h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Oh, but I do think religion is a crutch. In the sense that it would be perfectly reasonable to expect a person to be able to work their way through life based on intellect and experience as opposed to superstition and avoidance of personal accountability. Some people use drugs to help them face life. Some drink to excess. Some choose pop psychology. And some choose religion.

What Edward says about humans having the ability to be supportive of each other without the need for religion is another opinion we share. It's been my experience that religious people can be far, far from supportive of their fellow human beings, and nuch of what suuport they do offer comes with strings attached.

So why not do away with the flam-flam, and just be good to each other because we can and should be?

PsychoCandy:

!. Although it might be "perfectly reasonable", it isn't the only perfectly reasonable option open to us. And many millions of people over hundreds of generations have opted for other choices. Not that that automatically makes them 'right', but then, what *is* 'right' in this context?

2. I think superstition may be in the eye of the beholder, don't you?

3. Personal accountability is not directly linked to religion, as far as I am aware. [And it is something I heartily approve of, if anyone doubted it! ]



Some? The vast majority, surely?



Flim-flam is also, I believe, in the eye of the beholder. So why not just be good to each other because we can and should be?

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

>Some? The vast majority, surely?<

I doubt very highly that the majority of human beings are addicted to drugs, P-C!

>3. Personal accountability is not directly linked to religion, as far as I am aware.<

Except for christianity, which teaches that you can do whatever you want and your imaginary friend will forgive you, as long as you furnish his house with enough silver.


I don't see how anyone could argue that superstion is as acceptable a choice, from an intellectual standpoint, as seeking empirical evidence and logical/scientific explanation?

>>. I think superstition may be in the eye of the beholder, don't you?

No. This is where empiricism come in.

Naughty! Your comment, which I was replying to, said "use" not "addicted to". Including caffiene, alcohol, etc., I think most people use drugs, don't you?



That is factually incorrect, and appears to be the product of your emotional response to christianity.

P-C:

PC:

So how does empiricism allow the reliable detection of superstition? [I'm not saying it doesn't; I'm asking how it does.... ]

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"
>

Ooops! Sorry, Ed, for misindentifying you!

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

>

That is factually incorrect, and appears to be the product of your emotional response to christianity.<

Nope. Comes from my personal *experience* of christianity. A man in our congregation was a convicted killer and sex offender, who was somehow "saved", and allowed to teach sunday school! A church where a woman was not only thrown out of the congregation but her family was told to cast her aside (on some biblical prinicple about plucking an eye before it causes you to stumble?) simply for exercising her reproductive rights. She was told we should be allowed back in *only* when she would "publicly repent", and make a weekly tithe of a minimum of 10% of her income.

My emotional response to this was merely to be disgusted, and to have nothing to do with *that* congregation after that. Took me several more years, and a very expensive education, to come around to the realization that all religion/superstition is nonsense.

>Naughty! Your comment, which I was replying to, said "use" not "addicted to". Including caffiene, alcohol, etc., I think most people use drugs, don't you?<

*If* you think of caffeine or alcohol as "drugs", I guess. Although I know plenty of people who drink coffee or the occasional glass of wine merely because they like the taste and not as an emotional crutch to help them avoid reality... nor does everyone who uses presription drugs to treat medical or psychiatric conditions use those to escape reality. *Some* people use drugs because they can't cope with reality. *Some* people use alcohol. And *some* people need superstition or religion.

If I needed a crutch, I'd take drugs over religion any day. The overall long-term effects (on one's self and on others) are a lot less harmful.

Alcohol is unquestionably a drug.

Let's see--it can cause pretty serious addictions. It affects brain function enough that it can make you drunk. How is it not a drug?

As for caffine--well, it has withdrawl syndromes if you drink it regularly and then stop. People often drink it specifically because it affects their brain function by making them more awake.

What are they if not drugs?

I didn't mean to get into an argument of semantics here. The point was, and is, that reliance on religion can be as bad and dangerous as reliance on drugs or alcohol.

And even the fluffiest types of religion, like recreational use of drugs or alcohol, can lead to serious addiction and negligible effects on one's mental health.

The word "drug" is commonly used to refer to either medicines or opiates, narcotics, or hallucinogens. Not alcohol, nicotine, or caffeine. I don't think it has anything to do with the effect on your brain. Plenty of pharmaceuticals don't affect the way you think.

Ste

The general definition, though, seems to be that it's taken for some biochemical effect other than simply being food. Not necesarily the brain, although brain affects seem to be the main reasons people take alcohol and caffine (ok--now it's being claimed that wine may have some beneficial affects on the cardiovascular system, but that still seems to support the idea of it being a drug if people are drinking it to prevent heart problems.

Hm, that's not what the OED seemed to think...

Ste

A substance used in the diagnosis, treatment, or prevention of a disease or as a component of a medication.
Such a substance as recognized or defined by the U.S. Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.
A chemical substance, such as a narcotic or hallucinogen, that affects the central nervous system, causing changes in behavior and often addiction.
Obsolete. A chemical or dye.

(from http://www.answers.com/drug&r=67)


1 a obsolete : a substance used in dyeing or chemical operations b : a substance used as a medication or in the preparation of medication c according to the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (1) : a substance recognized in an official pharmacopoeia or formulary (2) : a substance intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease (3) : a substance other than food intended to affect the structure or function of the body (4) : a substance intended for use as a component of a medicine but not a device or a component, part, or accessory of a device
2 : a commodity that is not salable or for which there is no demand -- used in the phrase drug on the market
3 : something and often an illegal substance that causes addiction, habituation, or a marked change in consciousness

(from http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=drug&x=0&y=0)

By answers.com's second definition and by Merriam-Webster's 1(3) and 3, it's hard to see how alcohol and caffine aren't drugs.

Of course their manufacuters and sellers would prefer they not be called that because it might hurt sales, but that doesn't justify creating an exception for them.

sorry--meant third answers.com definition

I'll raise you one OED definition :

1. a. An original, simple, medicinal substance, organic or inorganic, whether used by itself in its natural condition or prepared by art, or as an ingredient in a medicine or medicament. Formerly used more widely to include all ingredients used in chemistry, pharmacy, dyeing, and the arts generally, as still in French. In early use always in the pl.: cf. spices. (So in Fr.)

b. spec. Now often applied without qualification to narcotics, opiates, hallucinogens, etc., esp. attrib. and Comb., as drug-abuse, -addict, -addiction, -dependence, -evil, -fiend (FIEND 4c), -habit, -peddler, -peddling, -pusher, -pushing, -taker, -taking, -traffic.

2. A commodity which is no longer in demand, and so has lost its value or become unsaleable. (Now usually a drug in (now freq. on) the market.) Also transf.
[It is questionable if this is the same word. Quot. 1760 implies it; but it may possibly be only a witty play on the word: see also Fuller's contrast of drugs and dainties.]

3. Comb., as drug-compounder, -counter, -grinder, -house, -jar, -mill, -pot, -seller, -shop, -store, -vase, etc.; drug clerk U.S., an attendant in a drug-store; drug culture, the subculture (sense 2) associated with and peopled by users of illegal drugs; drug-fast a. [FAST a. 1h] = drug-resistant adj.; so drug-fastness; drug-induced a., (of a mental or physical condition) brought about by the taking of a drug or drugs; drugman, a man who deals in drugs, an apothecary; drug-resistant a., resisting the effects of a drug or drugs; so drug-resistance, -resisting adj.; drug(s) squad, a division of a police force appointed to investigate crimes involving the taking of or trafficking in illegal narcotic and other drugs; cf. narcotic(s) squad s.v. NARCOTIC n.2

http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/entry/50070232?query_type=word&queryword=drug&first=1&max_to_show=10&sort_type=alpha&search_id=scrI-k8WQrl-7970&result_place=1

Merriam-Webster - psh.

Ste

So marijuana isn't a druge either? That etc. has to include some other stuff not in the catagories listed to match common usage of the word, because marijuana isn't a narcotic, opiate, or hallucinogen, is it?

Point taken--alcohol isn't a drug by the common usage of the word.

But that doesn't change the fact that it's impossible to justify a logical distinction between it and the set of substances refered to as drugs. Which still makes psychocandy's objection to alcohol and caffine being thought of as drugs in the context of the discussion problematic. While it may not be a drug by the general usage of the word, it seems to me that it is a drug for all practical purposes unless you can draw a logical definition of the set "drugs" that doesn't include it. As opposed to excluding it for legal/cultural reasons.

When it comes down to it the word "drug" is what people generally think the word drug means; what it has come to mean. And yes, I'd agree with you that does include weed nowadays. I don't think it does include caffeine and alcohol, and I think most would agree.

English is hardly logical

Ste