No special case for tolerating religion

[rug]

Why tolerate religion? Prof Alex Miller examines this question, through the views of Prof Brian Leiter.

Fri, 16 Aug 2013

A young Sikh boy goes to school wearing a ceremonial dagger - the kirpan - and thereby causes the school teacher to alert the police, who arrive and confiscate the dagger.

In his book Why Tolerate Religion? (Princeton University Press 2012), Prof Brian Leiter points out that in most Western democracies, the Sikh boy would stand a good chance of getting the kirpan back and of being allowed to wear it to school.

In fact, Prof Leiter cites a case from Canada in which this actually happened.

This contrasts with a boy from a purely secular background where there is a tradition of receiving and wearing a dagger when coming of age: he would not be allowed to wear the dagger to school.

http://www.odt.co.nz/opinion/opinion/268916/no-special-case-tolerating-religion

FYI, the University of Otago is on the South Island of New Zealand. The book mentioned, Why Tolerate Religion? is excellent, imo. It goes into the nonreligious bases for religious exemption, or privilege if you will, along with their philosophical and legal underpinnings.

[unblock]

1. he's right. it's tradition (religious or otherwise) that should be respected and balanced against

other considerations, such as public safety.

the wearing of a head covering might violate a school dress code, but it is easy to accommodate, so the tradition should win there.
the carrying of a potentially harmful weapon in school should not be accommodated, whether the tradition is religious or secular.

[rug]

4. It's really fascinating to see how these competing principles play out publicly.

[napoleon_in_rags]

2. Because its not religions that have caused all those wars.

Its someone's intolerance of someone else's religion that has started all those wars. A war against someone for their religion is a war against someone for their religion, regardless of the religion (or lack thereof) of the attacker.

Secondly, I saw a post here not too long ago which correlated religiosity with low IQ. I saw another post which said it was genetically determined. Both would be interpreted as anti-religious by most religious people, but I just looked at them and said "okay, assuming that, now what?" If the former is true, conflicting with religious people is a futile attempt to raise some one's IQ by arguing with them, a method with no scientific backing for its efficacy. (try going into a special ed class sometime and arguing up the IQs of the developmentally disabled people there if you think I'm wrong). If the latter is true, then its a kind of racism, to war with people who's genetic disposition makes their minds different than yours.

[rug]

3. There was a good review of that study today.

http://www.religionnews.com/2013/08/16/are-atheists-smarter-than-believers-not-exactly/

[napoleon_in_rags]

5. That's a good read.

“This kind of study points to a very clear issue for believing Christians,” he said. “We do not draw support for our faith from scientific reports. Anyone whose faith is shaken by the claim that research proves that higher intelligence leads to lower levels of religious belief has a misplaced faith.

Faith. It is the proof of things unseen. Hebrews (11:1) It won't be affected by arguments or observations.

But how can that be in a rational person? Well, can you give a rational account of why you're attracted to your favorite celebrity? Can I give you a rational argument that will change your attraction? Or how about if you're gay, living in an oppressive country? Can you give a rational account of your attraction to same sex when it would be so much wiser (in the circumstances) to be straight? No. Things like that are at a level deeper than what can be effected by arguments or observations.

Faith exists at that same level. You either are, or you aren't.

The paragraph quoted gives you an inside view of experiencing that, and maybe the outside view is to say certain people are "wired" for certain things, like being gay, having faith, whatever. But there it is. It makes the most sense to me to accept the stuff we cannot change in people, and move on.