Based Camp: Is a Secular Religion Possible?

In this thought-provoking discussion, Malcolm and Simone explore whether it's possible to craft an enduring secular religion or culture. They analyze why previous attempts failed and the need for cohesion beyond scientific truth. Malcolm argues adapting beliefs while avoiding dogma is key. Simone stresses traditions that create belonging. They agree combining strong community with fluid science may succeed where others faltered.

Malcolm: [00:00:00] And this has happened throughout histories where people essentially deify the secular understanding of the world at the time. And then, our understanding of the world moves forwards, it begins to look ridiculous, and it gets thrown out.

Malcolm: This is why only the most conservative in terms of sticking was the original way of viewing the text, or the original way of practicing a religion. Typically those are the iterations that survive, rather than the ones that try to adapt. But, then there's the other problem, which was the other thing that some groups did, is they say, Well, we will just outsource our metaphysical understanding of the universe.

Malcolm: To the scientists, the scientific institutions. But after the scientific institutions became infected with this, a progressive memetic virus it began to care less and less about truth.

Malcolm: It basically became a tool for just infecting and injecting other cultures with this progressive memetic virus.

Malcolm: The problem is, is the internet exists now. Engaging with technology is intrinsically [00:01:00] caustic to systems that try to tell people about a metaphysical framework for reality that's

Simone: wrong

Malcolm: I think that many of these older systems that can only compete by telling people not to engage with technology, which I think is going to be an increasingly successful strategy.

Malcolm: Yeah, they'll continue existing in the future, but they won't have economic power. Because technology is critical to massive economic power and military power to an extent. So even if you're a smaller cultural group, if you're the cultural group that is engaging readily with AI in a way that isn't decreasing fertility rates you are going to just dramatically outcompete cultural groups that have been able to keep their fertility rates high.

Malcolm: By disengaging from the internet, disengaging from AI, disengaging from cell phones, disengaging from genetic research.

Simone: Okay, but Malcolm, I still think you're totally missing the beat here.

Would you like to know more?

Simone: Hello, Malcolm. I am keen to talk with you today about , maybe one of the stupidest [00:02:00] projects we've ever taken on in our lives, because we are trying to do something that it doesn't seem anyone has really successfully done

Malcolm: ever yet. Well, one of my pushbacks is going to be, I think you're wrong there. Okay.

Malcolm: But what

Simone: we're gonna talk about

Malcolm: is Yes, and we're gonna talk about to save society, one of our thesis is you need to create an intergenerationally durable culture. That is resistant to the current technological environment that we live in, you know, whether it's online dating or modernity or the medic viruses that exist online and the initial pushback.

Malcolm: We often get from conservative groups is why don't you just adapt one of the existing conservative traditions that has been able to do this historically? And our answer is twofold. The first is that I don't think I've seen any other than maybe Judaism that seems durably resistant [00:03:00] to the current social and technological environment that doesn't have quickly falling fertility rates.

Malcolm: But even they, the, parts of Judaism that have the highest fertility rate still are often the most technophobic forms of it. So they are the least engaged with industry and technology. Which is not something I want for my family or their descendants. I mean, many people would say, you can't have these two things together, right?

Malcolm: No, I just think no one has intentionally created a culture that can work alongside this. But then the question becomes, historically... Well, why haven't intentionally created, and when we call a culture secular, what I mean is it has broadly concurrent views with the scientific community about how sort of metaphysics in the world exists.

Malcolm: It believes in evolution and particle physics and the Big Bang and all of that, and it updates those beliefs as new discoveries happen. So first this idea that no one has done this before, I think, is wrong. [00:04:00] I think, in many ways, you could think of the Catholic Church as one. The Catholic Church had a system for recognizing scientific discoveries, even when they were initially declared to go against biblical doctrine, you know, whether it's the earth isn't the center of the universe anymore.

Malcolm: It took them. A really long time to recognize them longer than it probably should have and it slowed down the advancement of these types of scientific inquiries through generally offering no reward mechanism for, , updating these heuristics, but he did have the ability

Malcolm: to eventually incorporate these scientific discoveries, I mean, you could, you could even

Simone: argue actually that the slowness of adoption was a feature, not a bug, because if you are having a culture adapt with the times or adapt with science, it's important that you not. Jump on every latest potential discovery or trend, right?

Simone: I mean, that could be really damaging.

Malcolm: I'm sure. Yeah [00:05:00] But to be a culture that has any level of adaption to this If you are a traditional religious group, you typically have to be a centralized and hierarchical religious group So, for example, both Catholics and Mormons would be able to incorporate new discoveries into their religion pretty easily if they wanted to.

Malcolm: And in many ways, you know, they benefit from being conservative in how they do this, but they could. Whereas most Protestant traditions, because they're decentralized, Most Islamic traditions, because they're decentralized, and most Jewish traditions, because they're decentralized. If they are of the, stricter iterations of those, they're not going to be able to, because they are basing their tradition on older texts.

Malcolm: Or they're, they're not always going to be able to. Now, there are some cultural groups that are more accelerationist within these decentralized cultural groups. Okay? Classically Calvinist, or what? I mean, if you read Puritan Spotting, which Scott Alexander wrote, , which is about Calvinist stereotypes and this is the older form of [00:06:00] Calvinist, not this newer cosplay, I'm theologically Calvinist, but not cultural Calvinist, you know, he'll say things like, oh, yeah, plus one point if they're an atheist, deist, or freethinker, you know.

Malcolm: Plus three points if they wrote a book about their heterodox religious views. Plus three points if they invented a new religion. Plus three points if they invented a new Christian heresy. Plus three points if they're obsessed with religious tolerance. Plus three points if they wrote a list of virtues.

Malcolm: Plus three points if they had plans to anesthetize the eschaton. That's trying to create a utopian Okay, okay, okay, okay, we get it. Okay, no, but the point