On Sat, 10 Jan 2004, John Sechrest wrote: (01)
> I really liked connections. (02)
I've only seen that one episode but it looked fun and
interesting. (03)
> However, I often found that the connections that were displayed
> were abstract connections and rarely were they causal connections. (04)
I think causality is a rough area. With all the interconnections
in things and the amount of complexity in the world a rigorous
commitment to causality as a true and direct force in the
universe is its own brand of fundamentalism. (05)
> We had fundamentalists before the 20th century. It is not
> a new impulse. In fact the article I just read in the UU world,
> suggests that it predates culture (as an impulse). But we can
> at least demonstrate cases of it in the 700's, the 1100's and the
> 1600's.
>
> There must be some value to the pattern, we keep seeing it
> pop up. What is being optimized for by this pattern? (06)
To some extent this has been suggested elsewhere in the thread
but I'd like to claim that fundamentalism is a form of external
cognition that allows for some automation that enables higher
(perceived) performance or greater (perceived) flexibility in
other areas. (07)
In the general form: I'm going to have faith in this idea or set
of ideas so that I can either know what to do in a certain set of
circumstances or not have to think about something. I optmize
decision making. (08)
Sometimes this is necessary simply to deal with a complicated
world that is difficult to understand. (09)
At the other end of the scale it can be a logical choice. I can
use myself as an example for this. I've made the decision to
have a fundamental commitment to the following idea: Artifical
Intelligence is not achievable, at least not in our time but
maybe ever, in any real way. This allows me to limit my interests
and activities by removing a huge swath of stuff. Instead I can focus
on augmenting tools. (010)
Many people who complain about fundamentalist thinking have
problems with it because they (the complainers) have the mistaken
belief that there is a form of thought that is not based on faith
and that that form is closer to some absolute form of correct.
That belief is fundamentalism in a nutshell. (011)
It's faith all the way down, whether your god is Science or Shiva. (012)
--
Chris Dent cdent@blueoxen.org AIM: sleepleft
Once you knew, once you really, really knew,
then you had lost your alibi. --Samantha Power (013)
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