From: mls@cbnewsm.cb.att.com (mike.siemon)
Subject: Re: Michael Siemon's "dealt with in themselves"
Organization: AT&T
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 19:38:24 GMT
Summary: I *favor* theory, but we need more of it

In article <1992Oct5.155337.1287@cass.ma02.bull.com>, ddavis@cass.ma02.bull.com (Dave Davis) writes:

> My initial response would be: Even at the most basic level, 
> isn't there a existential difference between 'talking about being 
> in love' and 'being in love'? 

You would seem to be introducing the phenomonological differences of
theory (talking about ...) and experience (being ...), which is not
quite what I had in mind, whatever claims this might have.

My sensations, should I jump off a cliff, would most definitely be
extremely vivid and compelling in a way that a textbook problem in
Newtonian physics would not be -- yet the Newtonian theory (let alone
what later physics might say in amplification of it) is quite adequate
I think to *specify* centrally significant aspects of that experience
(initial weightlessness, for example, and possibly something about the
final crunch; subsidiary and later physics -- aerodynamics, say, might
amplify the first order Newtonian description.)

The things to note here, in relation to my earlier statement, are

	- a purely kinematic (Galilean) description of my fall might
	  NOT go far enough (i.e., to the description of forces) to be
	  much use as a description of my sensations (as opposed to my
	  trajectory, where it is adequate)

	- I'd be likely to be undergoing certain other elements of
	  "experience" besides the dispassionate noting of forces and
	  accelerations (and decelerations) in this exercise, and much
	  of THAT part of the experience is outside the purview of
	  physics, no matter how refined a post-Newtonian theory gets.

With regard to religion, there HAVE been some attempts at theorizing at
least at the descriptive or if you will "kinematic" level (William James
comes to mind; others have mentioned Rudolf Otto), and even to some
extent the "dynamic" level -- Freud and Jung, however, are not generally
regarded as being on the right track.  Jung is dynamic nonsense in search
of some way to validate a literary approach to myth.  Freud's dynamics
explain far too much, and would make us all into neurotic Europeans with
odd complexes projected into a patriarchal super-ego named God.  Freud,
at least, understood that his theories were complete nonsense UNLESS we
as a species were evolving with inheritance of aquired characteristics,
and with ontogeny recapitulating phylogeny.  Freud, at least, gets an A+
for effort and for an attempt at providing mechanisms at the right level,
and understanding both the physical/biological and psychological elements
that would need to enter into explanations -- even if he got it all wrong!

But consider how completely universal lingusitic competence is in human
societies -- major neurological disruptions are needed to *prevent* a
child from aquiring essentially the identical language as surrounded
it in its early years.  Linguists and psychologists are struggling to
create adequate theories of this, without yet being demonstrably success-
full, even at the descriptive level.

The "problem" of religion is much more difficult, and in some sense it
"exists" at a psycho/social level built on *top* of language.  We all
learn SOME part of the relgious vocabulary of our society, and that is
the language we then tend to use in description -- regardless of whether
we "agree" with statements in that language.  But even in traditional
societies with no competing modes of universal description, religious
language is mostly casual in usage, more like a standard idiom than a
propositional base built out of individually intended elements.  Like
a typical American's use of Christian terms, in fact.

What the evangelical/revivalist type of American religion does is to,
paradoxically, play on the ease with which people will utter such idiom
and then try to confront them with a situation as a way to "make" the
language be taken seriously.  This "internal conversion" is quite central
to one flavor of American Christianity (the "have you taken Jesus as
your personal savior" type.)  There are other types, and in other cultures
this would be odd, but not the adolescent seeking that might lead to a
child becoming a shaman, or a monk.  All of these things characterize
religions as having -- in every cultural context I know -- "athletes"
who tend to define the religion for the casual idiom users around them.

A serious theory of this can't simply cop-out and say it is only human
variety, a matter of style in language use -- the athletes of a religion
are those whose style is most influential.  That is even true, as far
as it goes; but what WANTS explanation IS the variety (within and between
cultures) exhibited with no satisfactory location of causes for this in
any better known strata of individual psychology, interpersonal social
theory, or any interactions of these.

WARNING: to those who might take refuge in a "god of the gaps" -- be
aware that theories more adequate than Freud's ARE likely to emerge.
It is true, at the very least, that anything we learn about the basis
in human psychology and sociology which would explain "cult" behavior
and the tendency of people to identify themselves with an emotionally
compelling group WILL APPLY to Christian churches just as much as to
Nazi party rallies. 

As a counter warning: even if we do get adequate kinematic/dynamic
theories of this field (human religious variety, which I take to be a 
near secular equivalent to what a Christian might mean by "objective
study of the soul"), beware of reifications or over-eager attempts to
"prove" anything religious from the theory.  As in the case of evolu-
tion, it is only some particular (and basically ill-regarded, theolog-
ically speaking) ties between religious language and scientific de-
scription which become untenable.  Christians have generally seen God
as "acting in history" in a manner that is entirely consistent with
Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzare and Cyrus all being autonomous human beings.
-- 
Michael L. Siemon		   "Oh, stand, stand at the window,
					As the tears scald and start;
mls@usl.com			   You shall love your crooked neighbor
standard disclaimer			With your crooked heart."