I've been following the story of Joshua Duggar, who's screwed up time and again. Molesting his sisters and cheating on his wife. The entire time, I try to get into the heads of his parents and what they must think. How do they deal with the fact that their son is a hypocrite and - from their perspective - a sinner?

I read through the comments from both Josh and his parents, and they share the sentiment that he gave in to his fallen nature. Something about this felt wrong to me, so I studied the thought. Sure, Josh is to blame, but it seems as if the blame is somehow shunted. It's as if they blame his weakness, but the bad deeds themselves are blamed on the fallen nature of man.

They see men as suffering from a choice made by Adam and Eve long ago. This suffering comes to us in the form of temptations to do wrong. So when immoral acts are committed, some of the blame inevitably falls not on the perpetrator, but on Adam and Eve; on the fallen nature of man.

Adding to this is the fact that most wrongdoings can be forgiven. Since I believe this is fantasy, I can't really know how it feels to be absolved of sin. My guess is that it's a weight lifted off your shoulders. The guilt you've carried with you through life is lessened or even washed away entirely. I can see the allure to this, since guilt seems to be like mercury; it builds up over a lifetime and never diminishes.

While guilt is uncomfortable, it's also invaluable. It guides our future behavior. Guilt of a past act is a strong influence against committing the same act. So what happens when you wash your guilt away? I can see your inhibitions going away with it. The saving grace for Christianity here is that if the change is large enough, it's usually accompanied by a commitment to Jesus; a commitment to good behavior. But what happens when this commitment wanes?

I wonder if there's a connection here in how many seemingly devout christians there are in prisons.

Yeah. There are many many convicts in prison that became Christians, turned their lives completely around, and eventually integrate back into society with a new outlook, or help change lives in prison.

Cool, huh Interbane?

ant wrote:Cool, huh Interbane?

Yeah, convincing.

http://tcr.sagepub.com/content/17/1/49.short

Oh gosh there's all sorts of studies and organizations I can point to that would be like putting garlic around your neck.
I know one outstanding man who was greatly assisted by Prison Fellowship and now works as one of their fellows who helps ex convicts integrate back into society while maintaining Christian fellowship in a very supporting and loving community.

You simply have zero hands on experience with this and are grasping for stupid shallow theoretical studies that do not match the real world or give an accurate representation of live flesh and blood.

You are just a man that's angry at religion in general, Christianity specifically.
And some of us know why.

Right, you're boasting of your anecdotes in the face of a scientific study.

Interbane wrote:Right, you're boasting of your anecdotes in the face of a scientific study.

You mean yourr going to totally dismiss shared anecdotes and replace them with "scientific" SOCIAL studies which are far from being hard science?

And just to bag more on Christianity?
Wow.
Why are you so comfortable in your irrationality about all this?

Even when fortified by the latest findings from neuroscience, genetics, and other fields, social science will never approach the precision and predictive power of the hard sciences. Physics addresses phenomena—electrons, elements, electromagnetism, the nuclear forces, gravity—that are relatively simple, stable and amenable to precise mathematical definition. Gravity works in exactly the same way whether you measure it in 17th-century England or 21st-century America, in Zambia or on Alpha Centauri. Every neutron is identical to every other neutron.

In contrast, the basic units of social systems—people—are all different from each other; each person who has ever lived is unique in ways that are not trivial but essential to our humanity. Each individual mind also keeps changing in response to new experiences—reading Thus Spoke Zarathustra, watching Lord of the Rings, banging your head on the ice while playing pond hockey, having a baby, teaching freshman composition. Imagine how hard physics would be if every electron were the unique product of its entire history.

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cro ... er-change/

"Scientific study"

One problem with Joshua Duggar's explanation is that it implies that if any of us "gave in to our nature" we would act the same. This is simply not true. There was a documented case of a pedophile who experienced no urge when a brain tumour was removed, but when it grew back he again wanted to molest children. Pedophilia is within the range of biological variation, but we are not all repressed pedophiles.

I think humanity's fallen nature is a fact, (though it didn't happen like the Eden story says). We are fundamentally animals, and our nature includes animal instincts which resist the biological pressures to invest in extended child-rearing and to cooperate with other humans, not to mention the cultural constructs of justice and education which have flowed from these. In some sense behavior like Duggar's is always "giving in" to this animal side, but some have an easier time resisting than others do.

Turning around the lives of prisoners is one thing the cultural construct of religion is capable of. It happens, it is wonderful, and it may be responsible for the unexpectedly high degree of religiosity among prisoners. Other possibilities should also be considered.

As for the "unscientific" nature of social sciences, I agree. But the hard sciences also have trouble with complexity. Physicists have not yet solved the "three-body problem" of setting out an analytical model for the gravitational interaction between three stars or other objects. Computer simulations don't do too badly, but it remains an intractable problem beyond the reach of our tools. Models of dynamical systems are notoriously tricky. Protein-folding can only be modelled at a gross level, so far. So before anybody kicks Social Science they should find a simplified problem (you know, like sending a rocket to the moon) to apply it to.

Soft science is still science. It is only unscientific when you expect too much of it, which I agree most people do. But like anywhere else, we're left lacking a better tool.

We all individually base our social beliefs on individual anecdotes. Which is a surefire way to build a false belief. It's like trusting uncle Jimbob about his sighting of Bigfoot. What social science has over this is better, but still relies on anecdote and self-assessment. But taking groups of anecdotes and looking for patterns is far better than relying on one or two. There's no way to gain context unless you look at a larger number.

Turning around the lives of prisoners is one thing the cultural construct of religion is capable of. It happens, it is wonderful, and it may be responsible for the unexpectedly high degree of religiosity among prisoners.

Yet 80% of prisoners are repeat offenders. Do we praise religion for the 20%, and blame the prison system for the 80%?

Interbane wrote:Soft science is still science. It is only unscientific when you expect too much of it, which I agree most people do. But like anywhere else, we're left lacking a better tool.

We all individually base our social beliefs on individual anecdotes. Which is a surefire way to build a false belief. It's like trusting uncle Jimbob about his sighting of Bigfoot. What social science has over this is better, but still relies on anecdote and self-assessment. But taking groups of anecdotes and looking for patterns is far better than relying on one or two. There's no way to gain context unless you look at a larger number.

Turning around the lives of prisoners is one thing the cultural construct of religion is capable of. It happens, it is wonderful, and it may be responsible for the unexpectedly high degree of religiosity among prisoners.

Yet 80% of prisoners are repeat offenders. Do we praise religion for the 20%, and blame the prison system for the 80%?

You've gotten so used to "soft" in your life you'll quote me soft science all day just to bag on religion.
keep it up (no pun intended)