
What happens when social media manipulation targets religious faith? - longdefeat
https://www.thedailybeast.com/inside-the-secret-facebook-war-for-mormon-hearts-and-minds
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seren
What is interesting at the meta level is that some faiths, notably the
Mormons, have a duty to proselytize, so if Facebook ad targeting is an
efficient way to convert unbelievers, it becomes a moral duty to use Facebook
ads rather than sending missionaries.

This also sounds slightly nightmarish once every faith will start bidding wars
for some piece of your soul.

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bargl
I can see a way that the Mormon church goes down that path, but the
proselytize is typically a one on one nature by going on a mission rather than
billboards. It does happen I've seen Ads for the LDS Church before (you'll
never see one for Mormons).

I think the "moral duty" portion comes in on an individual basis within the
church so it's a character building exercise to spread the faith as well as a
moral duty. I can definitely see what you mean though there could easily be
some interpretations that lead to Ads.

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SketchySeaBeast
> I can see a way that the Mormon church goes down that path, but the
> proselytize is typically a one on one nature by going on a mission rather
> than billboards. It does happen I've seen Ads for the LDS Church before
> (you'll never see one for Mormons).

I thought the two titles (LDS and Mormon) were basically synonymous?

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andyv
They are, but "Mormon" is being phased out in favor of "LDS".

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cmroanirgo
I had a dyslexic moment and read this as

> "Mormon" is being phased out in favor of "LSD".

Which is also very true at societal level.

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SketchySeaBeast
"Buckle up kids, church is about to get weird."

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smcameron
I think that while targeting specific faiths like this is interesting,
targeting the very concept of faith itself is more interesting. What is faith?
After more than a decade of thinking about it, I've concluded that what it
means to _exercise faith_ is to _deliberately attempt to be more certain about
something than the available evidence warrants._

As such, faith is _inherently dishonest_ , in that it involves lying to
yourself about how certain you should be, and that faith is not a virtue, but
a vice.

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DoofusOfDeath
Everybody _could_ have a different definition of the word "faith", so perhaps
there's some homework required every time you want a meaningful discussion on
the topic.

In traditional Christian theology, my understanding is that it's the
willingness to live one's life on the premise that various propositions are in
fact true. So in that context, exercising faith isn't some form of mental
gymnastics; it's a willingness to bet everything on the hope that those
propositions are true.

I wouldn't call that definition of faith inherently dishonest. I think it as a
decision about how to proceed in the face of uncertainty.

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kup0
_A willingness to bet everything on the hope that those propositions are true_
, to me, seems essentially equivalent to _deliberately attempting to be more
certain about something than the available evidence warrants_

And it does seem willfully intellectually dishonest to do that, no matter how
you frame it. I say this as someone that was a believer for 20+ years and is
no longer.

That said, I am not ascribing a value to whether "being intellectually
dishonest" is always dangerous or bad for everyone. Overall I'd be inclined to
say yes, at some deep/base level.

But, it depends on the person and the way they use it. There are plenty of
caring people I know that are religious, and in some ways, they use that faith
to inspire them to do good things. There is always another side to that coin,
though.

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DoofusOfDeath
> And it does seem willfully intellectually dishonest to do that, no matter
> how you frame it.

That's really interesting to me. Can you elaborate on what about that strikes
you as dishonest?

To me, that kind of decision in the face of uncertainty is a normal
occurrence. For example, in college I had to pick _some_ major, and despite
uncertainty regarding what would give me the happiest life, I went with
computer science.

Or to use a more well-worn example, when my wife tells me that she loves me, I
admit there's the possibility that she's wrong, but as far as making decisions
in life, I'm willing to assume she's telling the truth.

Neither of those two examples strike me as dishonest in any way, and the seem
to fit the definition I gave.

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kup0
Questions of evidence and trust (or trust vs. faith) complicate our
conversation, I think.

If you have consistent, major evidence that your wife does not love you, then
it would be intellectually dishonest to believe she does. Some religious faith
does the equivalent of this- believing in spite of evidence.

The way you're framing "faith" to me is closer to what I would consider
"trust" which IMHO is basically faith of future truth based on current
evidence of said truth.

Of course, the final wrench, is believers have sources that they think are
evidence (holy books)- but that faux-evidence is not the kind I am
referencing.

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GnwbZHiU
“Why did Joseph marry a 14 year old girl?”

Ex-Muslims can do similar thing with "Why did Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) marry a
6 year old girl?"

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creaghpatr
Good luck doing that campaign but for Islam on Facebook.

