ronburgundy
Contributor
'Why' questions are not anti-intellectual. They aren't at odds with rational thinking.
But if you want to stick your fingers in your ears lalalalala...and close your eyes and believe on faith that nothing is deliberately caused, so as to avoid 'why' questions, that seems pretty lazy/gutless.
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I don't believe nothing is deliberately caused. I ask why questions that assume deliberation after I have strong evidence that a mind exists capable of deliberation (something all evidence suggest requires a brain), and has the mechanisms (a body connected to that brain than can manipulate matter) by which to execute that will onto the physical universe. I just don't do what you do, which is assume on irrational faith that an immaterial mind exists not housed in a brain that precedes and causes matter. Only after you make that baseless assumption does asking why? have any meaning when asked about anything other than the behavior of specific biological organisms. Outside of animal behavior, asking "why?" is not a sign of bravery or curiosity. It is a sign that the person asks "why" because it forces them presume ahead of time the existence of a god-like mind that could have a motive, b/c the person is too cowardly and dogmatic to live in world where such supreme authority isn't in charge.
BTW, your little meme provides zero support for your nonsense, nor does your other one from Sagan that you grossly misconstrue. Neither presume teleology or any "why?" type notion that there is any deliberate goal or purpose in the Universe beyond animals that have their own goals. Humans are in fact made of and from the matter of the universe more generally and are conscious of themselves and of the parts of the universe that lack consciousness. That first quote is saying nothing more than that, while noting the subjective beauty and poetry in it. Similarly, Sagan was referring to "spirituality" as emotional joy and wonder that can result of rational understanding of the Universe. Science is a source of understanding and thus can trigger those emotions. But that doesn't assume and if anything is the opposite of religious notions of "spirituality" where joy and wonder are manufactured by self-deceit required to believe in miracles rather than the far more amazing regularities of nature that make miracles impossible, and seeking emotional comfort in childish "daddy did it" theology rather that far more interesting answers to how the universe arose if you don't blindly presume a creator which doesn't in fact answer anything but just replaces "universe" with "god" in the question "how did the universe come to be what it is?" The theist simply says "There is no answer b/c god just is." So, "god" is a way of stopping the questions and the open minded seeking of answers. God is accepted as an answer only by frightened non-curious minds that value the comfort of certain belief that silences questions over true understanding that is always uncertain and thus the search for answers never ends.