The Paris Attack Debate Thread

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Stripping citizenship is definitely problematic.

That caught my eye as well.  What is the advantage for the government to do that?  Also legally what would happen to these now stateless people? 

(Just general questions, not directed at Yi specifically.)

probably only for people with double nationality (another farce that should be gotten rid of).

[grumbler]

On the theology I would put PW's point a little differently.

Most monotheistic believers would agree that a single omnipotent Creator god exists.  The nature of such a belief excludes the possibility of other gods, whether dozens, thousands, or millions.  Again, the believers would all accept that, regardless of their sect.  The differences among the sects amount to differences on how to characterize the single omnipotent creator god.   Those differences are significant theologically as between themselves but are not significant in terms of their collective difference as against those who do not believe in a single omnipotent creator god.  As to the latter, the believers are in fundamental agreement with each other and in disagreement with those who reject the concept.  A successful argument against them would require directly taking on the belief in the single omnipotent creator god concept.

I am not sure that this is worth debating, but I disagree with your idea that the religions that believe in a single omnipotent creator god would agree that the god that commanded their prophet/savior/whatever is the same as the god that commanded the other guys'.  For instance, I don't think that Jews believe that their god told Mohammed, for example, that Hews believe that Ezra is the son of God.  Clearly Mohammad says that his god did.  Can the same god say two contradictory things?

Ditto for Christians accepting that the god of Mohammed is their god.  If they truly believed this, they would be Muslims, not Christians.

Now, the Sikhs and Hindus would agree with you that the names men call the creator-god/ultimate reality doesn't matter, and that all sacred texts are fallible and useful for allegorical purposes only.  That's why I excluded them from my argument. 

One does not need to distinguish between the differences between the creator-god-religions and non-CG religions and those between CG religions, as a matter of logic.  All one needs to note is that, if Jews or Christians really believe that their god told Mohammed what he claims, then they are disobeying their god by not following his dictates passed through Mohammed.

I think all of them agree with me about the creator-gods of, say, Mithraism or Zoroastrianism, though.

[Berkut]

On the theology I would put PW's point a little differently.

Most monotheistic believers would agree that a single omnipotent Creator god exists.  The nature of such a belief excludes the possibility of other gods, whether dozens, thousands, or millions.  Again, the believers would all accept that, regardless of their sect.  The differences among the sects amount to differences on how to characterize the single omnipotent creator god.   Those differences are significant theologically as between themselves but are not significant in terms of their collective difference as against those who do not believe in a single omnipotent creator god.

I do not agree with that in the least - the differences between the beliefs of various groups who claim to believe in a "single omnipotent Creator god" is immense, insofar as they make claims about the characteristics of that god and how those characteristics map to demands on the deities followers.

I don't even accept that there is anything "special" about this *particular* characteristic that you have singled out - that the set of gods in question share the attribute that belief in them is a belief in a singular deity. As a non-believer, I don't think that particular belief is of any more moment than any other particular common attribute shared by some set of posited deities.

All posited "gods" have some set of attributes that define what the believer actually believes in - the set of those characteristics and attributes defines the being they claim exists. If person A believes in a deity that has an attribute X, and person B believes in a deity that has an attribute ~X, then they clearly are NOT believing in the same deity, not matter what they call it.

[Tamas]

Stripping citizenship is definitely problematic.

Definitely not. Slovakia has made a law a few years ago that any Slovakian who takes up the granted Hungarian citizenship (on ethnic grounds) in Hungary, automatically loses his/her Slovakian citizenship. And this is for people who are only residents in Slovakia and nowhere else.

Did the EU care? No.

[Valmy]

Sure there is. Of course it would be a long tedious theological response that would be as pointless as your entire point but there does exist such a response.

How... persuasive.

I am not even sure how to respond to this. Was I attempting to persuade you of anything? Why would that be worth my time?

One does not need to distinguish between the differences between the creator-god-religions and non-CG religions and those between CG religions, as a matter of logic.  All one needs to note is that, if Jews or Christians really believe that their god told Mohammed what he claims, then they are disobeying their god by not following his dictates passed through Mohammed.

I think all of them agree with me about the creator-gods of, say, Mithraism or Zoroastrianism, though.

Oh this garbage again. Joy.

All posited "gods" have some set of attributes that define what the believer actually believes in - the set of those characteristics and attributes defines the being they claim exists. If person A believes in a deity that has an attribute X, and person B believes in a deity that has an attribute ~X, then they clearly are NOT believing in the same deity, not matter what they call it.

Well many Christians claim God has different attributes. So therefore Christians do not believe in the same deity I suppose?

[Admiral Yi]

Definitely not. Slovakia has made a law a few years ago that any Slovakian who takes up the granted Hungarian citizenship (on ethnic grounds) in Hungary, automatically loses his/her Slovakian citizenship. And this is for people who are only residents in Slovakia and nowhere else.

Did the EU care? No.

It wasn't clear to me from the article that the law would only apply to people with dual citizenship.

[Berkut]

Well many Christians claim God has different attributes. So therefore Christians do not believe in the same deity I suppose?

No, of they don't.

If Christian A believes in a god that says the Pope is his representative on Earth, and Christian B believes in a god that thinks the pope is sent from Satan, then no, they most certainly do NOT believe in the same god.

They both believe in different gods that share a lot of attributes. But it is certainly NOT the same god. How could it be, when they have exclusionary attributes?

The fact that they both call their god the same thing, or both belong to religions that for purely semantic reasons we find convenient to label as "Christian" doesn't mean anything from a logical standpoint.

Hell, I am not sure, from my own experience with Christians, that there are even TWO Christian who believe in the same god!

[lustindarkness]

I have not had time to keep up with this thread. Has anyone proposed nuking from orbit yet?

[The Minsky Moment]

B&G: factually I think you are eliding over the very substantial similarities between the God worshipped by Jews/Christians/Muslims (for example Muslims unequivocally believe it is the same God) but it isn't essential to the point.

The point is that the mere fact that believers in a monotheistic God don't agree on the characteristics of that God is not itself an argument for the existence or non-existence of such a being, UNLESS one assumes that a necessary characteristic of such a God is that it would be irrational for it to permit such a state of confusion to exist in the first place. 

But that is not how I read grumbler's argument.   I read his argument as saying that since there is widespread disagreement about the specific characteristics of God, the "majority view" as to any specific posited God is that it doesn't exist.  Thus by operation of a series of hypothetical votes, each posited God would be voted down, therefore one should conclude there is no God.  One problem with this argument is that the results could change if e.g. there was a massive conversion to one particular sect - then there would be clear majority in support of a singular god-concept.  By how could such a mere change of contingent human opinion cause a God to spring into existence?

From my POV as an observer what Jews/Christians/Muslims/Zoroastrians/etc believe is irrelevant to the question of whether some singular God exists.  The arguments for or against that question are either sound or they are not.  If the arguments are sound, they don't become unsound if billions of people suddenly develop confused understandings.  If the arguments aren't sound, they don't become sound even if billions of people all decide to convert overnight to one sect.  Again, the exception being an argument that a rational omnipotent God wouldn't "hide the ball" but would make sure everyone got it right.

[crazy canuck]

Well many Christians claim God has different attributes. So therefore Christians do not believe in the same deity I suppose?

No, of they don't.

If Christian A believes in a god that says the Pope is his representative on Earth, and Christian B believes in a god that thinks the pope is sent from Satan, then no, they most certainly do NOT believe in the same god.

They both believe in different gods that share a lot of attributes. But it is certainly NOT the same god. How could it be, when they have exclusionary attributes?

The fact that they both call their god the same thing, or both belong to religions that for purely semantic reasons we find convenient to label as "Christian" doesn't mean anything from a logical standpoint.

Hell, I am not sure, from my own experience with Christians, that there are even TWO Christian who believe in the same god!

How very pre reformist of you.  "You don't worship the same way therefore you are not a Christian.  You shall be burned as the heretic you are!" 

[The Minsky Moment]

Also - take the B&G argument and apply it to a known existent person, say George Washington.

Some people think that George Washington chopped down the cherry tree.  Some people think he didn't. Does that mean they believe in two different people?  Should we question the existence of George Washington?

It could be objected that this is a trivial example, but it isn't difficult to think of historical personages about whom there are fundamental differences in interpretation - for example, Socrates, Caesar,  Augustine,  Napoleon - to the point of basic disagreement about the nature of the person and what he said, did, believed.

[Zanza]

Stripping citizenship is definitely problematic.

Definitely not. Slovakia has made a law a few years ago that any Slovakian who takes up the granted Hungarian citizenship (on ethnic grounds) in Hungary, automatically loses his/her Slovakian citizenship. And this is for people who are only residents in Slovakia and nowhere else.

Did the EU care? No.

The definition who is and who isn't a citizen is a national not EU matter and one that is closely guarded by national politicians. So even if the EU had cared there wouldn't have been anything it could do legally. Blaming the EU here makes no sense.

[Martinus]

Well many Christians claim God has different attributes. So therefore Christians do not believe in the same deity I suppose?

No, of they don't.

If Christian A believes in a god that says the Pope is his representative on Earth, and Christian B believes in a god that thinks the pope is sent from Satan, then no, they most certainly do NOT believe in the same god.

They both believe in different gods that share a lot of attributes. But it is certainly NOT the same god. How could it be, when they have exclusionary attributes?

The fact that they both call their god the same thing, or both belong to religions that for purely semantic reasons we find convenient to label as "Christian" doesn't mean anything from a logical standpoint.

Hell, I am not sure, from my own experience with Christians, that there are even TWO Christian who believe in the same god!

I think I disagree, Berkut.

[Martinus]

Sufism isn't really a sect, it's more a set of disciplines and approaches, although there are Sufi "orders".  Sufism crosses sectional divisions, for example the Ayatollah Khomeini studied Sufi texts and wrote Sufi poetry as a student.   It's true that Dash/Al-Qaeda/Salafi/Wahhabbi tendency is anti-Sufi and in its extreme manifestations resorts to violence and extirpation.

Sufism is basically a direct, intuitive, "mystical" approach to Islam. Though of course, many of the Wahabbi types would deny it is even Islamic. 

However, for our purposes, it isn't really material whether its adherents are classified as members of a separate "sect" or not (I'd say that in actual practice most are). The point is that it is dangerous to generalize about the religion as a whole - if you gathered some Muslims of a Sufi persuasion and some Muslims of the Wahabbi sort in one room, the delta of difference between 'em could be pretty wide.  I cannot imagine a Wahabbi writing this:

I have learned so much from God
That I can no longer call myself
a Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew.

-Hafez

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Hafez

To me, the biggest problem with religions is this: uneducated mystics taking personal for universal.

Only because the "God" (I am putting this in quotation marks because the word is meaningless outside of personal experience) is telling you not to eat pork or fuck guys it does not mean you should treat it as a universal law. There is nothing more blasphemous, to me, than assuming you know what the "God" wants for other people.

Sufis are cool.

[Berkut]

Also - take the B&G argument and apply it to a known existent person, say George Washington.

Some people think that George Washington chopped down the cherry tree.  Some people think he didn't. Does that mean they believe in two different people?  Should we question the existence of George Washington?

If one person says that GW did, and the other insists he did not, then they certainly both believe in different GW. Of course, one is wrong and the other is right - and there is no real way at this point to figure out which - but, it isn't really material in either case, as there is ample historical evidence the GW (absent characeristics relating to the chopping down of trees) existed. It's not like we have to solely go on this particular characteristic.

Now - if someone argued the GW existed, he did chop down that tree, and therefore we should all do X, Y, and Z because he chopped down that tree...then it becomes a bit more important.

If someone else argued that he exists, he did NOT chop down that tree, and there we should absolutely NOT do X, Y, and Z, then yeah - I might start caring about that.

You can certainly posit the existence of any god that does NOT have some characteristic, and it has the virtue of being more likely to exist, I suppose, since it would be one less thing for the various believers to disagree about. This is how we end up with the super weak gods that don't really do anything or have any attributes beyond "It makes me feel spiritual!" which are, if nothing else, logically defensible from the standpoint of not having problematic attributes, or making real demands.

It could be objected that this is a trivial example, but it isn't difficult to think of historical personages about whom there are fundamental differences in interpretation - for example, Socrates, Caesar,  Augustine,  Napoleon - to the point of basic disagreement about the nature of the person and what he said, did, believed.

And to the extent that this is the case, it is perfectly valid to point out that the "existence" of these objects is disputable insofar as their followers insist that not only did the person exist, but that they had some characteristic.

For example, if someone insists that there was a guy named Napoleon who was 4'9" tall, and we can conclusively show that he was certainly 5'5", then in fact it is perfectly reasonable to say that the person is wrong, and 4'9" Napoleon does not exist.

That is not, however, an argument that no person named Napoleon existed with some set of attributes that we can all agree on are in fact accurate (leader of France, general, etc., etc.).