Comments due by 11:59pm Tuesday, October 1.
This week we started considering fideism, looking at how it might be characterized and why one might be attracted to such a view on faith and reason issues.
Consider this article, and accompanying TED talk located just above the article, by Diane Benscoter. She discusses religious extremism and the brain. She relays her own experiences with a religious cult. She wonders how she got duped.
Relate what she has to say here to fideism. Do her story and corresponding reflections raise any worries for fideism?
Interact with each other and challenge each other. Get after the issues and learn from one another. As always, be gracious, charitable, and humble.
As appealing as fideism sounds to a person of faith, i can't beat a sneaking suspicion that it isn't perfect in it's entirety. It would be really easy for me to say that I would be betraying my faith if I took it to rational criticism, but is it merely a cop out answer? If we say that Clifford's principle doesn't apply at all to questions of religion, does that give any belief system free right to believe whatever they want regardless of how much sense it makes? I think there has to be somewhat of a balance to this reason and faith act. A faith based only on itself is blind and one based only on reason is dead or dry but where do these come together? I'm sure I probably won't figure it out for certain, someone smarter would have already found it and we wouldn't have to have this conversation. In my faith I have rational questions, quite serious ones that I cannot ignore but I know that they can't actually take away the object of my faith.
ReplyDeleteAs Diane Benscoter was talking in the TED, she shows a picture of the "moonies" and a picture of Hitlers followers. This is a good comparison to fideism because in fideism everything that is even a little different from your belief is completely wrong. As she said the moonies were a religious cult that went around and tried get every to have their religious belief and in some cases killed others that didn't follow the religious belief. This is much like Hitler did when he went around killing all of the Jews because they were not the race or religion that he wanted. I think with this religious extremist and fideism there is a huge problem because it forces one to have a closed mind. Dianne said it herself "My mind was closed, fixed, intolerant and impervious to change. I was an extremist." this creates a problem because you have people trying to force things among people and a lot of time it turns into violence or hatred which can drive the extremist away from their family and friends and become even more of an extremist. Overall I think that fideism is not a good way to look at your religious views because it is much like being a religious extremist and this it not good because a lot of times it turns into a violent practice.
ReplyDeleteElliott Westerbeck
The TED talk was quite interesting. I was always curious how people got manipulated so easy to become part of a cult or other extremist groups throughout the world. The pictures of the groups make you realize that people are back behind whatever they believe fully. It is kind of scary when you think that this kind of thing could happen to you even though you think it never will. This correlates with fideism quite well. This is because the extremist do things without reasons, backing, or proof or disprove that this is the correct thing to just like what fideism says as well. Also they are correlated because extremists take risks for their faith. For example suicide bombers take risks for their faiths and take their faith to the extreme. Also people believe in a specific thing like Christians believe in God or the moonies believe what they believe and the risk they take by believing in their faith may not be right so whatever they believed in for their whole lives may not be true and they could be in trouble when they die if whatever they believe in is not their or true. It was interesting how she said it was a virus of the brain. That is hard to believe because people have control over what they want to hear or believe while other viruses go through the body without having a cure or being able to fend it off. That didn't really make sense to me. It was interesting to hear her story and realize that it can happen to anyone.
ReplyDeleteNathan Schutz
Honestly the whole time I was watching this video I thought it was a joke. However, that's not to say that I'm close minded to the idea that extremism could actually be a mental illness. It is true that some people are more easily manipulated than others and with the right leader anything can be appealing. Also, like Diane mentioned in her TED talk, it is easy and thoughtless to accept the fact that God will fix everything as long as you serve him. Unfortunately extremists feel that it is necessary to go above and beyond to "serve" even if it involves self harm. I think that to relate fideism to extremism is an unequal, unbalanced equation. I do however think that fideism could be an early stage of extremism in the sense that everything starts somewhere. Fideism is simple and easy and leaves a lot of unanswered questions but the people who follow this way of believing clearly don't want those questions answered. It's almost the same concept of an extremist way of thinking because there is the bible and that is the reason why for fideists and there is God and He is the reason why for extremists. That's not to say that every extremist thinks like this but in relating the two this is an accurate model in my opinion. So do fedeism and extremism share common grounds? Yes. Are they common enough grounds to cause worry? I think this depends solely on what the specific extremist group stands for and what motivates them.
ReplyDeleteI think...there's a clear correlation between Fideism and extremism. Fideism, roughly speaking is that faith is independent of reason, and extremism, from what I understand from the talk suggests that extremists follow their beliefs, or what they've been taught without self investigating the matter thoroughly; so much so that their brain start to function in an entirely different way, as if they were brain washed.
ReplyDeleteDian Benscoter incorporated phrases such as "vulnerable, young, lost, easy fix, addictive, infected." in her TEDtalk and finally defined her unique experience as a "viral, memetic infection" which i believe is a perfect term to describe what was happening to her. Its tempting to turn to a religion that warrants a simpler version of life, Diane mentioned that she believed by being a moonie will end her worries, anxiety and problems, that "god" or her "messiah" will fix everything as long as she humbly follows; its an extremely tempting concept. Its the same reason why many turn to drugs and alcohol, its an easy way out of your misery.
E. Yoshinaga
now come to think of it this actually is a perfect rebuttal to pascal's wager, "nothing to lose and everything to gain"? really? babies die man, if the babies could talk they'd be saying "why you gotta do this to me god? i was in solitary confinement in my mother's uterus for the past 9 months just so she could poison the h* outta me?"
ReplyDeleteE. Yoshinaga
I think that Fideism is rather extremist because of the idea that Religion does not need confirmation in fact or ration. Why should religion be the only thing in your life that you hold different standards for?
ReplyDeleteBenscoter discussed her extremist brain as being "sick" and needing a remedy. It led her to do many things she later regretted in life, and while listening I was wondering how Fideism is different. Is it simply because there is a wide enough following for it to be accepted in such a way?
While Fideist Christianity cannot be tied to such extremist groups as Benscoter had joined, the idea that it cannot be challenged by rational thought and needs no recognition through it is a similar point between the two.
Fideist belief leads to many of the same things that Benscoter talked about in the extremist brain such as: Creating Us and Them, or Good and Evil.
The Fideist cannot comprehend why one would try to justify Religion through rational thought, creating a "Them" group that is different from "Us".
And the idea that it cannot be challenged by ration creates the "impenetrable" idea, that we are the only ones who are right, and the other options must be false.
Mike Gillum
This situation appears to be a very extreme view on what Fideism might lead to. I don't inherently believe that all types of fideistic thinking will lead to something this extreme. But I guess that depends on what religion it is applied to. Certainly a religion that slaughters innocent children would lead to a massacre as no one in the congregation can be lead out with reason. Unfortunately, Fideism appears to be so very tempting to believers. You are telling me that no one can question my faith and I am right in the face of all adversity? Sounds great! But perhaps it does take an disaster like this to prove that we must think before we believe.
ReplyDeleteFrom the outside, this seems like nonsense, but perhaps from the inside, if my faith asked me to commit suicide, I would see the struggle.
As a person of deep faith I can see that one would quickly become defensive with this entire situation and make the bold statement of how could one become seduced by such a thing that would allow themselves to become a part of a thing like this. After all when it comes to faith decisions should not there be some guideline, some scale of measuring what is of sound and realistic faith? Yet when reason is ruled out or one does not have a sound belief system the door tends to become open wider allowing one to enter into a system/ cult that would include a “religious” language that would seem to look like something authentic and genuine. Thus allowing oneself to become lured into and consumed by such a thing, especially when what is being offered feeds off of the venerable side of a person which in essence gives them a false hope in the long run of the scheme.
ReplyDeleteThe situation that Diane Benscoter was in, an extremists group, is fideism. She was young and wanted an easy answer to her questions and it was easier for her to believe than to question. Just like in fideism, It is not subjected to rational evaluation and extremists do not see the need to evaluate their views. Fideism is scary in a way because it allows people to fall victim to dangerous situations and those that are the leaders or these groups get their followers to not question or evaluate their beliefs just like fideism. These groups can harm others and think it is right and part of their beliefs. fideism is too extreme, just like strong rationalism. There has to be a middle for these too. It seems that many question their beliefs but we don't have the time to search for all the evidence that we need to make a decision. Fidesim just creates false hope and beliefs it is the easy way out.
ReplyDeleteWow. This video shows how the moonies used fideism to justify their cause. I do not think that all forms of fideism are this extreme though. However, her insight into how genocide is viewed by those caught up in the lies of extremism was interesting. It really made me think about what we discussed in class and how i view my faith. I do believe that fideism is an extreme. Faith should not be devoid of reason. I do believe Clifford's principle is on the other end of extreme though. However, believing because you are a fideist is very dangerous. This article showed me how easy it would be for someone following that dangerous path to become an extremist because reason and rational thinking will not factor into what the person believes.
ReplyDeleteMiranda Cornwell
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