religious considerations. Antivaxxerism comes immediately to mind.

In any case, the amateur semi-philosopher has appreciated the stimulations the professional has provided both inside and outside the realm of philosophy.

RIP Ed Brayton

I've long since stopped following "movement" skepticism or most "organized" atheism, especially anything that tilts Gnu-ish. I knew Brayton had been in somewhat declining health for some time, indeed, even from when he split off from the Freethought Blogs he co-founded with P.Z. Myers.

And now I see he died the early part of August, three days after his last blog post. Unfortunately, his dying reportedly was not as pain-free as he had hoped.

My take? He'll be missed to a degree, but not as much a degree as many paeans would have you believe.

I wrote about problems at FtB when Ed was still large and in charge. But, he had his good points, and he wasn't fully a Gnu, and he called out Islamophobia in people like Dawkins and Harris, which is why some weren't fans of him at all.

That said, contra some full-on Gnus who disliked him, his battles against things like Islamophobia were battles for social justice.

The big thing I have against Ed, per the link above, is from my main blog, and that's Ed getting into bed with PZ in the first place. And, the loonies he let stay there far too long. And the hypocrisy a year before that. (Per the first link in the graf, he and PZ were both cheap asses to the late Leo Lincourt in not paying his surely reasonable price to make FtB better as a website.)

I also, per this piece, had disagreement with Ed on something related to the Seth Rich conspiracy theory. Can't remember what it was, but I think it was twosiderism, in that he believed not only Trump wanted Putin's help, but Putin gave it. Nope. It was probably related to his thinking being confined to within the duopoly parties, and being a Dem tribalist there, as he showed in discussing American exceptionalism.

Probably what I'll miss most about him is what most of us miss about ourselves later in life: The could have beens. That would mainly be, in Ed's case, a FtB that never had PZ involved in the first place. Can't say you weren't warned, Ed, from this small corner of the blogosphere; as I noted, from the start, you were turning over too many of the keys to PZ. Had that been the case, Greg Laden and Stephanie Zwan might not have been part of FtB, as well, and the problems never would have reached that point. In other words, a secular humanist version of Panda's Thumb or something.

Patheos wound up kind of fulfilling that, but not really. The Patheos "nonreligious" vertical doesn't have some of the broader secular humanism and civil liberties focus Ed did himself, and that he surely originally intended for FtB. Nor does it have a personal "face."

I've said before that being an atheist is no guarantor of either moral or intellectual superiority. Ed was above average on both, but again, nothing was guaranteed.

The NYT and sheltered big media coverage of religion

On my primary blog, I recently discussed a New York Times story about President Donald Trump's continued support among the religious right, especially in rural heartland areas.

Here, I'm going to shift that focus more to the New York Times' coverage of religious issues, to the degree they're exemplified by this.

"Christianity will have power"? Yes, it's a nice phrase, but ... was one line in one speech in Iowa enough to elevate the speech into Donald Trump's version of a Cornerstone Speech vis-a-vis his relationship to the Religious Right? And, if so, why?

The New York Times would have you think so. But, I don't see it making the case, and its "marketing" efforts don't sell me any more than the story itself.

First, two of those marketing Tweets and my responses:

Understanding religion requires reading @elizabethjdias, one of the best religion reporters in the business. She spent months on this piece explaining Donald Trump's support among white evangelical Christians and it shows. https://t.co/7VJissul9R

— Marc Lacey (@marclacey) August 9, 2020

Uhh, no. I don't "need" anyone.

Actually, no, I don't need Elizabeth Dias at all for "understanding religion." I'm an atheist with a graduate divinity degree from a seminary far more rigorous than Religious Right bible colleges, the type of person the Religious Right hates.

— Nagasaki 75: Remember the FULL STORY 🚩🌻 (@AFCC_Esq) August 9, 2020

There you are, Mr. NYT National Editor Marc Lacey.

Then this:

If you have found yourself baffled by white evangelical support for Trump, this extraordinary piece by @elizabethjdias is for you. This is journalism as translation, requiring literacy in multiple cultures.https://t.co/vxL3VmfNoM

— Jia Lynn Yang (@jialynnyang) August 9, 2020

Sorry, but no translator needed, Ms. Deputy National Editor Yang.

Here you are:

Nope, not baffled. But?! Elizabeth Dias left stuff on the table, like not delving into the "martyr" mentality held by much of the Religious Right. (It's not quite as deep as Jehovah's Witnesses martyr mentality, but it's deep enough.) https://t.co/qrQLFPYHkq

— Nagasaki 75: Remember the FULL STORY 🚩🌻 (@AFCC_Esq) August 9, 2020

Just what did Dias leave off the table?

First, why Trump instead of Ted Cruz? That speech was in January 2016, before the Iowa caucus vote. On paper, Dominionist Ted Cruz and his Seven Mountains daddy were the ideal candidates for the Religious Right to back. So, why didn't they? (Pew notes that, in polling, the most devout among the evangelicals DID tilt Cruz, even though, overall, the Religious Right tilted Trump. Obvious deduction? Lots of these people may be sincere in their belief claims but don't go to church that often!)

If you're going to have someone with a graduate religious degree from Princeton work on this story for, I presume, several weeks, and you can't answer that? The story comes off as election-year pandering, in my book. True, you would still want the focus on Trump, but if you can't explain why him, not Cruz, then you can't fully explain "why still him" today, can you?

That said, assuming some of the lower-star ratings of a book that Dias edited are true, maybe that Princeton degree is not worth that much. A decade ago, I came across a friend of a good online friend who was in the graduate program at Harvard Divinity and who insisted that Plato's Euthyphro dilemma didn't apply to Christianity, so this isn't a "sour grapes" issue, it's a real observation. And, no, religious right idiots, claiming that good is good based on god's nature does NOT avoid the dilemma.

Second is Dias claiming that this is all new:

The Trump era has revealed the complete fusion of evangelical Christianity and conservative politics, even as white evangelical Christianity continues to decline as a share of the national population.

In reality, with data research sites like Pew having written about this for three or four years straight now, the "Rise of the Nones" (which is a broader issue than just the decline of conservative evangelical Xianity, and blogged about me three years ago, as well as last year) is yesterday's news. Indeed, the piece of mine three years ago noted that, by this year, per Pew estimates, "nones" would equal Catholics in the American population.

The problem is not just that the NYT is behind the curve on Nones. It's that a lot of people who might fall into "Nones" territory may not know this if they get much of their religious news from the Times, or from outfits following its lead. This ties to how politicians think their constituents are, overall, even more conservative than is true.  

As for the "complete fusion" issue? Forty years ago, the Religious Right backed for president a man who had expanded abortion access while governor of California, who never went to church and who consulted astrologers. (Ronnie turned Nancy on to that, not the other way around.)

Whether Dias personally believes this or not, I don't know. But, this is a common trope from the MSM, and from much of national Democratic leadership, and not just about religion. Trump is indeed an outlier on the vulgarity of expression of his stances. He may be a minor to moderate outlier on the degree of severity of some of his stances. But, no, nearly complete fusion within today's Republican Party on a lot of issues was around long before Trump.

Now, onto my original Twitter thread, with this blogpost being added to the end of it after being finished.

First:

Cliff Notes "Christianity will have power"
1. White #ReligiousRight Xns used to be able to bully America as Trump bullied tenants
2. SCOTUS has #FirstAmendment rulings
2A. America changed
3. So, Rel Right became #snowflakes
4. Trump came as bully-saviorhttps://t.co/HG0FV7gHeL

— Nagasaki 75: Remember the FULL STORY 🚩🌻 (@AFCC_Esq) August 9, 2020

See, that "bully" part is important. Per "The Rise of the Nones" issues, the Religious Right has been losing power for some time. Rather than sidle up to Hillary Clinton and her conservative DC prayer circle warrior background with The Fellowship, though, because she was pro-choice, and ignoring that Trump long had been so, they backed Trump.

This, too, was not really covered.  Nor were related issues. Looking from January 2016 to the fall general election, Dias appeared to ask none of the interviewees if they knew what Clinton's beliefs were, or even cared, which would itself be an issue. (That said, Clinton's lack of focus on Iowa allowed these folks to not even ask themselves what her beliefs and values might be.)

She does note that just 11 percent of people in Sioux Center caucused for him. But, she doesn't discuss why Trump instead of Clinton — or the option of not voting — was the choice in Novemer.

The bullying? Bullying and shaming people into expression of religious belief in small town America, even in blue states (Galloway vs Town of Greece) was and still is a real thing. Remember, most members of the Religious Right hate atheists even more than gays, and may hate non-Christians, especially Mooslims, almost as much.

The desire for bullying is far from new.

All one has to do is go back 1,800 years and read Tertullian's description of Christians in heaven rejoicing over the torments of the damned in hell. Maybe Princeton graduate divinity school grad Dias didn't want to look too much under that hood.

Anyway, again, when a lot of the most urban parts of blue America, or beyond, like Green or Socialist-red America, get a lot of religious news from sources like this, they get a skewed image.

They also get other skewed images. Even I did.

Did you know that Sioux Center isn't THAT small? More than 7,000 people and growing quite nicely since 2000, per City-Data. Did you know that, including the college students who claim residency there, it's still better-off than the Iowa average? Did you know it's less than an hour from Sioux City, Iowa, population 80,000 and metro area 180,000, and a flat hour from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, population 185,000 and metro 265K?

In other words, Sioux Center isn't the Idaho Panhandle or something.

Coronavirus, philosophy, the noble lie, and the real problem with Dr. Fauci (and his defenders)

The noble lie, of course, begins with Plato in The Republic. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy's entry on The Republic has more depth.

Its most destructive recent version has been in Straussian economics, and more broadly, Straussian neoconservativism.

That said, its latest proponent was Dr. Anthony Fauci. Only, unlike Plato or Straus, his noble lie was not deployed in the service of political leadership. It was more noble yet, but like all noble lies, both a lie and a lie whose attempt at nobility eventually backfired.

You don't have to go to wingnut websites to find that Fauci did, in the early days of coronavirus, say that masks don't work. Snopes, which in its attempt to go beyond skepticism to political fact-checking, has largely put its oar in the waters of the Democratic half of America's two duopoly parties, calls his claim "outdated." And, this is nothing but high-grade hypocrisy from Snopes.

There's three real options. Either he said it (as he did) and it's "true"; he didn't say it, and it's "false"; or it can't be determined and it's "unknown." NOT "outdated."

And, we know he said it.

Sadly, Snopes isn't the only defender of Fauci. (And, these defenders often have their own political tribalisms; BlueMAGA is as tribalist as MAGA). Snopes certainly does, and that's why, when it went beyond true/not true factchecking at the start of the Trump era, I delisted it. As for more on what those defenders are getting wrong, even in the science world, see this update at bottom.

Meanwhile, there's worse. Only four weeks ago, Business Insider reported that Fauci STILL STOOD BY telling the "noble lie."

Here's what he said:

"I don't regret anything I said then because in the context of the time in which I said it, it was correct. We were told in our task force meetings that we have a serious problem with the lack of PPEs and masks for the health providers who are putting themselves in harm's way every day to take care of sick people," Fauci told O'Donnell.

NO, NO, NO.

This is just like Plato, or Straus ... or do I go Godwin's Law?

Doubling down on the original noble lie with a lie about it.

You tell the truth.

Like, maybe, saying something like this:

Dear America: We don't know how serious the novel coronavirus will be, but information from many places in the world shows this is indeed more serious than the flu. Unfortunately, we have a shortage of surgical masks at this time. Our national leaders are doing everything they can to address this. So, at this time, in weeks ahead, we are asking you to take an abundance of caution when venturing outdoors.

But Fauci's refusal to admit he was wrong makes the noble lie that "noble." When one doubles down on a lie like that, then it's really the "noble lie."

In addition? China was recommending masks even for people with low infection risk at the time Fauci said, "nahh."

Update, Aug. 23: There's also the fact that Zeynep Tufekci, on Twitter, was calling out Fauci et al AT THE TIME he made his original statements, per this NYT piece. Extracts from it are worth reading:

Public health officials seem to have had an ulterior motive when they told citizens that masks were useless: They were trying to stave off a run on protective gear that could have made it unavailable for the health care workers who needed it. Ms. Tufekci’s faith in human nature has led her to believe that the government should have trusted citizens enough to level with them, rather than jeopardize its credibility with recommendations it would later overturn. 

“They didn’t trust us to tell the truth on masks,” she said. “We think of society as this Hobbesian thing, as opposed to the reality where most people are very friendly, most people are prone to solidarity.”

There you go. As I note below, and did so in sending a link to this blog post in response to her Tweet, it's possible, even likely, that coronavirus denialists and conspiracy theorists would have found other things to fuel their bubble views. But, more fuel for the fire is never good. (And, in that sense, I'm less optimistic than she was in her original column for the NYT calling out Fauci et al.) And, a sidebar to her: Good luck at The Atlantic. If you really believe in Zapatista Solidarity, aren't you at the wrong spot?

And, saying that Fauci wasn't the only one saying "nahh"? Pointing to Surgeon General Jerome Adams and others? "Just following the herd" isn't THAT different at times from "just following orders."

In addition, a herd telling a noble lie makes it worse by amplification, which then can open the doors to fallacious appeals to authority. (As far as I know, Fauci, Adams and others have never had serious training in medical ethics, or larger sociological ethics, therefore, as opposed to actual medical science issues, an appeal to them on "no masks" would be fallacious.)

As for the damage?

It's quite likely coronavirus denialists and conspiracy theorists would have found other things to fuel their bubble views. But, more fuel for the fire is never good. And, Greg Ip says encouraging early mask wearing might have helped nuance lockdowns and other strategies more selectively, early in the "game." That said, per that WSJ link, we need to be careful about thinking that Sweden's numbers showed that herd immunity worked. Rather, Swedes may may have heard enough in the news about how bad things were in their country and started masking up, started having businesses require masks, etc. And, Ip's info from JP Morgan claiming Sweden's economy suffered less than its Nordic neighbors? Business Insider says that's simply untrue.

Sadly, this untruth is even percolating among people who should know better. "Orac" of his own nom de plume and now part of the gang at Science Based Medicine, made this claim, or at least left himself open to interpretation as making that claim, Nov. 16.

Anthony Fauci, Deborah Birx, and others tried to emphasize responses to the pandemic based on the best public health science. …Messaging on masks early in the pandemic was borderline disastrous, such as when the main message being promoted was that people probably shouldn’t wear masks routinely unless they were sick. … Unlike Fauci, however, Trump refused to change his mind when evidence had by June become pretty definitive.

Sadder yet, this is a 2020 installation of what Orac has done at least one year in the past — a blog post about scientists trying to communicate science messaging to the general public within the American political world.

And, sadder, sadder yet, Orac ignores the February message out of China.

We'd all at least had a shot of being better off, and certainly couldn't have been worse off, both on getting a clear masking message early on AND a clear seriousness message early on, if Fauci had just said: "Masks help prevent the spread of coronavirus. We aren't sure how much they help, but we know they help. Right now, they're most needed by our medical personnel, but any substitute for them is better than nothing," we'd all be well off. After all, Gizmodo ran its DIY masks piece April 6, and notes it was just a week after the CDC issued a masks call.

And, Tufecki's Tweet? MARCH FIRST.

=

Update: Fauci has since this time admitted engaging in a SECOND noble lie, this one over the percentage of Americans who need either vaccination or previous contraction of the disease to provide "herd immunity."

Let's also not forget that, even as other medical experts, and emerging sociological experts like Tufekci, said otherwise, Fauci in March 2020 also DID utter "just the flu" statements.

Was Fauci better than Trump? Yes. My left butt cheek is better than Trump. But, #BlueAnon / #BlueMAGA tribalism, including that of Snopes, can't hide the facts.

Update 2, June 1, 2021: Fauci's now been busted, under emails obtained by BuzzFeed in an FOIA request, of having spread his original Noble Lie about masks privately already in late February of 2020. Sadly, BuzzFeed engaged in its own tribalism by which emails it chose to focus on for its story, promoting Fauci hagiography rather than his lies about masks — or his hints that, just maybe, the virus DID come from a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

If Fauci had any integrity, as well as political responsibility, he'd at least resign as Biden's special medical advisor at a minimum. At a maximum, he'd also step down from NSAID as well. And, BuzzFeed, if it had any sense of journalistic ethics, would do a second story. Somehow, I don't think either one would happen.

Update 3, July 1, 2021: Jared Yates Sexton, reflecting on the death of Donald Rumsfeld, reminds us of the deadliness of the Platonic Noble Lie.

The GIF and Hume, Sapir, Whorf, and Goodman

It's a piece from late 2017, but still quite interesting.

Some people hear GIFs.

Yes, those looped bit videos that have no sound.

Some people hear them, normally in cases where sounds would be expected in real life, such as a GIF of hands clapping, one of police lights (with inferred sirens), and such.

Are such things being heard?

Yes, indeed, an audiologist professor told the Times' journalist.

Two cognitive neuroscientists said it is similar to the "filling in" of some types of optical illusion. They added that people with synesthesia are more likely to do this.

That said, why the author, Heather Murphy, stopped with scientists, I don't know, but it presented a punches-pulled story.

Obviously, this has connections to empirical philosophy of centuries past, and per the cognitive neuroscientists, connections to cognitive philosophy today, namely the issue of qualia, and within that, how specific qualia may be in the auditory world. (Murphy does loop in Christof Koch, but, academically, despite his gushing about pantheism, he's a scientist, not a philosopher.)

Of course, hearing exists inside our heads.

"If a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound?" It makes sound waves, but it doesn't make a sound until it's heard. (That said, there are plenty of foxes, bears, deer and squirrels to hear it.)

This is partially what the whole idea of empiricism is about. But, David Hume, and his predecessors, didn't really wrestle with the issue behind sensory experience. (Of course, 300 years ago, they weren't really able to wrestle with how the brain works!)

It focuses itself in modern philosophy with the discussion of qualia. As a sidebar, and not to go too Sapir-Whorf, but per Nelson Goodman's new problem of induction, there's the issue of how we experience a sound based on not only our genetics, as in the synesthesia, but also based on our individual developmental histories. (The Inverted Spectrum idea, a thought experiment often discussed in thinking about qualia, more directly connects to Goodman.) To riff on Sapir-Whorf, an Inuit may hear 20 different sounds from snow at different temperatures, different thicknesses and different degrees of compaction and you or I might here three. But, a recording microphone will show the same sonic signatures for the Inuit's 20 sounds and my three.

And, this leads me to wonder aloud on other things.

Other than feeling vibrations from clapping, especially, let us say, large group clapping at a concert, political rally, etc., do deaf people have the equivalent of "hearing" clapping? If so, how would they respond to these GIFs?