On Skepticism, Faith, and Tactics with Claire Klingenberg
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): Medium (Personal)
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2018/08/01
Claire has a background in law and psychology, and is currently working on her degree in Religious Studies. She has been involved in the skeptic movement since 2013 as co-organizer of the Czech Paranormal Challenge. Since then, she has consulted on various projects, where woo & belief meets science. Claire has spoken at multiple science&skepticism conferences and events. She also organized the European Skeptics Congress 2017, and both years of the Czech March for Science.
Her current activities include chairing the European Council of Skeptical Organisations, running the “Don’t Be Fooled” project (which provides free critical thinking seminars to interested high schools), contributing to the Czech Religious Studies journal Dingir, as well as to their online news in religion website. In her free time, Claire visits various religious movements to understand better what draws people to certain beliefs.
Claire lives in Prague, Czech Republic, with her partner, and dog.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: What is a problem of the skeptics’ movement?
Claire Klingenberg: The skeptic movement is caught at the moment in the idea that it is by skeptics and for skeptics. It is comfortable to live in our bubble. However, we will not get far if we are afraid to talk to people with a very different opinion.
It is important to find a common platform to discuss things. Otherwise, we will not be able to evolve if we do not talk to people with an opposite opinion. It is our duty to speak respectfully with people who are believers and even people who are conspiracy theorists [Laughing].
Even if their conspiracy has direct consequences, it is not simply about the people we are talking with, but the people who are hearing the conversation. If we look to dogmatic, aggressive, and if we stay within our comfort zone, we won’t attract the in-between people, all the people between the skeptics and the other extremes, believers, conspiracy theorists. I think it is really important that we invite speakers from different belief groups to our meetings, or hold talks with them.
Of course, those talks have to be moderated to make sure the conversation stays respectful. That is something we skeptics really have to work on.
Jacobsen: What has been one lesson taken from someone who holds a faith that has something you have not considered before?
Klingenberg: I study religion. I study comparative religion. One of my professors, who has greatly influenced my thought, is a Christian. From him, I learned to respect people with widely opposite beliefs, and be able to work with myself and with my ego, and to be able to push aside my opinion [Laughing] so I can actually hear, for a moment, what the other person is telling me, not what I think they are.
Because I go and visit the different religious groups and, what some people might call, cults, it doesn’t make sense to be combative. You really have to learn to listen. I would say that learning to listen is the greatest thing I ever learned from someone of faith.
Jacobsen: When I talked to Faisal Saeed Al Mutar, a prominent former Muslim, he noted that in discussions different strategies work for different groups in terms of efficacy.
If you take someone who is an extremist but does not want to be in it and is questioning it, you can have a conversation. However, if you take someone who fully believes in extremist and terrorist interpretations or versions of a religion, that person will be very unlikely to listen to any argumentation.
So, an emotional appeal may be appropriate there. That is where a bridge can be built. Do you think that matches personal experience as well? Although, I do not know if you have been in contact with people on the far end.
Klingenberg: Definitely, not in such an extreme, fortunately, I never had to communicate with someone who had such radical beliefs, but I work with true believers in supernatural phenomena.
You do find out this quite quickly. Even though you have the arguments, logic, and statistics on your side that is not going to work. You have to be able to communicate with that person on the level the person is willing to communicate on.
Sometimes, you need to use emotional arguments and appeals, even as a skeptic it goes against what you hold dear. Sometimes, you have to commit logical fallacies such as appeal to emotion to get the person listening.
When that person starts listening to you and starts taking you seriously as a discussion partner, then you can start to have a discussion.
Jacobsen: Thank you for the opportunity and your time, Claire.
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