Creationism

[Deesse23]

The best book on this is still Hofstadter's classic Anti-Intellectualism in American Life. It's a thoroughly researched analysis of the frequent US belief that the efforts we make must be utilitarian or somehow productive -- almost always toward making money.

So it's common for Americans to dismiss metaphysics as mental masturbation, since it is unlikely to have any practical application. 

It's easy to see that the roots are in Puritanism. They think masturbation is bad because it doesn't make babies, and anti-intellectuals think that pure learning is bad because it doesn't produce something useful. Are you interested in discussing the fundamental nature of the universe? Big whoop.

A lot of atheists are Protestant in the way they think. Even though they've given up the God part, they still hold to Protestant values of practicality, self-reliance, etc. 

Another Protestant trait that anti-intellectuals have is suspicion of pleasure. Especially the pleasures that other people have that they don't share. So if someone here gets a lot of pleasure from discussing metaphysics, from pure learning about non-practical subjects, anti-intellectuals are happy to pass judgment on that, and express their disapproval. Pure pleasure is suspect.

I guess I hold to a view that's closer to the Aesthetic Movement (in Britain) or the Decadents (in France). For these people, the purpose of education (past a certain basic level) is to increase one's capacity for pleasure. The more you know, the more different kinds of pleasure you can have. People who know very little are limited in their pleasures -- usually they enjoy the commercial goods that they're sold, like pop music or Star Wars. To enjoy difficult or esoteric stuff, you have to do the reading.

I follow a guy on social media who reads a dozen Asian languages in both their modern and ancient forms. He writes books about the spread of astrological/astronomical knowledge from the Middle East into China and Japan. It's hard to imagine a less practical field, yet his work is full of fascinating imagery and unexpected historical detail. Largely I follow him because when he does field work, and goes to some obscure temple in Nepal or somewhere, the joy he feels in the discovery is so evident. He does not believe in astrology.

There are atheists who are more like Catholics in their views, and it's not a surprise that the Aesthetes and Decadents were attracted to Catholicism, though they were lukewarm about believing in God. Unlike Protestants, Catholics believe in pure Goodness, unrelated to one's practical efforts. For them, a good life may consist in a devotion to impractical beauty or learning. The goal is not some sort of reward received from the world for hard work, but a focus on that which is lovely in its own right. 

They also believe in a hierarchy of goods, while Protestants tend to equalize anything that isn't worldly success. So it's common for Protestants and Protestant-style atheists to say that where pleasure is concerned, everything is a personal choice and everything is just entertainment and there is no criteria for judging better or worse. It's personal and unimportant what you like, "as long as you're not hurting anybody," and Star Wars is as good as Plato if that's what you like. 

Like so many Protestant goals, this one is extremely helpful in a culture where the only standards are consumer values. 

By nature I am very much not a Puritan, and I find it hard to understand people who disapprove of my pleasures.

There's nothing as fulfilling as changing the subject, well actually abandoning it. But nice try to turn my responses into motivated by anti-intellectualism or money or Protestantism. Your issue with me is that I'm not willing to let you be the authority that you want to be, that mentally you need to be.

Have you noticed that you don't participate in any threads that are not about philosophy or religion? Or if you do, you derail them into philosophy or religion. Then proceed to try to run and direct the conversation. This is classic self absorption. So go ahead and increase your pleasure to the exclusion of others. I understand you think it's all about you.

I am just as dismissive of Bels BS as you are, yet neither am i american, puritan, protestant, anti-intellectual, obsessed with money or any other BS he claims about his adversaries . Hope you had fun writing all that   down, Bel.

Its quite amusing to see the lengths he went to set up an ad hom and poison the well (fuck you Bel for that pathetic attempt). As far as i am concerned he can stick to his pet version of special pleading as long as he wants. In fact one day maybe we indeed will find an "uncaused cause", but until that day i remain sceptical. However painting himself as some kind of intellectually superior because he is less sceptical and more gullible than anyone else, well Bel does Bel: Thinking that name dropping(s) like "Aquinas!" or "Aristotle!" would leave a lasting impression on anyone here, at least the kinda impression Bel thinks of.