A Physical Basis for Religion

These comments are in response to:

Religion: Biological Accident, Adaptation — or Both

"Taken together, the neurological states evoked by the questions are known to cognitive scientists as the Theory of Mind: They underlie our understanding that other people have minds, thoughts and feelings."

OK, so our thoughts about God are related to our understanding that others have minds, thoughts and feelings. Doesn't this mean that people who believe in God relate to God in a similar way that they relate to other human beings? No real surprise here then. So, believing in God works under fundamental processes. The only "strange" thing about it is that this relationship is with someone (imagined or not) who is not visible. Researchers could go on and demonstrate that children who have a relationship with an invisible friend have the same parts of the brain activated. What this means is that we are perfectly able to consider ourselves in relationship with a being that is not physically present.

The problem with the article (especially the title) and much of the reported comment is that it starts by assuming that the physical is the only thing that exists. This is an interesting assumption, but is an assumption nonetheless. Good science starts by stating assumptions.

How about starting instead with the assumption that the material is not all that there is? How about if we start by assuming that there is a consciousness that we can't measure physically? Once we do this we come to totally different conclusions (although these would still support the existence of evolution), and I would argue that we do not have tests that can rule out this premise. I am not saying that this one is right, just that it is a valid alternative that should not be dismissed. For more information from a philosophical perspective, I recommend "Why There Almost Certainly Is A God" by Keith Ward. A well-thought out book that doesn't require you to believe impossible things!

My comments on an IHT Article on skilled immigrant workers in the US returning home

The Real High-Tech Immigrant Problem: They’re Leaving

On reading the comments:
What an interesting set of discussions, wide-ranging and hitting on some good topics ,with the usual range of informed and uninformed opinions. I am an engineer, though not in IT, and I did a masters degree in the US, returned to England, and then was transferred to the US for a number of years before moving on to Hong Kong.

While I am not keen on exceptionalism and ostrich-patriotism, I think that the US has many wonderful people, some great scenery and a great constitution, and I am glad to have had the chance to live there. (End of intro)

In my experience, the US is short of engineers. I would say that this reflects the wage imbalance that is only now being addressed. Why rack up large debts to study engineering, when you can do finance or law and pay back your debts quickly? Of course, the WRONG solution is to allow short-sighted companies to simply import cheap labour from other countries, and many posters have identified this problem. However, the US has benefitted massively from immigration, and many of those complaining about immigrants are only alive because their ancestors managed to get to the US despite the actions of the "Native American" Movement of 1844 (these were British-Americans, who wanted to restrict Catholic Irish immigration) and similar anti-immigrant movements.

I agree with the poster who says that people should direct their complaints against the government and not against those on H1-Bs. Also don't forget that people with H1-Bs are a diverse group, some do indeed want to settle, some want to move home after making some money. Don't tar all with the same brush.

On the unfair advantage of "subsidised education", I believe it is true that Indians do not typically receive subsidised education. I on the other hand received a free university education in the UK. Perhaps I should therefore be the first to propose that you kick those free-loading Brits out before anyone else! Incidentally, despite the characterisation of some posters, some of the Indians who are posting have flawless English, well above the general standard of postings!

In my opinion the (current) global pre-eminence of the US can be attributed to a number of factors, and it is unwise to focus on one or two. By the second world war, the US had recovered from its crippling internal war and had learned to compete very well as a country with a large, relatively open internal market, plentiful cheap natural resources and a relatively low-cost, well-educated work-force in a business environment with legally enforceable contracts. The end of the second world war left it as the only industrialised nation without war damage, and as a major creditor nation, which allowed it to build economic strength. This, naturally enough encouraged immigration of skilled people who, together with descendants of earlier immigrants, built a strong economy, supported by ready investment. What we are seeing now, is a country that is still powerful, with a large internal market, but that is increasingly a debtor nation, with less money to invest in the future, and therefore less attractive to skilled immigrants.

So my conclusions are; remove some of the economic imbalance against engineering (i.e. don't pay gamblers for short-term returns), pay H1b engineers a market wage (which will remove some of the incentive to import people unnecessarily) and hire the best from a long-term perspective (which means treasuring expertise). Don't make it difficult for qualified people who are already committed to the US to continue to work there. Accept that there is going to be some pain in the next few years, but that moving forwards cooperatively is not necessarily a zero sum game and that it can lead to better, if not always richer, times. Look out for your neighbours and follow the Golden Rule. (How about that for an untypically British positive ending...?)