Category: Atheism

A couple of days ago the Bishop of Oxford wrote an op-ed piece for the Observer asserting (but not arguing) that “Science does not challenge my faith – it strengthens it”. Most of the piece is devoted to attacking what he called “the current bout of media atheism”, and arguing that we should concentrate on the best of religion, not the worst. Fair enough. In today’s Comment is Free, James Randerson responds head-on. “Surely the best justification for having God in your life is that it gives you a set of moral rules to live by,” he says – and then goes on to point out that in practice there is a strong positive correlation between religious belief and violent, anti-social behaviour. Hmmm. He concludes:

On their own, these studies aren’t good enough to proves that religion is the source of all these social problems – although it is tempting to think that it might be. But it kicks the idea that faith makes for a better and more moral society firmly into touch. So if even the best arguments for religion are found wanting, we’re inevitably left asking what is God for? To those of us who reject faith, the idea that without God we are incapable of behaving morally is the most offensive and patronising myth peddled by religion.
Which of these is the better person, I would ask? The atheist who practices “Christian” values because he has decided of his own free will that kindness and consideration for others are the best way to live his life, or the believer, whose moral actions are carried out with half an eye on reward in Heaven or punishment in Hell?

But that’s not what prompted me to blog about this. I was reading the comments on Randerson’s piece, and a reader with the nom de plume andrewthomas100 posted a link to a wonderful lecture by Steven Weinberg that I hadn’t seen before. Money quote:

The question that seems to me to be worth answering, and perhaps not impossible to answer, is whether the universe shows signs of having been designed by a deity more or less like those of traditional monotheistic religions—not necessarily a figure from the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, but at least some sort of personality, some intelligence, who created the universe and has some special concern with life, in particular with human life. I expect that this is not the idea of a designer held by many here. You may tell me that you are thinking of something much more abstract, some cosmic spirit of order and harmony, as Einstein did. You are certainly free to think that way, but then I don’t know why you use words like ‘designer’ or ‘God,’ except perhaps as a form of protective coloration.

And then he systematically and patiently demolishes one piece of special pleading after another. His treatment of the various “anthropic” arguments is particularly thorough. Recommended.

Andrew Sullivan finally realizes that there’s real discrimination against atheists here in the USA. He quotes Volokh:

In 2000, the Mississippi Supreme Court ordered a mother to take her child to church each week, reasoning that ‘it is certainly to the best interests of [the child] to receive regular and systematic spiritual training’; in 1996, the Arkansas Supreme Court did the same, partly on the grounds that weekly church attendance, rather than just the once-every-two-weeks attendance that the child would have had if he went only with the other parent, provides superior ‘moral instruction’.

And he concludes:

Imagine if Christian parents were denied custody because of their faith. O’Reilly would have weeks of programming. But atheists? Naah. When Christianists declare that they are fighting for religious freedom, bring this issue up. It will determine whether they are in good faith, so to speak, or not.

N.b.: the whirring sound you hear is Thomas Jefferson spinning in his grave.

Andrew Sullivan sounds surprised that “if you are an American Christian, you are more likely to support torture than if you are an atheist or agnostic.” But I bet he won’t think through the implications of this…
UPDATE: At least he recognizes part of the problem. Somebody must have sent him the “most mistrusted minority” report. But I still don’t think he can join the dots….

My mother just called me from Oxford to tell me about an interview with Dan Dennett by Tim Adams in last Sunday’s Observer. Good reading – check it out. (She also told me about the discussion in BBC Radio 4’s Start The Week yesterday, including Dennett, Dawkins, and the Bishop of Oxford. However I was ahead of her: Alec had tipped me off, and I’d already downloaded the MP3.)

Excellent op-ed piece in today’s NYT by Slavoj Zizek entitled Defenders of the Faith. His thesis is that for Muslims living in the west, the freedom to practice their beliefs comes from liberal, secular values. Money quote:

More than a century ago, in “The Brothers Karamazov” and other works, Dostoyevsky warned against the dangers of godless moral nihilism, arguing in essence that if God doesn’t exist, then everything is permitted. The French philosopher Andre Glucksmann even applied Dostoyevsky’s critique of godless nihilism to 9/11, as the title of his book, “Dostoyevsky in Manhattan,” suggests.
This argument couldn’t have been more wrong: the lesson of today’s terrorism is that if God exists, then everything, including blowing up thousands of innocent bystanders, is permitted – at least to those who claim to act directly on behalf of God, since, clearly, a direct link to God justifies the violation of any merely human constraints and considerations.

Exactly. This runs straight into what’s called The Divine Command Theory of morality. But as Zizek argues, Hume got it right:

Fundamentalists do what they perceive as good deeds in order to fulfill God’s will and to earn salvation; atheists do them simply because it is the right thing to do. Is this also not our most elementary experience of morality? When I do a good deed, I do so not with an eye toward gaining God’s favor; I do it because if I did not, I could not look at myself in the mirror. A moral deed is by definition its own reward. David Hume, a believer, made this point in a very poignant way, when he wrote that the only way to show true respect for God is to act morally while ignoring God’s existence.

And as he concludes,

The paradox is that Muslims’ only real allies are not those who first published the caricatures for shock value, but those who, in support of the ideal of freedom of expression, reprinted them.

Not that I’m worried about money, but if I was, here’s one way I could raise a few bucks.

I’ve just finished reading Dan Dennett’s new book, Breaking the Spell : Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. Overall, it’s an excellent book, and I highly recommend it. As for a full review, I couldn’t do better than the one in The Economist. (I’ve also seen some awful reviews and interviews which completely miss the point of the book. Dan anticipated this, and on p.412 he notes that he has “made a list of the passages in this book most likely to be ripped out of context and used deliberately to misrepresent my position… I am keeping my list… sealed and ready to release.” I can guess what may be included.)
The book’s divided into three sections. The first three chapters (together with two appendices) set forth the justification for a rational (naturalistic, scientific) study of religion. I suspect that atheists like me will find this rather too obvious and long-winded, but perhaps Dan’s careful approach is warranted for those who subscribe to those faiths which discourage introspection. Please don’t skip over the second appendix (“Some More Questions About Science”); it includes some powerful points and elegant metaphors.
The middle section of five chapters (plus two appendices) presents a collections of theories (or at least hypotheses and questions for further study) on how religion might have evolved. It’s interesting to see how prescient William James was, and Dennett repeatedly returns to “The Varieties…” and other Jamesian material. Indeed much of this section is a synthesis of the work of many others, and although Dan contributes many original insights, he rarely draws attention to them. I enjoyed this section a lot; I found myself re-reading various passages just for the pleasure of re-living the “aha!” moments. A modest version of memetics is proposed, but the main thread – language, intentional world-models, death, shamans and hypnosis, guilds, and the rise of institutional religion – doesn’t hang on one’s attitude to memes. The simple question underlying all adaptation and selection – cui bono?, who benefits – is what drives the development of Dennett’s thesis.
The last three chapters on “Religion Today” are… well, frustrating. The overarching question is “so what should we all DO about all of this?”, and while I agreed with almost every point that Dan makes, I can’t see how we make progress. Yes, we should brush aside traditional “Philosophy of Religion” approaches. Yes, we should all talk, respectfully and openly – but how do you include those whose faith is systematically invulnerable? Yes, it’s deeply frustrating that religious moderates seem unwilling or unable to challenge the extremists in their own tradition. Yes, you can demonstrate the logical inconsistency of those who demand the respect that they are unwilling to grant to others – but so what? Perhaps for those of us that live in countries with liberal democratic traditions some of Dan’s ideas may be useful in working to defend those traditions, but when it comes to Islam reforming itself, or the challenge of disaffected youth in China, I suspect larger forces will be involved.
But perhaps contemporary events have left me too pessimistic. And if there’s one quality that permeates this book, it’s Dan’s optimism. We can understand these matters, if we can just shed the taboos that inhibit our natural curiosity. And we should, because knowledge is better than fear and ignorance. Cui bono? Everybody….

Very witty spoof interview between Brian Lamb and Paul of Tarsus. Final exchange:
BRIAN: What are your long range plans? Any future scrolls in the works?
PAUL: Well, as I say in the letters, the world is going to end shortly… so there wouldn’t really be much point.
BRIAN: The world’s going to end?
PAUL: Yes.
BRIAN: Now, did you write that to sell scrolls or do you really believe it?
PAUL: I believe it.
BRIAN: Is it going to end soon?
PAUL: We are living in the final days.
BRIAN: You’re sure?
PAUL: Oh yes! Many alive today will witness the end of the world. This is as absolutely and undeniably true as anything else I have written.
BRIAN: Paul Of Tarsus, thank you.

Here’s Penn Jillette’s contribution to the NPR series this i believe. Forget about the subtle distinctions between positve atheism, negative atheism, agnosticism, and so forth: Penn just cuts to the chase. “I believe there is no God.” He expresses my belief exactly, but more wittily and with a bigger audience 😉 Key quote:

Believing there’s no God stops me from being solipsistic. I can read ideas from all different people from all different cultures. Without God, we can agree on reality, and I can keep learning where I’m wrong. We can all keep adjusting, so we can really communicate. I don’t travel in circles where people say, ‘I have faith, I believe this in my heart and nothing you can say or do can shake my faith.’ That’s just a long-winded religious way to say, ‘shut up,’ or another two words that the FCC likes less. But all obscenity is less insulting than, ‘How I was brought up and my imaginary friend means more to me than anything you can ever say or do.’ So, believing there is no God lets me be proven wrong and that’s always fun. It means I’m learning something.

(Via Susan.)

Charles Krauthammer had an excellent piece in the Washington Post, entitled Phony Theory, False Conflict, on the farce of intelligent design. Money quote: “The school board thinks it is indicting evolution by branding it an ‘unguided process’ with no ‘discernible direction or goal.’ This is as ridiculous as indicting Newtonian mechanics for positing an ‘unguided process’ by which Earth is pulled around the sun every year without discernible purpose. What is chemistry if not an ‘unguided process’ of molecular interactions without ‘purpose’?”

As I’ve always said, creationists and ID’ers aren’t simply attacking evolution. They may not realize it (since they seem to have difficulty with logic), but they are taking on all of science – evolution, biology, chemistry, physics, geology, astrophysics, mechanics…. And ironically, by turning their backs on science they are rejecting the principles that underpin the technologies (radio, TV, computer networks) that they use to spread their ignorant blather.

Now I know that I’m not “supposed” to belittle these people. I’m supposed to treat their (presumably genuine) religious beliefs with respect. (Next thing you know, someone will hail their views as a “different way of knowing” – ugh!) But they are ignorant, in much the same way that a witchdoctor is ignorant of antibiotics and by-pass surgery. As a species, we have collectively learned important things about the world, and in many cases this knowledge has superseded earlier beliefs. For example, anyone who still thinks that epilepsy is caused by demonic possession is, quite simply, ignorant, and we expect that a parent who uses physical force to “drive out the demon” in their epileptic child will be arrested for child abuse. To fail to call the believers in creationism what they are – ignorant – is either patronizing or hypocritical.

(Via Sully.)