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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Professor Wagstaff)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: What is a religion: American Heritage exposed.
Message-ID: <742@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 22-Mar-85 11:55:44 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.742
Posted: Fri Mar 22 11:55:44 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 23-Mar-85 03:46:13 EST
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Organization: Huxley College
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> OKAY, Rich, we've seen clearly that you firmly believe that ``religion''
> only refers to deistic systems.
> We've seen that your authority is the American Heritage Dictionary, and
> you seem not to be interested in the definitions of other dictionaries.
> (Even though the AmHer is not all *that* authoritative...)

As I mentioned, compare the way AmHer (vs. Webster's) defines terms like
"scientism".  Webster's definition is clearly a biased judgmental one,
in which it is called "an exaggerated trust", something Wingate, who is
clearly biased against "scientism" might agree, but hardly qualifying as
unbiased.  Compare that to AmHer.  Also, compare the two dictionaries'
definitions of "miracle".

> But when I looked up Buddhism (a non-theistic whateverthehellitis) in
> *my* copy of AmHer (1979), it states:
> 	Buddhism: 1. The doctrine atrributed to.... 2. The *religion* of
> 	eastern and central asia... (Emphasis is mine.)
> And when I looked up Taoism in the same book
> 	Taoism: A principle philosophy and *religion* of China based on
> 	the teachings of Lao Tzu...

Thus, you've shown that the mislabelling I've referred to does exist.  If 
a dictionary defined purple and mistakenly called turquoise a shade of purple,
would that make it so?

> You know, Houghton-Mifflin has a department which handles errors;
> you really ought to write them a letter about the bad definition of
> religion.

I'm not the one who thinks the definition of religion, either in the
dictionary or in common usage, is "bad".  Who is any of us to claim that
a common usage *definition* is "bad"?

> Alternatively, you must argue now that Buddhism and Taoism *do*
> have a deity; you must have a considerably better authority than
> a dictionary for that to convince me, as I have been a Buddhist
> for some years, have taught both Buddhist and Taoist religions at
> college level, and have yeears of sutra-study.

1) I make statements about religion in an article.
2) Laura says:  "Why did you make those comments when they don't apply to my
   religion, which doesn't have a god?"
3) I say: "I didn't make comments about your beliefs.  I was referring to
   religions, those belief systems which have worship/concepts of a supernatural
   deity."
4) Laura: "How dare you make those comments about my religion.  They're false.
   What's more my religion doesn't have a god!"
5) I go back to definitions.
6) You [Charlie Martin] and others:  but you're wrong in telling Laura that
   her belief system is not a religion.  In fact, it would seem that it fits
   the definition in the broad sense anyway."
7) Me:  "Fine.  If that's true, can we get back to the original discussion???"

> This sort of thing is why I stopped reading net.religion...

How do you stop reading it yet continue writing to it?  And in response to
something you haven't read (??)
-- 
Anything's possible, but only a few things actually happen.
					Rich Rosen    pyuxd!rlr