[The Personist]

Originally Posted by bung

Can you point me in the direction of any quotes or passages from Harris, Dawkins, or Dennett where they attempt to justify as such, or endorse, any of things you've listed? They're the only three I've read, but it sounds like you're more familiar with their writings than I am.

Dawkins has said on his blog that Islam is an unmitigated evil and that it's better to support Christian missionaries--whom he hates--than to allow Islam to have any foothold whatever (this is such a disgusting claim, chock full of Orientalism). Basically wherever in The End Of Faith that Sam Harris talks about Islam, it's bad. Off the top of my head I can't think of anything of Dennett's that's explicitly like this, though I'm fairly certain he holds Islam in the same imperialist contempt as Dawkins and Harris.

They're all shitty scientists, shitty philosophers, and shitty people.

[perceptrons]

Originally Posted by The Personist

I have no problem calling someone a jackass for being as ahistorical and colonialist and imperialist as Dawkins et al, and I think that aligning oneself with people who think it is a moral task to "liberate" the oppressed people of the Middle East from the Evils of Islam (also they always suggest that Islam is the worst of all possible religions, Dawkins saying Christianity is better and that Islam is "the unmitigated evil of the world," Harris being a huge prick about it in The End Of Faith, Hitchens shitting all over the middle east at all times) just because of something so stupid and irrelevant--in the sense that, as I said, it signifies nothing other than nonbelief in a concept that if you really didn't care about, you wouldn't be talking about--as identifying as an atheist.

So basically what I'm saying is I can't really let you align yourself with those dudes unless you're cool with racism, sexism, colonialism, imperialism, etc. in which case we have a whole new problem.

Well, I'm not aligning myself, I'm saying many would lump me in with them, as most don't have the same definition of "New Atheists" as you.

Originally Posted by The Personist

They're all shitty scientists, shitty philosophers, and shitty people.

Dawkins isn't a shitty scientist, at least he wasn't when he was more actively doing scientific research. Dennett isn't a particularly bad philospher on certain topics. I liked some of his stuff with Hofstader.

[bung]

Originally Posted by The Personist

Dawkins has said on his blog that Islam is an unmitigated evil and that it's better to support Christian missionaries--whom he hates--than to allow Islam to have any foothold whatever (this is such a disgusting claim, chock full of Orientalism). Basically wherever in The End Of Faith that Sam Harris talks about Islam, it's bad. Off the top of my head I can't think of anything of Dennett's that's explicitly like this, though I'm fairly certain he holds Islam in the same imperialist contempt as Dawkins and Harris.

They're all shitty scientists, shitty philosophers, and shitty people.

"Given that Islam is such an unmitigated evil, and looking at the map supplied by this Christian site, should we be supporting Christian missions in Africa? My answer is still no, but I thought it was worth raising the question. Given that atheism hasn't any chance in Africa for the foreseeable future, could our enemy's enemy be our friend?"

That's the entirety of the article? Is part of it not loading for me (legitimate question)? All he's insinuating in this is that, if he had to choose, he would support Christian missionaries over Islamic missionaries, or that if he had to support Christian missionaries, he would do so on the basis of mitigating the strong presence of Islam in Africa. But he explicity says he does not support Christian missionaries--regardless of the fact of the strong presence of Islam in Africa. He's just bringing up a discussion question, and basing possible responses on the fact that he thinks Islam is a worse religion than Christianity. I don't see any orientalism nor any imperialism in such a position.

As for Harris, I've read the End of Faith, and I don't recall any imperialistic, colonial, sexist, or racist claims. I can understand someone disagreeing with his analysis of Islam, and not liking it, but I was looking for some more concrete substantiation than "it's bad."

So I guess what I'm saying is that I would require quite a bit more evidence that these three (never read anything from Hitchens) are racists, colonialists, imperialists, and sexists-- that these are currents that run through "New Atheist" thought--than a few sentences from Dawkins that don't show anything of the sort.

As far as them being bad scientists, what are you basing that off of? Dawkins significantly helped popularize the gene-centered view of evolution, and he argued against group selection in evolutionary theory (among other contributions). Both of these stances are widely accepted among modern biologists and can generally be considered orthodox positions. Harris did some pretty uncontroversial and unproblematic neuroscience research that looked at belief. I can understand someone thinking them bad philosophers (although Dennett is the only actual philosopher here, and I agree with a lot of what he says about philosophy of mind), but what's wrong with their science?

[The Personist]

Originally Posted by bung

"Given that Islam is such an unmitigated evil, and looking at the map supplied by this Christian site, should we be supporting Christian missions in Africa? My answer is still no, but I thought it was worth raising the question. Given that atheism hasn't any chance in Africa for the foreseeable future, could our enemy's enemy be our friend?"

That's the entirety of the article? Is part of it not loading for me (legitimate question)? All he's insinuating in this is that, if he had to choose, he would support Christian missionaries over Islamic missionaries, or that if he had to support Christian missionaries, he would do so on the basis of mitigating the strong presence of Islam in Africa. But he explicity says he does not support Christian missionaries--regardless of the fact of the strong presence of Islam in Africa. He's just bringing up a discussion question, and basing possible responses on the fact that he thinks Islam is a worse religion than Christianity. I don't see any orientalism nor any imperialism in such a position.

Implicit in the position that Christianity is "less evil" than Islam is a whole host of unconscious value-judgments that, going along with a Western racialized conception of Islam, are extremely colonial. We have to make sure, in other words, that the white missionaries are the ones who are in control in Africa, to stop the brown evil people from doing anything. Like I said, it's in partly unconscious, but it frames the whole problem in terms of an essentially racial question: given that I hate the brown people's religion and the white people's one, should I support the white people's one?

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As for Harris, I've read the End of Faith, and I don't recall any imperialistic, colonial, sexist, or racist claims. I can understand someone disagreeing with his analysis of Islam, and not liking it, but I was looking for some more concrete substantiation than "it's bad."

Doesn't he say something about Islam being "more violent" than other religions? Actually Dawkins says something about this too. It's such a ridiculous claim to make considering what the Abrahamic religions share in terms of doxa.

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So I guess what I'm saying is that I would require quite a bit more evidence that these three (never read anything from Hitchens) are racists, colonialists, imperialists, and sexists-- that these are currents that run through "New Atheist" thought--than a few sentences from Dawkins that don't show anything of the sort.

New Atheism tends to offer up the "we have to liberate the brown women from the oppressive burqas" argument a lot; if you Google around you'll find it all over the place. It's a reasonable extension of the logic of their positions, which reify an Enlightenment conception of reason and rational thought (against which Nietzsche and others have thoroughly railed--in fact, Nietzsche would argue this kind of atheism is awful, since it just expropriates the same morality that makes religion problematic in the first place) and then see it as a transhistorical vehicle to some kind of unmediated meaning or truth in the world (see what happens?). They create straw men of what they seek to critique (straw men that invariably describe their position) and then in the place of "religion" suggest a merely mimetic system of values or methodologies (how is a universal principle of Reason any different from a transcendent God, both being concepts that can be said to have a history until reified in this particular way?). Just as reading the Bible as purely the Truth Of God is incredibly, incredibly flawed, and resists the historical accounting for discrepancies and problems that biblical scholars have done for thousands of years, reading Reason as The Be All And End All Principle Of Truth discounts, like, the history of science. New Atheists use a recent--17th century--concept of reason, reread science as having developed along those lines since its inception (ignoring that religious institutions are responsible for the inauguration of science as a field), and then defend, in the name of common sense and the aforementioned concept of reason, the very same values and morals they see as so hostile to life and truth or whatever within religion. That is to say, these are people who in the name of "common sense" and "free thinking" and "science" are repeating the most toxic and reprehensible aspects of religion in terms of valuation. And if what we're interested in is thinking outside the boundaries of limited, limiting moralization and structuration, then why the hell would we establish a critique on the basis of the same set of values so that we can just extrapolate them and have them by other means? And more insidious means, I'd argue, since there is so much appeal to "common sense," "logic," and "natural" or "self-evident" truth in New Atheism--all of this an attempt to block thought and strip the critical element of history from the conversation.

Also on a more basic level, what about liberation theology? What alleviations of suffering has atheism effected that have been remotely on that same level? Why is the discussion of religion so black and white?

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As far as them being bad scientists, what are you basing that off of? Dawkins significantly helped popularize the gene-centered view of evolution, and he argued against group selection in evolutionary theory (among other contributions). Both of these stances are widely accepted among modern biologists and can generally be considered orthodox positions. Harris did some pretty uncontroversial and unproblematic neuroscience research that looked at belief. I can understand someone thinking them bad philosophers (although Dennett is the only actual philosopher here, and I agree with a lot of what he says about philosophy of mind), but what's wrong with their science?

Underpinning all their scientific work is the idea that science is capable of explaining everything. That's pretty problematic.

[bung]

Originally Posted by The Personist

Implicit in the position that Christianity is "less evil" than Islam is a whole host of unconscious value-judgments that, going along with a Western racialized conception of Islam, are extremely colonial. We have to make sure, in other words, that the white missionaries are the ones who are in control in Africa, to stop the brown evil people from doing anything. Like I said, it's in partly unconscious, but it frames the whole problem in terms of an essentially racial question: given that I hate the brown people's religion and the white people's one, should I support the white people's one?

Saying he's unconsciously racist is unfounded and something for which there is certainly no evidence, and it side-steps any legitimate engagement with a critique of Islam. It's also what I see as a pretty desperate attempt to save your argument. If you want to pursue the line of argument that he's actually an unconscious racist and colonialist, then you can sure do that, but it's a conversation stopper. There's nothing anyone could say or do to prove that he doesn't hold unconsciously racist or colonial values (unless we subject him to a variety of psychological tests designed to measure implicit racism, which we won't have the opportunity to do).

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Doesn't he say something about Islam being "more violent" than other religions? Actually Dawkins says something about this too. It's such a ridiculous claim to make considering what the Abrahamic religions share in terms of doxa.

Yes, he does. But sharing something in terms of doxa doesn't mean that praxis can't largely differ, so both must be considered. Regardless, this is a pretty minor point. One religion has to be the most violent, and I imagine that, of the big ones, it's gotta be either Christianity or Islam, as compared to, say, Buddhism.

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New Atheism tends to offer up the "we have to liberate the brown women from the oppressive burqas" argument a lot; if you Google around you'll find it all over the place. It's a reasonable extension of the logic of their positions, which reify an Enlightenment conception of reason and rational thought (against which Nietzsche and others have thoroughly railed--in fact, Nietzsche would argue this kind of atheism is awful, since it just expropriates the same morality that makes religion problematic in the first place) and then see it as a transhistorical vehicle to some kind of unmediated meaning or truth in the world (see what happens?). They create straw men of what they seek to critique (straw men that invariably describe their position) and then in the place of "religion" suggest a merely mimetic system of values or methodologies (how is a universal principle of Reason any different from a transcendent God, both being concepts that can be said to have a history until reified in this particular way?). Just as reading the Bible as purely the Truth Of God is incredibly, incredibly flawed, and resists the historical accounting for discrepancies and problems that biblical scholars have done for thousands of years, reading Reason as The Be All And End All Principle Of Truth discounts, like, the history of science. New Atheists use a recent--17th century--concept of reason, reread science as having developed along those lines since its inception (ignoring that religious institutions are responsible for the inauguration of science as a field), and then defend, in the name of common sense and the aforementioned concept of reason, the very same values and morals they see as so hostile to life and truth or whatever within religion. That is to say, these are people who in the name of "common sense" and "free thinking" and "science" are repeating the most toxic and reprehensible aspects of religion in terms of valuation. And if what we're interested in is thinking outside the boundaries of limited, limiting moralization and structuration, then why the hell would we establish a critique on the basis of the same set of values so that we can just extrapolate them and have them by other means? And more insidious means, I'd argue, since there is so much appeal to "common sense," "logic," and "natural" or "self-evident" truth in New Atheism--all of this an attempt to block thought and strip the critical element of history from the conversation.

Saying their view is that "we have to liberate the brown women from the oppressive burqas," is, indeed, a strawman. Both Dawkins and Harris have argued against the idea and adoption of the burqa, as have many feminists, but that doesn't translate into a positive position of invasion and "liberation." It's possible to critique a cultural practice without proposing or endorsing a radical "liberation" strategy.

I'm aware of Nietzsche's critique of science, and I see it as provocative, but largely misguided. I won't have the time to have a long discussion on the philosophy of science and rationality, though, and I'm sure you're aware that I largely disagree with a lot of your assertions, anyway. You're entire paragraph here, as far as I can see, doesn't really answer my main question, however, which I'm still looking for an answer to. It's pretty much just Nietzsche's critique of certain philosophical values of the Enlightenment. I don't think he went where you go with this, but you seem to basically be positing that since Enlightenment philosophers held certain unfortunate political and moral positions that these same political and moral positions must be present in a group of thinkers of who are strongly influenced by the Enlightenment, or that they're a necessary extension of those philosophical values. You say it's a "reasonable extension" of their views, but you don't actually provide an answer as to how the Enlightenment-influenced stance that Dawkins and others take leads to racism, sexism, colonialism, and imperialism. There's no explanation of how one gets from point A to point B. (Edit 2: Dawkins does recognize that science originated with religion.)

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Also on a more basic level, what about liberation theology? What alleviations of suffering has atheism effected that have been remotely on that same level? Why is the discussion of religion so black and white?

Atheism on its own provides no relief from suffering. It's not a belief-system or a means to relieve suffering. It's the lack of a belief. I don't endorse atheism because I think it, and it alone, relieves any sort of suffering. In fact, it probably provides people with much less personal comfort than religion. Edit: I will agree with you, though, that, in some instances (Dawkins especially--I don't see how the same could really be said for Harris, however, who is pretty into Eastern religions without being a current follower of any of them), the group of New Atheists are too black and white regarding religion. As far as suffering, I would say applied science has relieved far more than liberation theology (though it has arguably also caused much more).

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Underpinning all their scientific work is the idea that science is capable of explaining everything. That's pretty problematic.

Well, this is just false. Any scientist will tell you there are certain questions not able to be put through the scientific method, or, to put it another way, there are questions that just aren't scientific questions. This is also not a critique of their scientific findings as such, but a critique of a philosophy of science (a philosophy which neither Harris, Dawkins, nor Dennett holds).

[The Personist]

Dawkins and Harris don't "critique" Islam (there is nothing in this strain of atheism that resembles a thoughtful engagement with the religions they dismiss; to suggest they take it seriously enough to critique it would be to suggest that their project is in and of itself an intellectually rigorous one, which it is not) and I certainly wouldn't say anything they have to say about burqas is anywhere near what feminists have to say about it. I'd also say that's a strain of feminism that's been heavily critiqued for eurocentrism and orientalism, and rightly so. And anyway, this just proves my point: Dawkins is racist and sexist and imperialist by virtue of agreeing with racist, sexist, imperialist feminists.

I don't agree with Nietzsche about everything but realize that Dawkins et al are the picture of ressentiment and he would fucking hate them, not because of their deference to science but because of their mimesis of the structures of religion they purport to reject.

I don't agree about science and its application as ameliorating because the access to that application is drastically limited by the hierarchies imposed by global capitalism, which liberation theology explicitly critiques. By the way, since Dawkins et al blame religion--rather than taking material and social conditions into account--for the world's ills, I find that no matter how palatable their conclusions (they're not palatable at all) I am at odds with them. I'm a materialist. I have a problem with capitalism. They have a problem with "conservatism" in the bullshit American sense. Fuck 'em.

Let me put my last point another way: people who don't think critically about science are bad scientists, and into that category fall all the white guys under discussion.

[Nevuk]

Do you consider Maher a New Atheist? After religulous I was kind of disgusted with him.

[bung]

Originally Posted by The Personist

Dawkins and Harris don't "critique" Islam (there is nothing in this strain of atheism that resembles a thoughtful engagement with the religions they dismiss; to suggest they take it seriously enough to critique it would be to suggest that their project is in and of itself an intellectually rigorous one, which it is not) and I certainly wouldn't say anything they have to say about burqas is anywhere near what feminists have to say about it. I'd also say that's a strain of feminism that's been heavily critiqued for eurocentrism and orientalism, and rightly so. And anyway, this just proves my point: Dawkins is racist and sexist and imperialist by virtue of agreeing with racist, sexist, imperialist feminists.

Again, this isn't any sort of argument for them being racist, sexist, or imperialist. All you're doing is making the claim that they agree with feminists who are racists, sexists, and imperialists without providing any substantiation. What I would appreciate are some quotes from any of them that you take to be indicative of these values--without sinking to the non-evidentiary claims of unconscious racism and colonialism.

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I don't agree with Nietzsche about everything but realize that Dawkins et al are the picture of ressentiment and he would fucking hate them, not because of their deference to science but because of their mimesis of the structures of religion they purport to reject.

I think if Nietzsche properly understood the scientific enterprise he would see it as wholly affirming the individual, and humanity along with it, rather than just another instance of an ascetic ideal, but that's neither here nor there.

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I don't agree about science and its application as ameliorating because the access to that application is drastically limited by the hierarchies imposed by global capitalism, which liberation theology explicitly critiques. By the way, since Dawkins et al blame religion--rather than taking material and social conditions into account--for the world's ills, I find that no matter how palatable their conclusions (they're not palatable at all) I am at odds with them. I'm a materialist. I have a problem with capitalism. They have a problem with "conservatism" in the bullshit American sense. Fuck 'em.

Well, socialism would only be possible with a significantly advanced means of production capable of producing abundance. This means that a means of production of a certain degree would not be possible without being first created, and informed by, scientific results drawing from a large number of fields. So, while science is necessary to the establishment of socialism, religion is not.

Dawkins et al focus on religion for a number of reasons, but that doesn't mean they reject material or social conditions as ills in their own right. Dawkins talks about religion because he is primarily a writer of evolutionary theory, and he sees the primary attacks on evolutionary theory as coming from religion. This leads him to also talk about other areas where religion's influence is harmful. But in an interview with him, he's said that he wouldn't much bother with religion if fundamentalism didn't exist in such large numbers. Harris is a neuroscientist who has studied belief, so he's interested in religion because he wants to know the relationship between beliefs and actions. Dennett is pretty mum all-around about anything "political," but as a philosopher of mind and science he's interested in the obstacles to studying religion (and obviously critiquing it) scientifically from a naturalistic perspective. I realize that you may have a prejudice against anyone who doesn't profess some form of belief in socialism, but to say that they blame religion for all the world's ills is another strawman.

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Let me put my last point another way: people who don't think critically about science are bad scientists, and into that category fall all the white guys under discussion.

This isn't putting your point another way--it's a wholly different point. Regardless, I don't know what evidence you're using to say that none of them think critically about science. That they all endorse it as a superb method? That they haven't written books specifically examining a philosophy of science? That they've reached conclusions different from your own?

[The Personist]

I guess my thing is I don't know how anyone who knows anything about science, history, philosophy, culture, &c., would take anything these guys have to say seriously. The fact that you do is kind of dumb.

[perceptrons]

Originally Posted by The Personist

I guess my thing is I don't know how anyone who knows anything about science, history, philosophy, culture, &c., would take anything these guys have to say seriously. The fact that you do is kind of dumb.

I take some things they (mainly Dawkins and Dennett) have to say seriously, though not usually about religion.

[The Personist]

Originally Posted by perceptrons

I take some things they (mainly Dawkins and Dennett) have to say seriously, though not usually about religion.

Yeah because they have nothing to say about religion because they don't know anything about it and proudly parade that fact around (Dawkins often saying "why read theology if I don't believe in God," thereby missing the point of, you know, historical/material contextualization or research or whatever). That's why I like Terry Eagleton's approach to this group of writers: he takes them as seriously as they take religion and makes fun of how ridiculous their arguments are for an entire book. And I wonder why it is that Dawkins et al haven't pointed out the interesting coincidence between the rise in "fundamentalism" in the US and the emergence of neoliberalism (the two happening at the same time). The American political right generally played on the fears of a DEFEATED--see Scopes trial--religious fundamentalist body to take control in the country. But all we hear about is how religion is dumb, not about its uses (and I care more about what something is doing and how it's being implemented than what it 'is' or 'isn't').

[jawstheme]

Originally Posted by bung

Well, socialism would only be possible with a significantly advanced means of production capable of producing abundance. This means that a means of production of a certain degree would not be possible without being first created, and informed by, scientific results drawing from a large number of fields. So, while science is necessary to the establishment of socialism, religion is not.

The ownership of the means of production is the problem, not its advancement. You seem like you're talking about some science fiction utopia.
And your defenses of the new atheist writers is a little off point. I don't care that they attack fundamentalists, that's really easy and probably shouldn't take a whole book. I care that they make general claims about belief using fundamentalist attacks, and often ignore other cultural, economic, and social issues that are also underlying causes of the problems they see religion causing.

[bung]

Originally Posted by jawstheme

The ownership of the means of production is the problem, not its advancement. You seem like you're talking about some science fiction utopia.
And your defenses of the new atheist writers is a little off point. I don't care that they attack fundamentalists, that's really easy and probably shouldn't take a whole book. I care that they make general claims about belief using fundamentalist attacks, and often ignore other cultural, economic, and social issues that are also underlying causes of the problems they see religion causing.

Well, yes, that's the problem for socialism now, but all of Marxist thought is predicated on the fact that it was science that provided the grounds in which capitalism could flourish, and socialism would make direct use of the capitalist means of production. No science means no means of production advanced enough to provide abundance, and thus no socialism.

And actually I think both Dawkins and Harris say that, because of the existence of fundamentalism, they are forced to attack more liberal religious belief systems at times (albeit in a different way) because they provide the grounds for the more extreme fundamentalisms, or so they contend, through a reluctance to provide substantial enough criticism. So they're not completely limited to fundamentalist attacks, and it's actually not even religion per se that they think is the problem. It's more of a dogmatic belief in the supernatural that they think can be problematic.

Can you give me an example of a social issue that the "New Atheists" have attributed to religion that you believe can be attributed to something else?

[bung]

Originally Posted by The Personist

Yeah because they have nothing to say about religion because they don't know anything about it and proudly parade that fact around (Dawkins often saying "why read theology if I don't believe in God," thereby missing the point of, you know, historical/material contextualization or research or whatever). That's why I like Terry Eagleton's approach to this group of writers: he takes them as seriously as they take religion and makes fun of how ridiculous their arguments are for an entire book. And I wonder why it is that Dawkins et al haven't pointed out the interesting coincidence between the rise in "fundamentalism" in the US and the emergence of neoliberalism (the two happening at the same time). The American political right generally played on the fears of a DEFEATED--see Scopes trial--religious fundamentalist body to take control in the country. But all we hear about is how religion is dumb, not about its uses (and I care more about what something is doing and how it's being implemented than what it 'is' or 'isn't').

I'm actually not even really defending anything they say about religion, but more trying to clarify the caricatures you make about them. I'm mostly trying to understand how what they say about religion makes them sexists, imperialists, colonialists, and racists. Edit: Dawkins thinks that "theology" in the sense of "historical/material contextualization" and biblical scholarship to be worth pursuing.

Originally Posted by Richard Dawkins

I don't mean to say that all theologians are wasting their time -- I should have said that earlier. I mean, it's important to recognize that what theologians actually do in many cases is not what I call theology -- it's Biblical history or literary criticism of ancient Hebrew text, and that's fascinating and should be done, just as the same exercise on English historical texts should be done. I'm all for that. I love history, I love literature, and I love Biblical history and Biblical literature, and I am very keen that that should be done as a proper branch of scholarship.

But theology as opposed to Biblical history and literature -- when you argue about the true inner meaning of the trinity, or the transubstantiation, and try to come up with some symbolic meaning -- I think that is a total waste of time.

[jawstheme]

Originally Posted by bung

Well, yes, that's the problem for socialism now, but all of Marxist thought is predicated on the fact that it was science that provided the grounds in which capitalism could flourish, and socialism would make direct use of the capitalist means of production. No science means no means of production advanced enough to provide abundance, and thus no socialism.

And actually I think both Dawkins and Harris say that, because of the existence of fundamentalism, they are forced to attack more liberal religious belief systems at times (albeit in a different way) because they provide the grounds for the more extreme fundamentalisms, or so they contend, through a reluctance to provide substantial enough criticism. So they're not completely limited to fundamentalist attacks, and it's actually not even religion per se that they think is the problem. It's more of a dogmatic belief in the supernatural that they think can be problematic.

Can you give me an example of a social issue that the "New Atheists" have attributed to religion that you believe can be attributed to something else?

Alright, they take this idea that believing in the supernatural is much more likely to lead to "martyrism", or specifically suicide terrorist attacks. It must be easy to dismiss people dying for their country or idealism and not even look into the research on whether those people had a belief in "the supernatural" or if it really even mattered. But more importantly, a social issue which is what you are looking for I guess, is that terrorists tend to blow themselves up to compel imperialists or democracies to withdraw military forces from what is considered their homeland. Religion is the scapegoat here. They also tend to just look at the middle east, which ignores belief in the supernatural all around the world, and some 4,000 religions and those supernatural beliefs that go untested. In any other field this would be considered horrible science.