Life of Pi

[Bong Lover]

sapphi_snake said:

Bong Lover said:

Yeah, it's quite apparent that you don't buy into a world view that allows for anything 'supernatural'. Also I get that you (erronously in my opinion) feel that religion and spirituality promotes a dangerous world view. That's fine, the proposition of Life of Pi does not appeal to you, life goes on. However you feel about the book though, I still think it is a mistake to interpret it as a story that shows the danger of religious delusion. That is ironically 'missing the better story'.

Finally, and I know I should not ask this question because no good can come from it, but I ask anyway. Assuming that spirituality is nonsense, that the world can be described presisely using reason and physics, what makes it wrong to kill another man? If reality is nothing but physics and matter, how do you justify normative rules?

Nothing that exists is "supernatural". "Supernatural" is a term used to define things that people know nothing about, that's not part of their current bagage of world knowledge. Lot's of things were considered supernatural in the past (like giant squids), and are now viewed as perfectly natural. The book isn't a story that shows the dangers of religious dellusion, it's a book that UNWILLINGLY shows the dangers of religious delusion. It would've been a great story had there been no "unwillingly" part. The better story isn't always the "feel-good" one.

Normative rules are invented by people to make coexisting within a society possible. If people go around killing eachother, we might as well all be dead, as you can kiss progress goodbye. It's quite funny though that you ask this question. History shows that religion in no way stops people from killing eachother, or even makes it be percieved as something wrong. There are accounts in the Old Testament of Jews commiting genocide, and it being called a command from God. Things like the  Crusades or the Inquisition are also excamples. Heck, even this book is an example: Pi commits murder and cannibalism, yet he creates a fantasy story in which his terrible deeds never happened, so he can feel better about himself and never face any negative consiqunces for what he actions. He's religious/spirirtual beleifs didn't stop him from commiting attrocities. If anything, they helped him commit them.

You are skirting the issue or I am not framing the question clearly enough. In a world where there is nothing except physics and mechanics, why does a concept like 'progress' have any meaning? It doesn't make a difference to the atoms that make up a human if the human is alive or dead. What does gravity care about progress and coexsisiting within a society? In fact, by bringing up these justifications for norms you imply some form of 'supernatural' exsistence (perhaps "unwillingly"?). Why is progress and coexisting desirable and better than death and annihilation? In a mechanical world view there is nothing to place one as better than the other. You can't measure how 'good' something is using physics or math. (For reference, by supernatural I mean something that can't be observed and measured scientifically)

Also, this discussion really has nothing to do with religion even though you keep trying to bring this back to that topic. Religion is just an attempt by humans to frame these 'supernatural' concepts. That people have used it as a tool for thousands of years to divide, control, manipulate and murder other people is tragic, but not really relevant to the question. (Also, I think you'll find that in a world without any form of religion you would still have attrocities).

Finally, I don't think you are getting the full depth of the Life of Pi, and I am sure you feel the same about me. Let me just round out that part of the discussion by saying that I don't see Pi's actions as attrocious, rather quite heroic in all their grusomeness.