Reasonism Versus Areasonism

I’m watching Beyond Belief: Enlightenment 2.0, and after Sam Harris’s talk there was a comment from the audience (at 48:20) that perhaps a good replacement for atheist would be reasonist, because the prefix a- is usually applied by those who are in the position of power within a given paradigm, to identify those who reject that paradigm. So we should turn the tables and call theists areasonists.

The comment somewhat misunderstands the etymology of atheist, which is not actually a derivation of theist, but in fact comes to us more or less intact from the ancient Greek atheos. Anyway that’s quibbling over a minor detail and is beside the point.

I love the idea. It’s really just a reworking of rationalism versus irrationalism, but the a- prefix has the added benefit of drawing a connection to atheism, with the hope (at least for me) that the point would not be lost on the recipient of the areasonist label.

Presidential Illegitimacy

The US has never had a legitimately-elected president, because legitimacy has only been possible in the last nine elections, and none of those presidents has received majority support from among the voting-age population (VAP). And as I’ve said before, the percentage of registered voters (RV) is not a valid indicator of support, because not voting is the same as voting “none of the above” (NOTA).

The first possible legitimate presidential election was 1972 (which Nixon “won” with 33.51% VAP), because the 26th amendment guaranteed the right of 18-year-olds to vote in 1971. If you’re old enough to fight and die for your country, then you’re old enough to have a say in how it is governed, and anyone who disagrees with that had better have a powerful argument.

If you reject the above (let me get some popcorn before you begin that argument), then the first possible legitimate presidential election must have been 1924 (which Coolidge “won”; % VAP unknown, but at 54.04% RV it couldn’t have been a majority), because it was the first where women from every state were able to participate fully (the 19th amendment, which guaranteed the right of women to vote, was ratified in time for the 1920 general election, but not the primaries, thus that election was not fully legitimate).

If you reject the above (I’ll get more popcorn), then the first possible legitimate presidential election must have been 1872 (which Grant “won”; % VAP unknown, but at 55.58% RV, again, it couldn’t have been a majority), because it was the first where (male) blacks were (technically) guaranteed the right to vote, by the 15th amendment (ratified 1870). I say “technically” because they were still disenfranchised through all manner of intimidation, especially in the south.

If you reject all the above, then you’re probably a racist, misogynist… monarchist… or something.

Incidentally, here are the VAP percentages for all nine post-26th-amendment presidential elections:

1972 - Nixon   - 33.51%
1976 - Carter  - 26.81%
1980 - Reagan  - 26.67%
1984 - Reagan  - 31.21%
1988 - Bush I  - 26.77%
1992 - Clinton - 23.76%
1996 - Clinton - 24.12%
2000 - Bush II - 24.11%
2004 - Bush II - 28.49%

So there you have it, the closest we’ve had to a legitimate presidency is Nixon’s second term, to which he was elected by barely 1/3 of the electorate. I’ll leave it to the reader to decide which part of that sentence is more depressing.

More fun with numbers:

Interest in the upcoming election appears high, so participation will presumably be relatively high as well. But according to the source I’m using, the highest VAP turnout on record was 63.1% in 1960, when Kennedy beat Nixon by less than 113,000 votes (the source doesn’t have turnout records before then). That election was at least as hot as this one. Also, the highest winning RV percentage since 1824 (when the popular vote data begins), was 61.05% RV in 1964 (Johnson).

Assuming a generous (but unlikely) two-thirds VAP registration and turnout (using the 2004 VAP count, since I don’t have the current figure), and assuming the winner of the upcoming election takes two-thirds of the RV (also unlikely), then he would boast the support of over 44% of the electorate — better than Nixon, and probably the best ever, but still illegitimate.

Is Homosexuality Natural, or Supernatural?

Religious people usually claim that homosexuality is a choice. If this is true, then how does one account for the Bonobo chimpanzee? These close relatives of ours use sex as a social lubricant (no pun intended), with both sexes engaging in frequent homosexual activity. Is this a lifestyle choice? Do they have “free will,” or is their behavior natural?

If it is natural in the Bonobo, then there is good reason to believe that it is natural in humans (not to mention the other species that exhibit the behavior). This would refute the “choice” hypothesis. It would also mean that God, as the creator of all things, must have created homosexuals and intended them to be that way.

If it is unnatural, then it must be the opposite of natural, since a behavior cannot be both natural and unnatural. The opposite of natural is supernatural. This, too, would mean that God created homosexuals and intended them to be that way.

Which position would the religious prefer to deny? Unless they wish to present some other hypothesis, they must decide if homosexuality is natural or supernatural. The only solution to this riddle, as I see it, is to grant free will to those other species, which raises a whole new set of questions that will need answering.

On Self Defense

If rights exist only by virtue of their recognition by others, then presumably only those liberties which concern others would require that a right to enjoy them be granted.

For example: a right to privacy. Since I can hardly prevent the rest of my community from barging into my home all at once and rummaging through my personal effects, then my right to privacy can only come from a mutual agreement that we will not do that to one another. Moreover, in the absence of a community of potential snoops, I do not need a right to privacy — it becomes meaningless.

But what about a right to life? What does that phrase mean? (Note that I am not talking about the abortion issue here.) Presumably a right to life carries with it a right to self defense. To say that I have a right to life, but not to self defense, implies that there exists some other means of guaranteeing the first if I am assaulted while no third party is around. Without round-the-clock protection, there can be no such guarantee; and besides, who would protect my protectors? It is not enough simply to extrapolate that thought, and suggest that we are all each other’s protectors; clearly, the risk of being attacked exists, even in a large community (especially there!). So unless we engage a protection force capable of watching over each one of us at all times, and we grant them the right to self defense (since we are compelled to fold our arms in the face of danger), then we must ultimately rely on ourselves for protection.

But do I even need such a right? Does the terminology of rights even apply? Whom does it concern, besides myself and my attacker? Presumably he will not agree to my right to defend myself against him, so we will have reached a stalemate. If anything, my attacker would need a right to attack me (since murder has a negative impact on society); presumably that right would never be granted.

No, I submit that it is of no concern to the rest of society whether I defend myself or not. It’s not as though I can choose to “go around defending myself,” so as to become a menace to society; the choice is foisted upon me, and it is mine to make. I need no “right” to self defense. I must prove that my attacker presented an imminent threat to my life, but I need not justify or even explain my response to that threat.

If there is no need for a right to self defense, then is a right to life still necessary? Yes: since the individual cannot adequately defend itself against the collective, then a mutual agreement is in order, as with the right to privacy. Unfortunately, this does result in a “fox guarding the henhouse” scenario, which is how capital punishment (and privacy violations) can be tolerated in an otherwise civilized society. But, that is another post for another time.

If You Run Them, We Will Vote

A lack of participation in the democratic process is an implicit “No” vote for all the available choices. If there were any choices that the non-participants felt they could support, they would participate.

Looking at the 2004 U.S. presidential election, 56.2% of the voting age population participated. Never mind the percentage of “registered voters,” that is a stupid figure which only proves the point: if the choices elicited enthusiasm, an overwhelming majority of the VAP would not only register, but would actually show up and vote. Bush received 50.73% of that 56.2%, Kerry received 48.27% of it.

In other words: 71.49% of the VAP effectively voted “No” for Bush; 72.87% did the same for Kerry.

These turnout figures are typical. At best, about one third of the electorate makes the decisions in American politics. Any lower and I would be tempted to throw around pejoratives like “oligarchy.” But it would be an oligarchy by consent (if that makes any sense), which somehow makes it sound even worse. Turnouts for state and local elections run from slightly better to much worse.

What should this tell us? That something is fundamentally wrong. It’s not that “the system” is flawed; that is just a convenient scapegoat for people who lose elections. It’s not that the people aren’t politically educated; they don’t need to be educated (although ideally they would be), they just need to be motivated.

There is a lot of hype for Obama this time around, but I am not convinced that it is genuine. I don’t foresee an overwhelming turnout. I hope that I am wrong. Regardless of who wins, a 100% turnout should be the goal, more so than victory for any particular candidate. If the victor cannot induce a majority of the VAP to vote for him, then he did not “win” anything. It is possible to win and still be a loser.

Give people something to vote for, and they will vote. If they are not voting, then the choices suck. It is just that simple.

(Figures taken from Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections.)

Does the Planet Belong to Us, or Do We Belong to the Planet?

“One does not sell the earth upon which the people walk.”
–attributed to Thasuka Witko, A.K.A. “Crazy Horse“

John Locke, who was a theist, believed that since God created humans, we are his property. I do not believe in God, but I do still find value in much of Locke’s philosophy. Just because he begins from a theistic starting point doesn’t mean I have to dismiss everything he said, so long as I limit myself to those parts that do not depend on God, or I replace God with some other causal agent that fits reasonably well: evolution, for example. Of course, when I do that, I may be forced to tweak the philosophy a bit in order to make sense of it without God…

According to Locke, the creator owns his creation, which for humans means that we own that which we create or make useful by our labor. However, unlike God, we are bound by the restriction of sufficiency: it would be unjust to accumulate so much property that we deprive others of the ability to fulfill their needs. If I hoard all the berries, I’ve not only taken more than I can eat before they spoil, but I’ve taken that which I could have left for you. When it comes to land, this philosophy dictates that I am only justified in owning that which I am capable of working and turning to utility. (Presumably our right to own land at all comes from the belief that God has gifted the planet to us.)

But what happens when we replace God with evolution as our “creator”? It should be obvious: the relationship between humans and the planet gets flipped, and we become the “property,” or, more appropriately, the children, of “Mother Earth.” The natural process of evolution arose from the conditions of the planet, so its offspring is the planet’s offspring. If the planet is our creator, then how can we own pieces of it? The created cannot own the creator. The very concept of land ownership requires a supernatural creator, because the supernatural cannot be ensnared by this neat little trap.

In short: supernatural origins allow for land ownership; natural origins preclude it.

It was not long ago that I would have bristled at a post like this, yet here I am writing it. My position then was that I should not be allowed to use land unfairly — for example, to buy up all the land surrounding an important resource and prevent you from gaining access to it — but the concept of land ownership was perfectly acceptable to me (although I’ve never owned any). Yet, once again, reason has forced me to reconsider my position in order to remain consistent.

This poses a potential problem for me, regarding my position on “One World” government, since it becomes difficult to justify our borders if we cannot justify our claims to the land. But that reality doesn’t erase the one I described in the other post, and that one represents a more serious and immediate concern, in my judgment. The issue of political empowerment, and the fear of losing it under a global authority, is very real, whereas this topic is largely philosophical (although it does have real-world repercussions).

At any rate, it would seem that if Locke was right about ownership, then Crazy Horse was right about the land.

Science Is Faith-Based

As a person to whom supernatural faith is anathema, and for whom science is both a comfort and a shield against faith-based dogma, I am not happy to admit that the title of this post is in fact true. But in order to remain consistent with my own proselytizing of reason and logic, I am forced to do so. Here’s why:

Science is based on our observation of the Universe; observation relies on the senses. The veracity of the senses cannot be tested without invoking the senses (a logical fallacy); thus, even empirical data is inherently suspect.

Suppose I see a UFO flying overhead: how can I confirm that it is real? I observed it with my eyes, but how can I be sure that they are trustworthy? I can ask someone else if they see the UFO, and they can agree that it is real, but that doesn’t prove anything because the trustworthiness of their eyes has not been confirmed. My eyes cannot be invoked to corroborate theirs, because the trustworthiness of mine remains in question. We can get a third person to corroborate the second, and so on, but we will eventually run out of people, having proven nothing about the reality of the UFO.

Thus, acceptance of empirical data, and the science that depends on it, requires a leap of faith that what is observed is real — not just according to the senses, but irrespective of them — which cannot be proven conclusively.

The Parental Paradox

It is a precept of American governance that parents shall be afforded the right to raise their children according to their own values. It is also a precept of American governance that society as a whole has a vested interest in preventing parents from raising their children in a manner contrary to the consensus view of what is proper. These two precepts can be contradictory.

In practice, the consensus view takes precedence, at least in cases where the violation of consensus is considered extreme. In those cases, parents whose values do not conform to the consensus view often find their right to raise their children according to their own values infringed. In order to reclaim that right, they must conform to the consensus view, in which case they become, in effect, unpaid surrogate parents of society’s children.

Indeed, all parents who conform to the consensus view, willingly or not, are providing a free service to society by raising society’s children in accordance with society’s values. Most parents are only too happy to raise the children they’ve produced, but should society be taking free advantage of that eagerness? Should parents be paid a stipend for the service they provide? If so, then it would follow that they should be licensed and monitored to ensure that they continue to conform to consensus opinion on child rearing, or else forfeit their stipend and their parenting privileges.

This is not a personally-held belief for me, it just popped into my head suddenly. My inclination is to find it extreme and even repugnant, but it’s not exactly trivial to get around, logically, so I may be forced to accept the idea. I’ll have to think on it some more….

Atheists: Please Stop Talking About Morality In Absolutist Terms

There are no universal morals or ethics. It sickens me when atheists speak as though there were. It is a total cop-out. I understand that it can be difficult to discuss societal ideals without the context of right and wrong, but if you want to live in reality you simply must learn to do so. Morality is a human construct; it shifts like the winds. This need not be a problem unless you are a dogmatic, doctrinal demagogue. Whatever the percentage of theists who fit that description, the percentage of atheists is at least as high.

As for you theists, do not think that you have just picked up some free points. The basis for your system of morality is even shakier. Just because you have an ancient book that spells it out for you doesn’t make it any more real. At least (some) atheists take the time to explain the evolutionary utility of a system of right and wrong. You simply invoke God, as you do for everything else. So hush.

Back to the atheists: stop it. No, seriously, fucking stop doing it, please. It is exceedingly embarrassing to those of us who understand that the concept of morality was invented out of whole cloth and, moreover, who feel no need to invoke morality to explain why we hold various political positions. When you show theists that you need morals as much as they do, you make yourselves look like abject fools and, sadly, this is projected onto the rest of us, by those even bigger fools who believe that atheism is a cohesive “worldview.”

If you think it is inconsistent for me to ask you to view morality as I do, even as I deny such a cohesion, imagine how inconsistent you appear as you count off the planks of secular naturalism on nine fingers, then poke into the ether with the tenth, pretending to point to “morality.”

The Silver Rule

The so-called “Golden Rule” is something that most theists and non-theists seem to agree is a Good Thing, but I hope that people will not invoke that “rule” in their dealings with me.

Simply put, the Golden Rule says:

Treat others in the same manner that you would like to be treated.

Since I do not know how you would like to be treated, I do not know if I would like to be treated in the same manner. So the Golden Rule makes me a bit leery.

The Silver Rule, on the other hand, carries no such risk. It says:

Do not treat others in any manner that you would not like to be treated.

If you would rather that something not be done to you, it is reasonable to presume that I would not want it done to me; and even if I would, no direct harm is done by you not giving me what I want.

There is also the “Platinum Rule,” which says that we should treat others however they want to be treated; this sounds nice, but it is unreasonable, I think, because it would allow others to make arbitrary and selfish demands on us. Even if they agreed to reciprocate in kind, there is no guarantee that they would be capable of doing so, whereas everyone is able to meet the demands of the Silver Rule.