If we are to progress as a species, we need to understand differentiation. And this lies in attributing respect, rights and sympathy to the right sphere in an individual. If anything, humans are so made to resemble a snow man, with various massive parts that fit together in a semblance of form. Rolled into one, we thus view this whole-person as a thing to be respected.
But this view is wrong.

A fundamental error in our dealings comes from this fallacious view. Because our ideas and opinions are also part of what constitutes our individuality. And ideas are powerful enough to move mountains, given time for ripeness, fruition and actualisation. The petals to reality open to the light of reason and are justified accordingly to truth. Yet we forget that the ideas, the nectar from the fruits, need not be accorded rights and liberties and respect.

We need to be able to criticise every idea and scrutinise every opinion. Perhaps we can even add that no idea should be respected, given rights and treated with sympathy. If we are to understand this position, I need only point out the undue irrationality that this poison fruit is ripe for. In the garden of bad ideas, the flies always drift to this one.

Things like “blasphemy” or “non-Christian” or “non-Muslim” views are in this area. Religious ideas are cloistered within a sacred, pure garden and any outsider trespassing with his dirty feet, soiled hands and hardened eyes will ruin that sanctity. But no such place exists. The realm of ideas is constantly under growth and change and to consider otherwise is to live in delusion. Every idea should be under scrutiny, every thought should be liable to disagreement, every conceptual position should be amenable to change. “Sceptical scrutiny,” wrote Carl Sagan, “is the means by which deep insights can be winnowed from deep nonsense.”

Because many of us continue to harbour the belief that certain ideas dwell within the garden of purity, living by the flickering light of faith, we do undue harm by the truckload. We should all be the dirty, unkempt traveller into garden unknown, into territory long hidden to us. The acquisition of knowledge is one of the greatest things for any human.

But to treat those ideas and opinions with respect is unjustified.

Let us look at two polarised examples: The ideas in shari’ah law that women are given the status, in courts, of being only half-a-man; and the ideas and opinions of great humanists, respect, love, compassion, and so on.

In the first place, we can say the idea that women are inferior to men is a pretty stupid one. We can formulate arguments for this, and writers better than myself have done so (from the great John Stuart Mill to Simone de Beauvoir, though take her with a pinch of salt). Nonetheless, this is an idea we can criticise, look at sceptically and so on. Our desire to show that this idea is flawed can give rise to discussions on the brain, on the differences inherent in women and men and so on. This can only further our knowledge and be a good thing. This shows that whilst we do not respect the idea of treating women as inferior, it does give rise to knowledge because of the inevitable outcome of scepticism, scrutiny and critical analysis.

That was a soft target and one we can all agree is a silly one. But we can see that by looking at an idea critically, no matter how apparently backward, it does give rise to further knowledge.

Now, in this second instance, let us take the humanists’ view. Many, including myself, advocate free-speech, compassion, respect, reason, helping one’s fellow man in any way and so on. But here’s the essence of what I’m saying: Even these, I do not want you to respect! Why should you have to respect these ideas of mine? Saying that just because Bertrand Russell, AC Grayling, and Paul Kurtz express these views is an appeal to authority. Yet they have ideas which I (and which everyone should) endorse.

But just because we endorse a view does not repudiate it from criticism. If anything, we should constantly be challenging our notions of compassion, looking critically at what constitutes respect (which prompted me to write this article in the first place!); we should challenge how we can help others; we must look sceptically at free-speech (for example, does writing an article which calls black people defamatory names warrant banning?). We are constantly under self-scrutiny – even though these ideas must sound pleasing to the average person, they need not be respected.

They are just ideas.

By showing you polarised ideas, I hope I’ve demonstrated that ideas never need respecting. What does respect mean in this arena? Let us look at all the definitions that Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary provides and juxtapose them with the bad and good idea I provided. The Bad Idea in this case is the idea (or view) that women are inferior to men; the Good Idea is the idea that people are worthy of compassion.

1 : a relation or reference to a particular thing or situation ‹remarks having ~ to an earlier plan›
2 : an act of giving particular attention : consideration
3 a : high or special regard : esteem b : the quality or state of being esteemed c pl: expressions of respect or deference ‹paid our ~s›
4 : particular detail ‹a good plan in some ~s›
- in respect of chiefly Brit: with respect to : concerning
- in respect to : with respect to : concerning
- with respect to : with reference to : in relation to

2respect vt (1560)
1 a : to consider worthy of high regard : esteem b : to refrain from interfering with ‹please ~ their privacy›
2 : to have reference to : concern regard

We can dismiss the first instances as a noun (for example: “with respect to Einstein’s equations, it seems this is wrong…”). This is synonymous with “consideration”. Now with regards to definition 3, we can safely say ideas do not warrant high or special regard. Be it the Good Idea of humanistic freedom and treatment; or the Bad Idea of viewing women as inferior. Both are ideas to be criticized about. We might be a little surprised to find that even ideas we endorse are not worthy of high regard. But I think that is to miss the point, as one can hold still something in high regard but treat it critically.

Consider: Even when it comes to those are ideas we find good, incredible, or beautiful. Daniel Dennett considers Darwin’s idea of evolution of natural selection incredible, calling it Darwin’s Dangerous Idea:

If I were to give an award to the single best idea anyone has ever had, I’d give it to Darwin, ahead of Newton and Einstein and everyone else … My admiration for Darwin’s magnificent idea is unbounded, but I, too, cherish many ideas and ideals that it seems to challenge, and want to protect them. [There are many ideas that] may need protection. The only good way to do this – the only way that has a chance in the long run – is to cut through the smokescreens and look at the idea as unflinchingly, as dispassionately, as possible.[emphasis added]

Dennett, as always, hits the nail on the head. I, too, love Darwin’s ideas on some things; I adore Dennett’s ideas, opinions and eloquence. I am enraptured by the awe and wonder of the beauty of the cosmos, as espoused by Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins and Peter Atkins. I enjoy being challenged by the ideas of Blaise Pascal, Einstein, Hawking. Ideas are there, growing in the fertile ground of the human mind. The fruit they bear is one which we can harvest or throw away – but we need to take the fruit, look at it critically, pressing our fingers into all its parts, and check it for rot or worms instead of simply throwing it into our baskets for immediate consumption.

This is my only plea: That we learn to look at all our ideas, opinions and viewpoints and realise:

(1) We are fallible, therefore our ideas are too.
- Every generation thinks it has the best morals and looks disdainfully at its past: Racism, misogyny, etc. “My goodness we would never incorporate those things as public policy!” we think now (not so in South Africa, only two decades ago). Yet, what will our children and our grandchildren think of some of the ideas we cherish? Perhaps the humanistic endeavor is fraught with lurid attempts at happiness, which will only be shown in the distant future.

(2) We can love and cherish ideas, but it does not mean we must respect them.
- You need not respect my ideas for fighting for equal human rights, over and above religious authoritarian views. But it should not be a crass dismissal; it should be intelligently answered and not dismissed with a snide-aside.
Thus, whilst I do think the idea of “women or non-whites as inferior” is a stupid idea, I can safely say why I think so and have no respect for that idea. Similarly, you can think my ideas are stupid and have no respect for it. Indeed, I hope you do not have an ounce of respect for any of the ideas I proclaim in this article! By looking at them dispassionately, but by treating each other as equal members of the human species, we progress.

•
This does not mean emotions are gone, or feelings. I am not stating we become robots marching to the drone of a flat-lined heart. It is in the defense of humanity that my view of ideas as open to criticism thrives. How many of us share opposing ideas, yet can embrace, love, and sit comfortably with another?

Ideas treated as they should be – as simply ideas – only add to our humanity. Treating ideas as if they were people in fact dehumanizes us. It is by liberating ideas from the conglomerate of the human individual that, in fact, we can locate the human to whom we owe respect, admiration and accord rights and liberties.

If one considers that ideas are “sacred”, it seems to minimize the central importance of us as humans: Ideas are not sacred, our lives and our existence are. It is for other people I would die and never ideas. How many of us would die for the ideas of Einstein? But how many would defend to the death our families? The sooner we start separating ideas from people, severing the immaterial from the mortal, the sooner we can come into full growth. One can consider ideas as vines that must be severed for the tree to stand tall against the light of compassion. Once we have severed the vines, we can hold them in our heads and treat them to the scrutiny they deserve. Let us place humanity before humanity’s ideas and never again equate the two.

Goya’s famous painting should be the siren to our sensibilities. “The Sleep of Reason Brings Forth Monsters” is written in an effort to engrave it in our conscious. The great Carl Sagan seemed to carry this idea forward, holding the tiny flame of reason forth in the wild-winds of absolutist ideologies: “The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir.”

Warnings to us all, yet not easily embraced. Whilst the sirens blare, most do not heed its call. We are like villagers who set up our watchtowers to crumble; who create warning-bells of cloth; and who sleep blindfolded whilst the village burns to cinders.

I am not focused on religion or faith. Perhaps some could be ascribed to the same inherent need that most have for religion or faith; but this affords a different place in our investigations. I am speaking on the vast array of absolute nonsense, which describes itself as “science”, “medicine”, “therapy”, “health”, “philosophy” or some such vagary of truth. My friend, Damian Thompson, dubs these and the language used to deal with it “Counterknowledge”. His (and his punchy writers) excellent website brings howls of consternation and tidbits of admiration, yet never ceases to get people thinking. Damian is fast becoming bullshit’s greatest enema inducer.

Yet, why do we as sceptics (or skeptics – curse Americanese!) seem to offer nothing but negative viewpoints with regards to things that are for “entertainment purposes only“? Isn’t it immoral or wrong to remove something which makes people feel good? It’s not like its hurting anyone!

Wrong.

If you don’t believe bullshit can hurt you, consider this website. Even the seemingly simple things can get us killed. By process of induction – which none other than the great sceptic himself, David Hume, warned us about – we must be wary to blame purely the quack treatment. You’d probably associate Ayuvedic “treatments” as another silly quackery – but… Consider the case of David Flint. “David sought out ayurvedic treatments from (among others) Deepak Chopra. At one point he was told his leukemia was gone. It was not. David died four months later.”

Now, did the treatment kill him? No. But that’s not what we should be concerned about.

What about the now infamous destruction of Myanmar’s economy? The summary on Whatstheharm:

General Ne Win’s astrologer and numerologist told him his lucky number was 9 and he would live to be 90 if he was surrounded by 9s. He reissued the currency in multiples of 9 causing mayhem and new insurgencies. He resigned within a year.

Do we blame astrology for it? No.

But, what we do blame are those who peddle these things, astrology, ayuverdic medicine, Christian science and so on – as actually yielding scientifically positive results. And by that, I mean the notion of the scientific method which,

can teach us nothing else beyond how facts are related to, and conditioned by, each other

In the same paragraph, Einstein writes “It is equally clear that knowledge of what is does not open the door directly to what should be.” It has a nice subtle echoing ring off and of Hume’s Fork:

All objects of human reason or enquiry may naturally be divided into two kinds …Relations of Ideas, and Matters of Fact. Of the first kind are the sciences of Geometry, Algebra, and Arithmetic; and in short, every affirmation which is either intuitively or demonstratively certain. That the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the square of the two sides, is a proposition which expresses a relation between these figures … Propositions of this kind are discoverable by the mere operation of thought, without dependence on what is anywhere existent in the universe. Though there never were a circle or triangle in nature, the truths demonstrated by Euclid would for ever retain their certainty and evidence.

Matters of fact, which are the second objects of human reason, are not ascertained in the same manner; nor is our evidence of their truth, however great, of a like nature with the foregoing. The contrary of every matter of fact is still possible; because it can never imply a contradiction, and is conceived by the mind with the same facility and distinctness, as if ever so conformable to reality. That the sun will not rise tomorrow is no less intelligible a proposition, and implies no more contradiction than the affirmation, that it will rise. We should in vain, therefore, attempt to demonstrate its falsehood. Were it demonstratively false, it would imply a contradiction, and could never be distinctly conceived by the mind. [emphasis mine]

My apologies for the extensive quotation but, where a better writer can say his or her thoughts, I must give way. In this sense, we must question and attempt falsification (Indeed, such is the basis for Karl Popper’s The Logic of Scientific Discovery). Why then this focus, from matters which we can know and matters which need to be falsified? Why apply this to quackery and snake-oil merchants?

As sceptics we must use the power of reason, the weapon of Ockham, and the open-mindedness of a teetering cup: just open enough not to let the contents spill. But the question arises, again, why should we critique or stand against charlatans?

People lose money, lives, health and gain suffering, debilitation and overall a nuanced view of life. There is much beauty in the scientific world, in the materialistic “mundane” potentially evidence-based world we sceptics live in. We are proud to defend reason and fight for truth. We do not accept things as a given, but judge them according to their claims and whether they live up to them.

Even now, one might dismiss this ideological notion. Where does our complacency come from? I believe, it comes from scepticism itself. As AC Grayling, in his book Scepticism and the Possibility of Knowledge, says:

The sceptic, in other words, has adopted the habiliments of relativism. Relativism, indeed, is the ultimate form of scepticism, because it challenges us to justify, as a whole, the scheme within which mundane judgments get their content and have their life.

Grayling is focused on the subtler pretext of philosophical implementations of scepticism. But, we can for our use perhaps extend this to our view of adopting strategies that we would otherwise think idiotic! The position of the stars, moon and planets can tell us something about your personality, your future, your life, your beloved? Hogwash. By looking at the lines and marks of your palm, we can tell everything about you. Further hogwash. These beautiful cards each represent an aspect of you. We can try detect your angel-guide, who is with you and protecting you… And so the list grows, like weeds blocking out the little flame. Wouldn’t we all love Ockham’s Razor to slice them down?

I recall a parable of Schopenhauer’s: “A rose always has thorns, but a thorn does not always have a rose.” Indeed, some idiotic schemes in the past may have led the way to beneficence. But now, we understand the methodologies to test whether the claims are true. We can say whether these crystals work. We can test astrology, as has been done many times.

We disprove these things – to a great degree – but people continue to use them, listen to the advice of “sages” who know nothing about medicine or nutrition (need I remind anyone of Patrick Holford?), and ignore our warnings. Niall Ferguson also questioned this, in his treatise on the evil of the 20th century. He says, in The War of the World: “Megalomaniacs may order men to invade Russia, but why do the men obey?”

And I think it is our horrid past of relativism. The paradox of being sceptical of the sceptics: How can you know it doesn’t work for them? Maybe their ancient art of x, y, or z, does work for them, but your scientific/materialist/Western/colonialist view is simply arrogant if you think it’s better.

Well I think its high time we do away with this silly notion. I think it’s high time we actually “stick our noses in” and point out the man behind the curtain. I think it’s time we continue to fight against the purveyors of Counterknowledge and bullshit. To quote Ibn Warraq on the notion of interfering with “alien” or other cultures:

The British intervened in the affairs of an alien culture and abolished the ancient tradition of suttee, whereby a widow had to throw herself on the funeral pyre of her husband. This must be considered a step forward in the lot of the women and the moral progress of mankind.

Some intelligent critics might say it was not better at all to intervene. The woman might face scorn, rejection and so on for not performing suttee. Thus her life is actually worse – but I say, it’s life nonetheless. The potential is snuffed out by the fires of her husband’s pyre. But I’d be interested as always for responses to any of the claims I make.

It seems then, that our natural past in leaving the “natives to their native traditions” or the savages to their savage views, is now long dead. We have means of repeating objectively verifiable data in the world. We can get to the truth, in a way that can benefit our fellow man. One might hasten to call it truth and Truth – but I don’t really care what you call that which is repeatable and demonstrable to everyone.

Claims of the charlatans are not true. And we should not be treating or paying for something which is packaged as true, but which demonstrably is not.

These charlatans and the snake-oil merchants and the quack-doctors and the bullshit merchants, need to come under the gaze of those who care about humanity. We need to stop allowing people to think Tarot readings are true in the same way Einstein’s prediction’s were true; we need to alert them to the better, broader world which awaits their grasp. This is not arrogance and I don’t mean us to charge into every person’s house who gazes into a crystal ball; or rob every one who loves relaxing with acupuncture. I simply mean we should not be afraid to point out the green man, with the smoke, making the giant head. We, as sceptics, do this for the benefit of all. Indeed, I would love nothing more than for there to be psychic powers that heal. How great would it be to utilise it … for science and medicine! It would just become another scientific method. Therefore, even those who are “against” science because they believe in psychic powers, etc. can benefit from helping to galvanise their position in the light of reason and science.

For that light is the light of all good. All the good that can shine humanity’s happiness forward. We are a young species, but we are a growing one. Every hand should be used to raise that flame of reason a little higher. It can only shed its light on us all.

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