one i'm only too familiar with unfortunately for my detractors

thanks for the heads up DWill

DWill wrote: I don't know if it makes sense to talk about conversion as fallacious. You're talking about the ideas that the person has taken up as being fallacious in some cases. All I was saying is that the "been there, too" retort that we can sometimes give means nothing in itself (though as Harry Marks said, maybe it could in the aggregate).

How I read your previous comment was that you said it is somehow fallacious for me to assert that conversion from supernatural belief to astral interpretation involves a change from error to truth. Much ancient thinking, with Ezekiel a great example, can only be understood scientifically in the framework of the visible cosmos as the paradigm of divine order. By contrast, supernatural literalism is entirely unscientific and incoherent, multiplying unnecessary entities, as William of Ockham caustically put it. There is no need of the hypothesis of God, per Laplace, so the task of applying Ockham's Razor to religion is to understand God talk without that fallacious literal content.

DWill wrote: Applied to the HJ topic, it doesn't signify anything that you once thought Jesus to have lived and now you believe him never to have existed. You changed your position, but it doesn't have to be because you were led by the truth. Maybe you were simply too susceptible to enticing, iconoclastic theories.

My focus at the moment is on how history can be explained by astronomy. I have just read a couple of fantastic science books about the Ice Age, with detailed information about how orbital factors have driven climate change as revealed in ice and benthic cores.

My hypothesis is that there is a perfect fit between Christian mythology and the millennial graph of climate change. This attunement between theology and astronomy has been ignored, but provides a highly elegant, explanatory, parsimonious and predictive model for the cultural evolution of faith and its symbols.

DWill wrote: I really don't mean to personalize this and could be talking about anyone. This historical Jesus matter isn't as cut-and-dried as you're making it, either. It's not on a parallel with creationism/evolution. You're stating the choice between HJ and myth as black-and-white, when it really isn't.

There are three big paradigm shifts for Christianity, with the end of geocentrism, creationism and now literalism.

The problem is that people are too embarrassed to imagine they could have believed a mass mythical delusion regarding the existence of Jesus. The debate is not even allowed in public.

The change in thinking occurring now from myth to science is a good parallel to how evolution displaced creationism. The reason this discussion remains so subterranean is that the scientific argument for nonexistence of Jesus is even more complex than evolution as a paradigm shift, resting on putting the pieces of a fragmentary historical puzzle together in the most probable way, shattering the foundations of major institutional frameworks.

DWill wrote: As I've said several times, I'm with the HJ only to the extent to object that your claim that Jesus was not even viewed as real (until Mark invented him and then people mistakenly believed in the reality), lacks plausibility and does violence to what evidence we do have about the times.

The very scanty evidence about Jesus before Mark consists solely of Paul’s assertions that Jesus was born of a woman of the seed of David according to the flesh. It is reasonable, given the preponderance of a purely spiritual Jesus in Paul, to consider these isolated remarks as imaginative, much like saying Adam was made from earth. They are not evidence. Meanwhile the troves of ancient material about the cosmic Christ, together with the sudden emergence of Christianity in different places, indicate that shared cosmic imagination was the primary driver of the myth.

DWill wrote: There isn't proof that anyone thought Jesus to have been entirely a myth until relatively recently.

The idea that Jesus was a myth has been a primary heresy throughout Christian history, from the ancient Docetics (whose writings have perished) who held that Jesus is pure spirit, through to the heretics of Orleans in the eleventh century, where chroniclers say the cathedral taught that Christ had not taken on human form. This debate is the subject of severe cultural repression, with any questioning of orthodox faith a capital crime for most of Christian history, reflecting a fallacious attitude of sneering superiority that still informs orthodoxy.

DWill wrote: I do not think you have such a shift, unreason to reason, in HJ to mythicism. That seems a big overreach.

No more so than in the shift from geocentrism to empirical astronomy, or from creationism to empirical biology. The whole Christian story comes alive if we re-tell it with Christ invented, using this heuristic to inform our understanding of the politics and psychology of church history, to understand how such a vast error could be so durable and persuasive and functional.

DWill wrote: your "hypothesis," though, has that 19th-Century feel of a grand, unified explanation that probably is hopelessly inadequate to explain a complex phenomenon like religion.

Recognising Christ as astral myth is a paradigm shift and grand unified explanation. There is plenty of coherence in the astral myth hypothesis. The direct match between the Chi Rho cross and the appearance of the spring point at the time of Christ is one prominent example of how the astral meaning forced its way through the subconscious into symbolism of faith.

The real burden of proof here rests on those who would say that such a correlation between symbol and stars involves no causation. The Chi Rho Cross as the zodiac, equator and first fish of Pisces is obvious as soon as you know how to see it, especially with the alpha and omega commonly included in the symbol, to indicate the blueprint used for the Christ Myth was the zodiac ages.

DWill wrote: I'm reminded of the character Causabon in Middlemarch, who labors over his life's work, to be called "A Key to All Mythologies." The narrator remarks that he is unaware that this approach has already been abandoned by scholars.

Such empty mockery has the flavour of apologetic rationalisation by pulpit cowards. Obviously a key to all mythologies has not yet been found in a way that has been properly explained to a mass audience. But there are many many writers, from Dupuis, Paine and others, who provide essential parts of this task.

Acharya S is one brilliant near-contemporary analyst, whose rejection illustrates the swirling political winds around astrotheology. DM Murdock will in my view be celebrated after her death as a thinker to rival Teilhard, who was similarly ignored in his lifetime.

DWill wrote: This also is a hypothesis, almost needless to say, for which you won't be able to gather support if the evidence was erased.

There is abundant support since the erasure was only partly successful. The glorious zodiac stained glass windows of the cathedrals of France are just one example of the enduring power and beauty of zodiac interpretations. The New Testament is full of cosmic imagery, lightly concealed.

Precession is the governing theme of Biblical cosmology. The literal tradition, especially in its pure obsolete young earth creation form, sets the six thousand years of writing as the entirety of human history, failing to place human cultural evolution within the real long time frame observed by science.

DWill wrote: Isn't is likely, anyway, that astrotheology is but a single stone in the foundation of religion?

The importance of astrotheology, in my view, begins with its ability to interpret the eschatology of the Bible as based on real observation of the stars and deep understanding of humanity. The theme of Jesus as the sun opens the symbolic meaning of how the story of creation, fall and redemption is marked by the slow real movement of the stars. Furthermore, Christ as solar allegory has an elegant fit within the real orbital dynamics of natural climate change.

DWill wrote: Think of all we know about the functions that religion has for people, the emotional and spiritual needs that it answers. With cosmology you seem to offer only aesthetic contemplation, scientifically based, as what satisfied needs prior to the church spoiling everything. I could also ask who did the spoiling in the case of other religions, if astronomy was all humankind's prelapsarian worldview.

Empirical cosmology as a ground of theology can open an understanding of how traditional religion is based on fantasy, not fact. Precession, operating at millennial scale, is the objective level of cosmology that enframes and drives human history.

In addition to a beautiful aesthetic, seeing how history and myth are mirrored in the stars, there is also an ethic in natural cosmic theology, especially with how gospel ethics fit to the idea of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ as the dawn of the Age of Aquarius.

Well, I don't have further response. Obviously we're not on the same page, not even in the same book. I thought it legitimate, and I still do, to point out a "beam in your eye" aspect to your excoriating others for their lack of reasoning. Questionable assertions, ideological rigidness, and a reliance on suppression and conspiracy--making your arguments unfalsifiable--hardly seem to epitomize good reasoning.

DWill, If you think it is irrational to reject belief in supernatural myths then you are hardly presenting a rational perspective, although I wonder which of my comments you see as 'excoriating'.

Do you think it is rational to believe supernatural myths?

Which specific claims I have made do you think are not falsifiable?

Why are you defending the church against historical observations that it conspired to eliminate intellectual inquiry?

My reference for the mythicist views of the cathedral of Orleans is Heretics - The Creation of Christianity from the Gnostics to the Modern Church by Jonathan Wright, published in 2011.

Robert Tulip wrote:DWill, If you think it is irrational to reject belief in supernatural myths then you are hardly presenting a rational perspective, although I wonder which of my comments you see as 'excoriating'.

You could start at the petri dish, Robert. And in general, you can come on like a ton of bricks, quite sure of yourself.

Do you think it is rational to believe supernatural myths?/

The language is imprecise, first. What is belief in supernatural myths? Some people here have indicated belief in myths. Second, you imply that stated belief in a myth would render one irrational. Could you prove that the global quality of rationality is thereby lost? Are those who believe in the Christian myth irrational? If not, what is the sin in their specific belief?

Which specific claims I have made do you think are not falsifiable?

If you say at nearly every turn, there was suppression, there was conspriracy and great secrecy, usually on the part of the Church, so that the evidence has been lost to us--that makes some of your claims unfalsifiable.

Why are you defending the church against historical observations that it conspired to eliminate intellectual inquiry?

To use the Church as an all-purpose whipping boy simply isn't a technique of good historical practice. For the suppression of heresy that it conducted when finally it was in a position to do that (not for several hundred years after the traditional dates of Jesus) I wouldn't even use the word 'conspiracy,' in fact, but that's neither here nor there. To hold, as many do, that the Church was responsible for a Dark Age of backwardness is another indication of the need for examining such an assumption in true historical depth. There are problems with the thesis.

Now if you don't mind I have a couple of questions for you that might clear up some of my confusion about your thinking, if you could please answer directly.

1. What supernatual myths are you inveighing against, or is it the entire category? Is there anything at all that could be labeled supernatural that is not such a clear and imminent danger? There is a wide range, from animism to hands-off deism.

2. Is the astronomy that you believe predates false belief in an external god or God then devoid of the supernatural? For the mass of people as well as for a small elite, did observation of the heavens--a scientific pursuit according to you--serve as a completely rational faith?

DWill wrote:

Robert Tulip wrote:DWill, If you think it is irrational to reject belief in supernatural myths then you are hardly presenting a rational perspective, although I wonder which of my comments you see as 'excoriating'.

You could start at the petri dish, Robert. And in general, you can come on like a ton of bricks, quite sure of yourself.

Yes, I am sure of myself, because I consider I am presenting ideas that in the future will be recognised as simple truth, while proponents of belief in supernatural myths reflect an obsolete and outmoded paradigm. All my ideas are up for specific challenge and refutation if possible.

DWill wrote:

Do you think it is rational to believe supernatural myths?/

The language is imprecise, first. What is belief in supernatural myths? Some people here have indicated belief in myths. Second, you imply that stated belief in a myth would render one irrational. Could you prove that the global quality of rationality is thereby lost?

Myth has two meanings. The most common meaning is false belief, and the less common is stories that provide meaning in life. Holding false beliefs is irrational when the believer should know the belief is false. But people hang on to religion like a security blanket, as DB Roy noted. The false belief is within a complex cultural formation, and admitting it is false would destroy cultural values such as belonging, loyalty, tradition and authority. So people hang on to myths they know are untrue. That is irrational, but the problem is that rationality has not yet provided a higher quality of myth, a story of the meaning of life, that is perceived by believers as superior to their outmoded superstitions.

This failure of the rationalist movement to get a handle on the social comforts of religion means believers are trapped in a rather brittle cage, knowing it is fragile but fearing that anything to break it is too risky. Eventually the cage of the Historical Jesus will break under the slow tectonic force of cultural evolution.

DWill wrote: Are those who believe in the Christian myth irrational?

When a person has not encountered information that shows their belief is false, then their belief can be rational. Such information has not as yet been presented to the general public in a persuasive and compelling way, but that will happen very soon. Carrier’s book is one earthquake in this inexorable seismic shift.

DWill wrote: If not, what is the sin in their specific belief?

The ‘sin’ in holding untrue beliefs is better understood in the Buddhist framework that sees delusion as the main cause of suffering. The truth will set you free, as Jesus Christ allegedly said. When people are deluded about the nature of reality by believing in an intentional God, they alienate themselves from nature, and allow maladaptive practices to flourish.

The only plan God can have for us is the one we construct ourselves. Human evolution can only progress through a resolute focus on building a purely scientific culture, even while traditional myths are cherished and fostered as part of the priceless natural heritage endowment of humanity, containing vast treasures of hidden meaning.

DWill wrote:

Which specific claims I have made do you think are not falsifiable?

If you say at nearly every turn, there was suppression, there was conspriracy and great secrecy, usually on the part of the Church, so that the evidence has been lost to us--that makes some of your claims unfalsifiable.

I really prefer to deal in specifics regarding whether any hypothesis is falsifiable. The existence of Christendom policies and their Biblical precedents such as 2 John that authorised suppression and secrecy are plain as day, providing strong evidence for the claims that I make. Far from making any of my claims unfalsifiable, church history provides abundant evidence of deliberate tampering with original messages, almost none of which survive from the first century except Paul.

Your criticism here is the equivalent of you saying you find my opinions emotionally disturbing to you, for some reason you cannot say. If you wanted to subject one of my claims above to rigors of falsification you could start by questioning the truth of my claims about the apparent correlations between climate and religion and how these causal factors could have filtered through into myth.

DWill wrote:

Why are you defending the church against historical observations that it conspired to eliminate intellectual inquiry?

To use the Church as an all-purpose whipping boy simply isn't a technique of good historical practice.

There is a big difference between “conspired to eliminate intellectual inquiry” and “Church as an all-purpose whipping boy”. You are creating a straw man rather than engaging on specifics.

DWill wrote:For the suppression of heresy that it conducted when finally it was in a position to do that (not for several hundred years after the traditional dates of Jesus) I wouldn't even use the word 'conspiracy,' in fact, but that's neither here nor there.

The church began its suppression of heresy as soon as it found the traction available in the myth of the Historical Jesus invented by Mark. As the churches’ power grew, it gradually entered alliance with state powers to support its false doctrine. The church evolved out of secret societies for whom the conspiracy of shared secrets was in their DNA. Not using the word conspiracy is like not using the word church.

DWill wrote: To hold, as many do, that the Church was responsible for a Dark Age of backwardness is another indication of the need for examining such an assumption in true historical depth. There are problems with the thesis.

The collapse of the Roman Empire had many causes, but its adoption of a thin and brittle dogma of Jesus of Nazareth as its security doctrine is a primary one. I personally think there was some inevitability in the collapse of Rome, given the economic power of the northern barbarians. The descent into the dark age, with the mass destruction of classical learning, is a crime abetted by the church for which its false doctrines provided moral cover.

DWill wrote:
Now if you don't mind I have a couple of questions for you that might clear up some of my confusion about your thinking, if you could please answer directly.

1. What supernatual myths are you inveighing against, or is it the entire category? Is there anything at all that could be labeled supernatural that is not such a clear and imminent danger? There is a wide range, from animism to hands-off deism.

In our recent fiction selection Flowers for Algernon, the moron Charlie has a lucky rabbit’s foot. I certainly would not want to snatch charms from morons, when their trinkets can be such a comfort and blessing and guide for them. Charlie’s charm is not dangerous.

I agree with Richard Dawkins that cultural Christianity is a beautiful and valuable part of the human heritage, and go further than Dawkins to agree with Carl Jung, that the symbols present in religion have deep real meaning of which we are largely unconscious. So treading on the dreams of the believer carries high risk of social damage when this leads to rejection of symbols such as the cross which carry unknown effect and weight.

The intellectual content of Christianity has to be revised from the ground up against the scientific paradigm, and this includes trying to bring matter that is now unconscious into consciousness through critical analysis of symbols and myths. That does not mean abolishing myth in some iconoclastic frenzy, but rather re-evaluating its content to see how its intent is allegorical and natural rather than literal and supernatural.

DWill wrote: 2. Is the astronomy that you believe predates false belief in an external god or God then devoid of the supernatural? For the mass of people as well as for a small elite, did observation of the heavens--a scientific pursuit according to you--serve as a completely rational faith?

I don’t think ancient astronomy was ever completely rational, given its close links to astrological divination. However, there are major elements of ancient astronomy that are purely rational and empirical, such as the vast troves of clay tablets that have survived in Babylon showing the daily measurement of the heavens to predict eclipses and other celestial events. My view is that empirical drivers from astronomy shaped the evolution of myth, and that beneath the story of Jesus Christ as alpha and omega there exists an obvious stellar blueprint based on ancient knowledge of precession of the equinoxes.

i really relished that response from Robert there.

and thanks to DWill for moving Robert to write it

Robert Tulip wrote:Yes, I am sure of myself, because I consider I am presenting ideas that in the future will be recognised as simple truth, while proponents of belief in supernatural myths reflect an obsolete and outmoded paradigm. All my ideas are up for specific challenge and refutation if possible.

Robert Tulip wrote:Do you think it is rational to believe supernatural myths?

The problem is the false dichotomy here. It is one thing to assert that supernatural myths are not factually correct. Since they do not have a pattern of repeating systematically, for whatever reason, claimed supernatural events will not have the property of being able to be confirmed further by further investigation. So the claim that they are false is likely to gain adherents over time, and "feel" right to those with a knowledge and science orientation.
But to claim that this implies one particular alternative explanation is the true one is to ignore the other possible alternative explanations. It may be that over time evidence will accumulate behind one particular conceptual structure as an alternative to supernatural claims. I rather doubt that will happen.
The dividing line between supernatural and natural explanations is a modern one created by an accumulation of knowledge. Robert, you are claiming that
1) there has been a particular, and more-or-less accurate, view of nature from earliest times which was obscured by later monotheistic intellectual imperialism, and that
2) the supernatural error arose because of the use of mythology to express this view of nature, then was installed in power by authoritarian literalism.
It is simpler, and more consistent with what we know of shamanism, etc., to interpret the matter as a natural process of thinking in terms of "other-worldly" explanations of things, as my children asserted that the dice had magical personality traits in games.
The "true explanation" of what we observe does not have to be a view that was true originally and can still be considered true today. The true explanation can be that there were errors in the past, and we face the challenge of separating useful myths of meaning from the erroneous way they were expressed in the past.
This offers the advantage of flexibility - we do not have to cherry-pick observations which support a monolithic "true explanation" as an alternative, but can go wherever the evidence leads.

Robert Tulip wrote:But people hang on to religion like a security blanket, as DB Roy noted. The false belief is within a complex cultural formation, and admitting it is false would destroy cultural values such as belonging, loyalty, tradition and authority. So people hang on to myths they know are untrue. That is irrational, but the problem is that rationality has not yet provided a higher quality of myth, a story of the meaning of life, that is perceived by believers as superior to their outmoded superstitions.

Why would you think rationality is at all suited for providing such a framework of meaning? Since rationality is committed to following evidence wherever it leads, then any evidence that, say, we are each individuals with distinct interests has as much claim on the imprimatur of rationality as an equally rational claim that we have common interests which will fail to be realized if people do not agree on a framework for addressing them.
A social value system with "reason" as its backer will be as fragmented and incomplete as the cultural systems we have had before. For every mechanism, such as a Supreme Court, to sort this out there will be Antonin Scalias and Donald Trumps to undermine its legitimacy.

Robert Tulip wrote:The ‘sin’ in holding untrue beliefs is better understood in the Buddhist framework that sees delusion as the main cause of suffering.

The Buddhist framework is entirely pre-scientific and is focused on the delusion of attachment. This is about values, not about mechanical cause and effect. If we are attached to comfort, wealth, social position and security the anxiety that results is likely to lead us to be unhappy and to take actions which make others more unhappy than they already are.
If the Buddhist assertion amounted to "more factual understanding = more happiness" we should all be free from anxiety by now, which would mean that Buddhist thought had been refuted by the obvious continuation of anxiety and its related suffering.

DWill wrote: To hold, as many do, that the Church was responsible for a Dark Age of backwardness is another indication of the need for examining such an assumption in true historical depth. There are problems with the thesis.

I quite agree.

Robert Tulip wrote:The intellectual content of Christianity has to be revised from the ground up against the scientific paradigm, and this includes trying to bring matter that is now unconscious into consciousness through critical analysis of symbols and myths. That does not mean abolishing myth in some iconoclastic frenzy, but rather re-evaluating its content to see how its intent is allegorical and natural rather than literal and supernatural.

This strikes me as a sensible program, more or less the same as that of the religious humanists of the 20th century. But if its intent always has to be natural and guided by astronomy, then you run the risk of laying a Procrustean bed for the otherwise sensible plan to find the social meaning in mythology.

Harry Marks wrote: the claim that [myths] are false is likely to gain adherents over time, and "feel" right to those with a knowledge and science orientation. But to claim that this implies one particular alternative explanation is the true one is to ignore the other possible alternative explanations. It may be that over time evidence will accumulate behind one particular conceptual structure as an alternative to supernatural claims. I rather doubt that will happen.

Hi Harry, thank you very much for engaging on this complex material. I think we are in the midst of a paradigm shift which is removing false old theories about God. The concept of the supernatural is incoherent and incompatible with scientific knowledge. There are vastly better explanations for belief in the supernatural from neuroscience than from theology. Carrier’s book is useful on this topic, with his assertion that claims about the supernatural always originate in allegory, error or deception. But what we must do is recognise that the authors were trying to say something in code, and look beneath the fantastic veneer to find the engine beneath. Astronomy is a very big part of this cultural and physical engine driving the efflorescence of the supernatural.

Harry Marks wrote: The dividing line between supernatural and natural explanations is a modern one created by an accumulation of knowledge.

Yes, and defining this dividing line is more complex than saying modern accumulation of knowledge can simply replace what humans did in the past by believing in the supernatural. Belief in God will continue, and that is a good thing at the popular level, since the atheist assertion that God does not exist is highly complex and difficult to understand.

What is required in scientific terms is analysis of how popular belief articulates into a scientifically credible theoretical framework. As our interpretation of myth changes under the power of scientific reason, new readings will find meanings that mesh with objectives and values supported by knowledge, and belief will evolve to harmonise better with knowledge.

Harry Marks wrote: Robert, you are claiming that
1) there has been a particular, and more-or-less accurate, view of nature from earliest times which was obscured by later monotheistic intellectual imperialism,

A hunter-gatherer band will naturally tell myths which contain embroidery of shamanistic dreams. And yet even these dreams, considered insane by some modern theories of rationality, hold their own reasonableness, providing a durable and robust framework for hope and identity for their holders.

By contrast, what you aptly term ‘monotheistic intellectual imperialism’ is based on imposing a modus vivendi for clashing cultures, a set of beliefs suitable for political stability. These imperial beliefs evolve under cultural pressure, co-opting elements that serve the ruler’s purpose and needs.

Nomad clans in the stone age had no great need to hold or promulgate false beliefs, except out of sheer ignorance, whereas teaching a lie can be supremely useful for a monotheist empire as part of its security and stability strategic agenda.

Harry Marks wrote:and that
2) the supernatural error arose because of the use of mythology to express this view of nature, then was installed in power by authoritarian literalism.

The word “because” is the only one that gives me trouble here. The overall process you describe is accurate, in the sense that Christianity selected supernatural tropes out of a mythological buffet that also held some deep lost natural insight.

Culture is by nature heavily repressive, censuring activity outside narrow norms. Mythology sought to encode allegory, and to present an emotionally appealing story which held a deep symbolic meaning. The encoding of allegory was necessary because the dominant culture was repressive towards the encoded material, and would not countenance it appearing in public, especially in the context of the Roman invasion. This problem of suppression drove the allegorists to elaborate secrecy.

The supernatural error that became enshrined in church dogma arose more as a social response to mythic coding of nature, not strictly because of that coding as an evolution from it. Error was driven by incentives in the world, and these worldly incentives, then as now, include rejection of religious ideas except those packaged in an acceptable format.

Harry Marks wrote: It is simpler, and more consistent with what we know of shamanism, etc., to interpret the matter as a natural process of thinking in terms of "other-worldly" explanations of things, as my children asserted that the dice had magical personality traits in games. The "true explanation" of what we observe does not have to be a view that was true originally and can still be considered true today. The true explanation can be that there were errors in the past, and we face the challenge of separating useful myths of meaning from the erroneous way they were expressed in the past.

Yes, you are rightly clarifying the unclarity in my suggestion that myth can be seen as inherently natural in its genetic origin. Myth arises from the transcendental imagination, a capacity of mind that is inherently linguistic, governed by concept, and therefore central to spiritual belief and practice, imagining how ideas persist through time by embodiment as entity. And yet even spiritual belief is natural in a larger sense, even where its content is imaginary and literally false, since it responds to natural evolutionary drivers of cultural selection.

Harry Marks wrote: This offers the advantage of flexibility - we do not have to cherry-pick observations which support a monolithic "true explanation" as an alternative, but can go wherever the evidence leads.

Evidence only leads us where an organising theory looks for it. Falsification of an organising theory can look for challenges and difficulties, while the proponent of theory will focus on the strongest supporting evidence.

Harry Marks wrote:

Robert Tulip wrote: rationality has not yet provided a higher quality of myth

Why would you think rationality is at all suited for providing such a framework of meaning?

Because irrationality involves believing contradictions, whereas rationality is committed to coherence, bringing all data into an encompassing explanation. Based on science, a theory of everything that addresses social formation as well as physics would provide a powerful framework of meaning.

I think modern rationality is a long way from supplying such a framework of meaning that addresses the concerns addressed by religion. Atheism often fails to understand the social value of religion, the moral values of conservative societies, and its own religious mythic structure. As I mentioned before, Carl Jung’s analysis of the relation between reason and symbol explores unconscious factors that would have to be brought out explicitly for rationality to become suitable as a framework of meaning.

Harry Marks wrote: Since rationality is committed to following evidence wherever it leads, then any evidence that, say, we are each individuals with distinct interests has as much claim on the imprimatur of rationality as an equally rational claim that we have common interests which will fail to be realized if people do not agree on a framework for addressing them.

That is an interesting hypothetical situation, but common interests, for example planetary survival, are more important than individual interests that clash with the common interest, as we see in the 1.5 degree warming target agreed last year in Paris. Global evolution is towards interconnectedness, and part of the religious agenda is naturally how liberty can be protected even while regulation becomes more entwined.

Harry Marks wrote: A social value system with "reason" as its backer will be as fragmented and incomplete as the cultural systems we have had before. For every mechanism, such as a Supreme Court, to sort this out there will be Antonin Scalias and Donald Trumps to undermine its legitimacy.

That is ridiculous. Reason examines evidence, consequences and accountability, with self-correcting mechanisms. The problem though, as encapsulated in the enthronement of Supreme Reason in Notre Dame during the French Revolution, is that our theories of reason remain, as you say, fragmented and incomplete. But given the choice, we should back reason over blind unreason any day, while maintaining safeguards for cultural tradition. I think of human evolution towards a rational society as a ten thousand year project. We are very irrational.

Harry Marks wrote:

Robert Tulip wrote:The ‘sin’ in holding untrue beliefs is better understood in the Buddhist framework that sees delusion as the main cause of suffering.

The Buddhist framework is entirely pre-scientific and is focused on the delusion of attachment.

I don’t agree. Texts such as the Dhammapada contain a sublime rationality that is compatible with a broader understanding of delusion than the attachment to matter alone. Detachment gives time and freedom to contemplate deep meaning, often leading to results that are compatible with scientific reason, even if Buddhist culture did not follow up with the empirical methods of European science.

Harry Marks wrote:This is about values, not about mechanical cause and effect. If we are attached to comfort, wealth, social position and security the anxiety that results is likely to lead us to be unhappy and to take actions which make others more unhappy than they already are.

Your anxiety theory looks causal, and compatible with the four noble truths as I understand them. Overall, recognition of anxiety as a source of suffering fits well with the Buddhist psychology that claims spiritual enlightenment is hindered by having to focus on security and protection of property and people. Only by having some people free from attachment can the society maintain a conversation about values that come from deep contemplation.

Harry Marks wrote: If the Buddhist assertion amounted to "more factual understanding = more happiness" we should all be free from anxiety by now, which would mean that Buddhist thought had been refuted by the obvious continuation of anxiety and its related suffering.

Rationality is not the same as factual understanding. Scientific facts have to be explained through an encompassing theory or paradigm to make rational sense. Facts can even hinder rationality when we see the collection of data as a substitute for the getting of wisdom. Overcoming anxiety requires that facts be explained as part of a story that provides hope and meaning. My view is that solving the cosmic riddle of Christianity is a good start on that path.

Harry Marks wrote:

Robert Tulip wrote: ...bring matter that is now unconscious into consciousness through critical analysis of symbols and myths. … re-evaluating its content to see how its intent is allegorical and natural rather than literal and supernatural.

This strikes me as a sensible program, more or less the same as that of the religious humanists of the 20th century. But if its intent always has to be natural and guided by astronomy, then you run the risk of laying a Procrustean bed for the otherwise sensible plan to find the social meaning in mythology.

Astronomy is the very opposite of a Procrustean bed, where the hotelier sawed off the legs of his guests to fit his furniture. Astronomy drives the long term orbital patterns of terrestrial climate, producing evolutionary selective pressures that have been stable on our planet for four billion years. Our genes evolved in an astronomical context, and exploring how we adapt to the future should include this context, even though the cycles of time are far slower than immediate terrestrial factors.

No guest ever comes to the cosmic hotel who is not fully pre-adapted through genetics, since all our ancestors lived in the same cosmic frame. That remains true even if alienated supernatural beliefs try to pretend otherwise by imagining they can stretch or chop the universe to fit their myths. The guide that I suggest is provided by astronomy is a simple matter of seeing culture as part of nature.

To hold, as many do, that the Church was responsible for a Dark Age of backwardness

what do they mean was, it still is