Sam Harris' new book

what do you mean when you add that in your signature JE?

interested in hearing your thoughts...

I'm interested as well, JE. I was into some of Sam's message a while ago until he started on his radical anti-muslim rants (at least I hadn't heard them before). I am someone who doesn't think any religion should be singled out, but all should be disintegrated based on their respective followers "waking up" (hehe, little Sam Harris joke) and leaving them.

Is there something in his recent Joe Rogan episode that brings this to the surface? I haven't listened to it yet.

well besides the personal fact that the JRE seems to think they need to have Sam Harris on as a 'followup' to my sister, which is odd that JRE has never had Abby on as a retort to Sam Harris I've always fucking hated the guy from the moment he hit the scene. I don't really have much to add actually besides my hatred. I don't think he is a feeling or emotional being, he seems incredibly analytical to the point where all I get now are neocon style cold equation vibes

things got pretty heated already in this earlier thread I made to bait neocon apologists, i mean sam harris 'fans' http://forum.watmm.com/topic/78338-how-rational-atheists-spread-anti-islam-pro-us-military-propaganda/

sam harris is a born again christian now

I think his foreign policy points of view don't combine too well with my personal thoughts.

However, this concern is far out-weighed by a lot of the stuff I agree with him on: elevating science and its role in society, deconstructing religion, deconstructing free will and promoting neuroscientific understandings relating to it, using health as an indicator for how well a society is doing etc. etc.

Anything else such as his eyes, his body language or how he looks is completely irrelevant to me.

Wow, lots of misinfo in this thread.

Clearly some folks have heard the basic premise and then simply imagined what Harris must think about the fine-grain details.

Anti-Islam =/= Anti-Muslim

Sheatheman - Until you resolve Euthyphro's Dilemma, you don't have a moral leg to stand on...you simply follow orders (which might explain why you think the Earth is 6,000 years old)

JE - dude is not a neo-con (lol)...he's essentially a post-Buddhist hippie with a pinch of hard-boiled pragmatism...dude spends his spare time thinking about compassion and mindfulness and population ethics...I'm sorry if he contradicted your sister but c'mon now.

If anyone is interested in what Harris ACTUALLY thinks, find the lecture/interview where he talks about "happy Nazis"...there he talks about what well-being might be, what it surely isn't, and whether "happy Nazis" could actually be a plateau on the moral landscape.

  On 5/1/2015 at 12:03 AM, LimpyLoo said:

Wow, lots of misinfo in this thread.

 

Clearly some folks have heard the basic premise and then simply imagined what Harris must think about the fine-grain details.

 

Anti-Islam =/= Anti-Muslim

 

Sheatheman - Until you resolve Euthyphro's Dilemma, you don't have a moral leg to stand on...you simply follow orders (which might explain why you think the Earth is 6,000 years old)

 

JE - dude is not a neo-con (lol)...he's essentially a post-Buddhist hippie with a pinch of hard-boiled pragmatism...dude spends his spare time thinking about compassion and mindfulness and population ethics...I'm sorry if he contradicted your sister but c'mon now.

 

If anyone is interested in what Harris ACTUALLY thinks, find the lecture/interview where he talks about "happy Nazis"...there he talks about what well-being might be, what it surely isn't, and whether "happy Nazis" could actually be a plateau on the moral landscape.

I've read three of his books and just want to add that he is very science-oriented as well, in terms of how society should be arranged. His buddhist retreat definitely had a huge effect on him, but his appreciation for science applied to society is what I think is his main interest and propels a lot of his thoughts.

P.S. Regarding 'I don't want one religion being singled out'...

Talking about 'religion' is like talking about 'sports'

Are sports dangerous?

Football is; golf isn't.

Somehow the two games belong to the same category, but the connection is tenuous.

So too with everything that falls under the umbrella of religion. Is religion good/bad/dangerous/etc? Again, religions vary the way sports vary.

Should we be as worried about Jainism as with Islam? Clearly not. That'd be like a Luddite worrying equally about nuclear weapons and electric toothbrushes because they're both 'technology.'

I tried to read the first 50+ pages of this book and it stunk. Has anyone else read it? What I got was this: he doesn't seem to really understand religion in the capacity he thinks he does, IMO he promotes buddhism in a light that only reflects portions of its belief systems, and neither atheists or religious people will really get much from the book. I appreciate his desire to bring a positive spin to "spirituality" but I don't think he actually gets it. His "spirituality" seems very much bound to science, and is consequently crippled.

Oops, this thread is older than I thought. I'm talking about the book "Waking Up."

  On 5/1/2015 at 1:08 AM, luke viia said:

I tried to read the first 50+ pages of this book and it stunk. Has anyone else read it? What I got was this: he doesn't seem to really understand religion in the capacity he thinks he does, IMO he promotes buddhism in a light that only reflects portions of its belief systems, and neither atheists or religious people will really get much from the book. I appreciate his desire to bring a positive spin to "spirituality" but I don't think he actually gets it. His "spirituality" seems very much bound to science, and is consequently crippled.

Huh?

So if only Buddhists should do mindfulness, then maybe only Christian alchemists should do calculus, and only Muslims should do algebra and astronomy.

I mean hey, free bathwater, ammarite?

What do you mean, he doesn't understand religion?

sorry i was just really pissed, i had no intention of trying to kick start a rational discussion. but by all means

he's a shitcunt.

Fuck this ni@@a

If people disagree with him on some point or other, then fair enough. Reasonable people can have differing opinions.

But for some reason people often seem to disagree with opinions that Sam Harris doesn't actually hold.

.

  On 5/1/2015 at 1:08 AM, luke viia said:

His "spirituality" seems very much bound to science, and is consequently crippled.

Why?

  On 5/1/2015 at 8:41 AM, Hoodie said:

don't like him, seems pretentious and fake

yeah, ben affleck does seem like a bit of a dick alright.

I should have actually double checked who this thread was about before shit posting, I retract my earlier statement about this ni@@a. Mea culpa innit.

I honestly don't see the Buddhist connection, and don't care much for his overwelming assumed cleverness and anti-religous polemics.

am i the only one who gets genuine nazi doctor vibes from the vacantness behind his eyes? Im not trying to be offensive to people who actually were inflicted pain by the hands of nazi doctors or scientists, because i really mean it. I sense zero genuine emotion or human feeling, its kind of fascinating actually. For people who have anti-islam views like Bill Maher and Rushdie they actually do seem human with emotional brains (even though i think maher is a massive cunt) he def does not give me a nazi doc vibe at all

apparently you haven't been paying attention to what post 2008 neocons did, which is rebrand themselves into 'rational skeptic' quasi liberals. You know how the Borg in TNG adapt to phaser shots? same principal. Robert Kagan the founder of the Project For a NEw American Century essentially has been trying for the past 8 years to rebrand neocons as 'liberal interventionists' who want to only use military force out of self defense or to save people from their dictatorial regimes human rights abuses.

One of the biggest, well the biggest neocon in the world Irving Kristol used to be a fucking trotsykite and a communist socialist, so to say that because Sam Harris is some kind of 'hippie' and that makes him not a neocon actually makes zero sense at all. You have to ask yourself what is the *main* effect of Sam Harrirs as a person? Is it to help the world free itself of religion or is to help grease the skids for people to hate those from another culture? Obviously its the latter, and who does that help? Weapons manufacturers and war mongers. So yeah dudes a fucking lying diingenous piece of shit no matter which way you slice it (unless you think he actually is some kind of emotionless autistic robot, which would be literally his only excuse, and he might be with those nazi doc eyes) . To these people the end justifies the means, so if you have to do some kind of fun song and dance to make yourself appealing to atheist people out there, go for it as long as it will killa bunch of brown people fairly soon.

For neocons it's always been about 'how to make the argument' and if the best 'way' to make the argument for war in the middle east is to convince all liberals of how truly deeply evil islam is and why we need to eradicate it, perfect job. Use liberal empathy to murder hundreds of thousands, its actually a really genius tactic imo. What sucks is even most regular people have been duped by neocon ideology now, including probably anybody who thinks Sam Harris is not a liar

  On 5/1/2015 at 12:03 AM, LimpyLoo said:

JE - dude is not a neo-con (lol)...he's essentially a post-Buddhist hippie with a pinch of hard-boiled pragmatism...dude spends his spare time thinking about compassion and mindfulness and population ethics..

this character asking Dustin Hoffman questions displays more human emotion than Sam Harris fyi