Richard Dawkins: A Knack for Bashing Orthodoxy

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/science/20dawkins.html?hp=&pagewanted=all

by dctoedt • 15 years ago

129 130 15 years ago

xavoy9• 15 years ago

I'm not a Christian, Muslim or Jew. I don't believe in God. I find it slightly unnerving that there's still religious fundamentalists out there that flatly refuse to accept scientific evidence of evolution and more, and yet...

I can't stand Richard Dawkins.

I know that there's some dangerous ideas put out there by fundamentalists, but for the most part, if they stick to themselves and are generally good people who don't interfere with others then I don't really care what they believe.

Not necessarily this article, but generally, and especially listening to him talk live (radio, conferences etc) Richard Dawkins is arrogant and pig headed. It's kind of ironic that by dedicating his life to setting them straight, Dawkins has become as much of a fundamentalist evangelist as the religious fundamentalists he spends his time mocking.

5hoom3• 15 years ago

This is pretty much my take on Richard Dawkins.

I remember when "The God Delusion" was a hot topic hearing groups of otherwise intelligent people hi-fiving each other over how smart they were because they were atheists, & how COMPLETELY WRONG religion of any kind is.

Maybe I just got all my anti-religious rage out of my system early in my life, but observing people carry on like the very fundamentalists they claim to despise (but it's ok, cuz we're secular!) is very disappointing.

logjam2• 15 years ago

I've listened to Richard Dawkins debate live several times. In no instance have I ever heard him being anything other than perfectly gracious, even when being repeatedly personally attacked, so I'm having a hard time understanding your criticism of him - which amounts to calling him names.

5hoom3• 15 years ago

Why don't you ask Rebecca Watson (co-host of The Skeptics Guide To The Universe) what she thinks of him?

There was an incident at a recent skeptics conference where Watson was accosted & hit on by an attendee in the small hours of the morning while riding an elevator.

She used her podcast & blog to describe the incident, hinting that maybe hitting on an un-escorted female in the middle of the night while the two of you are stuck in an elevator together is a good way to make said female feel vulnerable & uncomfortable.

Well, Dawkins wen't on to have a foaming at the mouth tirade about how she was carrying on like a hypothetical hysterical muslim woman who was all offended by being offered a coffee and that she should just toughen up.

He was rightly slammed by many for this, but the guy sounds like a dick to me.

[edit: in response to reply] I understand his message. I also think he was "foaming at the mouth" and a "dick". I am an atheist. I am also not so besotted by the cult of personality that I can't see past Dawkins contributions & still think he's a dick.

[edit edit: after some thought] On reflection calling Richard Dawkins a "dick" is not the right thing to do. Replace "a dick" with "an insensitive man".

chunkyslink• 15 years ago

I agree!

The man is one of the most important thinkers of our time. He is gracious and intelligent. His arguments cut with such logic that they often offend. When people have their belief systems ripped from under them there is bound to be high emotions but Dawkins handles all this brilliantly.

I think an excellent ambassador for Science.

niete5• 15 years ago

Well, feminists get upset that he does not drink their cool aid, but over all a pretty cool guy.

jamesbritt• 15 years ago

I know that there's some dangerous ideas put out there by fundamentalists, but for the most part, if they stick to themselves and are generally good people who don't interfere with others ...

If only.

When Dawkins et al get their own worldwide television networks and suitably sized fund-raising and political infrastructure then I'll entertain the idea that atheist advocates are anywhere near like that of the fundamentalists.

robertk8• 15 years ago

I agree. Here's why that will never happen (and I'm sure you know this):

Only the mistaken need proclaim their philosophy with grandiloquence. It is painful for atheists to proselytize with the only effective mechanism--propaganda--as it is a cognitive dissonance. The psychological truth is that the young mind is highly pliable and choice of religion is an axiom--unlike a formal system, the human mind has no need for internal logical consistency. For some large percentage of people, the only effective method is propaganda and indoctrination--an unfortunate irony.

jarin4• 15 years ago

It may be insensitive to be so blunt about it, but I think the longer you're an atheist the harder it gets to keep a "live and let live" attitude.

I liken it to having a friend who truly, sincerely believes in Santa Claus. At first, you might just laugh it off as a harmless quirk. But as time goes on, and every day you're hearing about Santa Claus this and he won't stop going off about whether or not he's on the Naughty or Nice list this year, you might start to tactfully point out some of the flaws in his belief.

How fast would Santa need to go to cover the entire world in one night? Why has there never been a photograph of Santa? What about people who don't celebrate Christmas?

Your friend laughs, and explains that you need to have more faith in Santa Claus, and that if you don't watch out you're going to be on the Naughty List. And now every time you go out for a drink your friend is telling people about Santa Claus, and he's posting Santa-related links on your Facebook wall. How long can you put up with that before you just snap?

stephen_g• 15 years ago

You could liken it to that, but you're using a logical fallacy (it's both a straw man and a reductio ad ridiculum).

Xetrill• 15 years ago

Being a religious fundamentalist and good person who does not interfere with others, well those don't go together, at all. If you honestly think that is possible, you should seriously rethink your stance.

Whether you tolerate them or not is meaningless, they cannot tolerate you, because of what you don't believe in.

You might wanna learn to recognize an enemy when you see one.

Edit 1: Relevant to my point (Sam Harris) http://www.youtube.com/user/Xetrill?feature=mhee#p/c/F25A63E... Edit 2: To the Rebecca Watson point (TheAmazingAtheist): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqU9JFbtucU

abless2• 15 years ago

If you're describing Dawkins as fundamentalist, then you either a) don't know much about him, and what he stands for, or b) have a grave understanding of what fundamentalism means.

It bothers me that Dawkins gets that accusation that often, when it's clearly false.

xavoy9• 15 years ago

According to Wikipedia, Fundamentalism is the "strict adherence to specific theological doctrines". According to my dictionary, the definition of theological is "Of or relating to or concerning theology". Atheism, according to Wikipedia again, is "the rejection of belief in the existence of deities." It seems to me then that I could argue that one could be an "Atheist Fundamentalist" although that wasn't my point. I was using the term liberally, and by way of analogy.

My point was that it is this stubborn adherence to a particular point of view that got Dawkins so fired up in the first place. And, although _I agree_ with Dawkins point of view, traveling the world telling people they are "idiots" for not thinking in a particular way is just as bad, or worse. Even if it is a view backed up by science.

This video posted by Hacker News member 'robertk' gives you a good idea of Dawkins general attitude: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_2xGIwQfik

adriand• 15 years ago

> I know that there's some dangerous ideas put out there by fundamentalists, but for the most part, if they stick to themselves and are generally good people who don't interfere with others then I don't really care what they believe.

It's easy to have this perspective if religious fundamentalism has not had a major impact on your life. However, if your parents were religious fundamentalists, you would likely view things in a different light (or, more likely, you'd be just as religious as them).

Mine are, and I enjoyed a childhood characterized by a morbid fear of eternal damnation, church twice weekly, private Christian school to ensure that I did not come into contact with peers from less- or non-religious households, and a total abhorrence of modern science and particularly evolution. However, my parents are intelligent people - it was not their fault they were both born into religious households - and they instilled in me a great love of reading, which backfired for them because, as a science/computer geek, I eventually started in on science books and started to question everything.

For me it was like a great window of truth opened on the world and suddenly, everything made sense - and was also so much better than I had been taught. Of course, that caused no end of problems within my family, in part because I passed along my newfound knowledge to my younger siblings. Dawkins would have been proud of me as a young adolescent.

Most of my friends from those days never read what I read, and they carry on in the same fundamentalist, "the earth is 6,000 years old and homosexuality is evil" fantasy land. And of course, they indoctrinate their children just as thoroughly as they were indoctrinated. Religion excels at that.

Meanwhile, my parents, who I love dearly, are still convinced they are both heading for an eternity burning in hell because they have yet to experience the born-again moment that Protestant Christians pine for. The problem, I think, is that they are too honest with themselves. They really just need that single powerful religious moment (aka hallucination) that they would get if they fasted for three days and prayed continually in a closet, but they haven't had it. So these dear, sweet, kind and incredibly honest and ethical people are still plagued by the morbid fear I managed to cast off as an adolescent.

Just because people are "good" doesn't mean that the religious beliefs that have taken over their lives are not damaging to the lives of others and particularly children. I would take Dawkins' earnest, educated, rational and well-meaning brand of urgent atheism over fundamentalist religion any day.

xavoy9• 15 years ago

Earnest, educated, rational. Yes, these words might describe Dawkins, but well-meaning?

I agree that indoctrination into a fundamentalist religion probably doesn't give a child the best chance at a happy, well balanced life. I think it is important that science continues to be made available, and people like Dawkins make it not only available, but easily digestible and understandable.

But seriously, running around the world, telling people they are "idiots" and to "f*ck off" if they don't see the world the way he does? Doesn't sound very well-meaning to me.

PakG12• 15 years ago

> Meanwhile, my parents, who I love dearly, are still convinced they are both heading for an eternity burning in hell because they have yet to experience the born-again moment that Protestant Christians pine for. The problem, I think, is that they are too honest with themselves. They really just need that single powerful religious moment (aka hallucination) that they would get if they fasted for three days and prayed continually in a closet, but they haven't had it.

As a Christian myself, it's sad to hear there are people who don't seem to understand what they purportedly believe. I'd love to sit down with people like your parents to discuss things, as my own knowledge of scripture is fairly advanced (and I would dare to say sound, despite knowing that many in this thread would see it as a crock of BS). But I do fear that type of discussion can be difficult. I've spoken with so-called fundamentalists in the past, and I find their knowledge mostly based on whims and hearsay, rather than actual scripture. Therefore, it becomes tiring if they are not willing to have a 2-way conversation.

It is ironic, because the word "fundamentalist" would indicate to me an adherence to basic fundamentals. In that case, I would call myself a devout fundamentalist, but the word unfortunately does not have that meaning in our society. I wonder why these people are called fundamentalists, and not simply extremists or something else that makes more sense.

Xurinos• 15 years ago

As a Christian... I wish everyone would agree not to call it "fundamentalism". There is nothing fundamental about the views of this subset of Christians. The term is pure marketing, wild enough for good TV and, thus, wild enough to acquire impressionable followers, and the beliefs are not fundamental.

I see the stance against evolution as just a form of We vs They, a political tool more than religious, unnecessary for Christianity at large, and damaging to the religion in the long run if it persists. I have seen it create stupidity in otherwise fairly intelligent individuals because they want to be seen as part of the group, not ostracized from their equally-susceptible peers. For similar reasons, I have had friends reject the religion entirely, as they do not want to be a part of this insanity. As for me, it is another nail in the coffin of my interest in the organization aspects.

niete5• 15 years ago

> Not necessarily this article, but generally, and especially listening to him talk live (radio, conferences etc) Richard Dawkins is arrogant and pig headed. It's kind of ironic that by dedicating his life to setting them straight, Dawkins has become as much of a fundamentalist evangelist as the religious fundamentalists he spends his time mocking.

Hardly. Dawkins can be very blunt, be he is hardly a fundamentalist. How do you think he should act?

xavoy9• 15 years ago

With compassion and respect.

He is an evolutionary biologist, so he should make what he knows about evolutionary biology available. Tell people about it, write books, grant interviews, attend conferences and seminars and host talks about his ideas. But show some respect.

At the end of the day, no matter how loopy or wacky a persons beliefs are, they deserve respect. There is just no need to go around calling people "idiots" or telling them to "fk off" if they don't want to take on his world view.

sgentle• 15 years ago

Argh. This makes my blood boil. There are many good responses to this comment but I want to address one idea in particular: the idea that by putting things in the same category you can make them equal.

It's terribly poetic to say that Dawkins, in his opposition to fundamentalism, has become a fundamentalist himself. But poetic doesn't mean true, and this particular trope abuses poetry for deceptive ends. Let us exhaust this "fundamentalism" idea. What does fundamentalism mean? Does it mean strongly believing in something? Does it mean accepting that thing as true? Am I a fundamentalist gravitarian because I tell everyone who asks that gravity is true?

Any definition of fundamentalism as "strong belief that something is true" is so common as to be useless. But that's not quite what's happening here. You might characterise a fundamentalist belief in God as one that would brook no counter-argument. A stronger definition than before: "belief that something is true that accepts no evidence to the contrary". Does Dawkins believe that? Let's ask him:

"I am no more fundamentalist when I say evolution is true than when I say it is true that New Zealand is in the southern hemisphere. We believe in evolution because the evidence supports it, and we would abandon it overnight if new evidence arose to disprove it. [...] My belief in evolution is not fundamentalism, and it is not faith, because I know what it would take to change my mind, and I would gladly do so if the necessary evidence were forthcoming."

This is from his book The God Delusion, which I infer that you haven't read. I don't blame you - I put it off until last year because I had heard that Dawkins was uppity and confrontational. I can't speak to who benefits by that impression, but it is fiction. The book is, if utterly uncompromising, extremely polite and calm in tone. Dawkins treats religion with neither kid gloves nor boxing gloves. His intent isn't to injure, it's to challenge.

It frustrates me so much that people repeat mistaken ideas like "Dawkins is a fundamentalist" even while he seems to take such great pains to make his points clear. People who are not familiar with his work or his opinions accuse him for things he's never said. To gleefully point out that a biologist and someone who mutilates female genitals for a living are both "fundamentalists" is not clever. It's a deceptive attempt to make unequal things equal by putting them in the same category.

You echo that idea in your earlier allusion that people should be left to believe what they believe. Can I label anything as a belief and therefore make it equally valid? Is a 'belief' that man was created by ejaculating into a river equally valid to a 'belief' that the total momentum within a closed system will remain constant?

We can do better, and you owe it to yourself to do better. I know disagreement isn't in vogue, and it might not win you friends at parties, but it's the intellectually honest thing to do.

Please, read Dawkins' work. Disagree with him if you like, but at least don't do it out of ignorance. Feel free to start with "Fundamentalism and the Subversion of Science", the entire chapter of The God Delusion dedicated to your "fundamentalists are equal" argument.

ellyagg• 15 years ago

Good point. I'm an atheist, but it always makes my blood boil when atheists apply false moral equivalence between the effects of different religions, as if all religions have equally bad consequences.

xavoy9• 15 years ago

I _never_ stated that Dawkins and someone who circumcises unwilling females should be compared. I never said all fundamentalists are equal. I used the word fundamentalist liberally, as I have explained elsewhere.

The comparison was made because both religious evangelists and Dawkins both believe they know what is best for someone else and would like to force that upon them.

And yes, you should be allowed to hold you own beliefs, no matter how wacky they might be, and still be respected. And you do. They mightn't be as wild or deep rooted as the world being created in six days, but you still have them. You might find that many of your beliefs aren't based on reality, or scientifically provable.

fecklessyouth• 15 years ago

Isn't the idea that the human race is progressing intellectually a remnant of Enlightenment philosophy? Espousing that is hardly bashing orthodoxy.

barry-cotter• 15 years ago

No, the idea that the human race is progressing morally is a highly contentious bit of Enlightenment philosophy. The fact that we can have this conversation over the freaking internet is ample proof that humanity is progressing intellectually, given that it requires an insane amount of distributed knowledge and capabilities that didn't exist when the Enlightenment was beginning.

TheRevoltingX4• 15 years ago

This isn't reddit, this isn't related to programming or even computers. Yes, I'm Christian and I find this guy annoying. As a programmer though, I couldn't care less about him.

freemarketteddy2• 15 years ago

this isnt the programming subreddit either....nowhere has it been ruled that Hacker News discussions will strictly be programming related....I understand that this annoys you but please dont be dogmatic!

davesims16• 15 years ago

Hacker is a state of mind, a kind of deep curiosity about how things work and what I can do about it. This topic, therefore, is about the ultimate hack...why are we here, how does the world work and what can I do about it?

odiroot• 15 years ago

We feel bad for you son.

Since we established this isn't reddit, your personal opinions on Dawkins shouldn't decide whether this article should or shouldn't be here.

TheRevoltingX4• 15 years ago

Nope, my opinion shouldn't. But the fact that he isn't hacking at anything should. Hence the comment, as a programmer I couldn't care less about him.

FD3SA3• 15 years ago

I must preface this comment with a personal note: Dr. Dawkins is the reason I understand biology, evolution, and all living things. I have read all of his books on evolution, including The Selfish Gene, The Extended Phenotype, and many others.

This being said, I have always been appalled by Dawkins' deeply ironic crusade against religion. The simplest explanation for the widespread phenomenon of organized religion is best described by none other than Dawkins himself: Religion is a vestigial extended phenotype.

Dawkins popularized the idea of an extended phenotype. This theory postulates that the phenotypic effects of genes are not restricted to a single organism. In effect, certain gene expressions could result in behaviours which affected the said gene's rate of survival. This is a profound theory, because it posits a very strong evolutionary foundation for human socialization and behaviour. As discussed in Robert Wright's "A Moral Animal", and Matt Ridley's "The Red Queen", among many other works, recent evidence has made Dawkins' extended phenotype theory extremely plausible.

Thus, if we are to analyse religion from the view that it is a set of behaviours which maximizes a set of genes' reproductive success, everything begins making a great deal of sense. Paradoxically, if Dawkins used his his own theories to explain the phenotypic phenomenon that is organized religion, he'd have the vast support network of evolutionary scientists around the globe who would provide endless empirical examples[1] to validate his theory. Yet, Dawkins continues to treat religion as a philosophy, and attempts to tackle it philosophically. As many philosophers have pointed out, this is not Dawkins' strong point and he comes off sounding like an extremely misinformed amateur at best, and an inflammatory pundit at worst.

Furthermore, it is the scientific explanation of religion which is likely to be the most useful and profound, and as Ridley, Wright, and many others have demonstrated, what we can learn from these insights are far more pertinent to the human condition than Dawkins' misplaced philosophical crusade.

I sincerely hope Dr. Dawkins sees the unbelievable irony in his approach, and addresses it promptly. As one of the most popular scientists in media today, he could reverse a great deal of enmity that various religious groups have developed towards scientists and the scientific community. Scientific illiteracy is the greatest enemy of our time, and I do believe Dawkins is making the issue much worse by inflaming the public with his misinformed rhetoric.

Science has explained every natural phenomena known to man, and its explanatory power is only growing as we gather new empirical evidence. There is a growing body of research which demonstrates that all human behaviour is guided by a deep evolutionary purpose. This is especially true of religious behaviours which are widespread and have severe fitness costs. Religious behaviours are thus best understood as a vestigial extended phenotype, and not as an ontological philosophy.

[1]. http://evolution-of-religion.com/publications/

robertk8• 15 years ago

Dawkins is perfectly aware of this. In fact, he gives arguments of your flavor in The God Delusion. See also

http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/Dawkins/viruses-of-the-mind...

He is aware that his approach is not optimal in terms of changing people's minds, but I'm not so sure he cares.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_2xGIwQfik

FD3SA3• 15 years ago

If Dawkins is aware of my points, his approach does not seem logical. The God Delusion approaches religion as a broken philosophy or a disease of the mind, not as an evolutionary phenomenon.

He does not quote any of the plethora of papers written on this subject, such as can be found here:

http://evolution-of-religion.com/publications/

A scientific approach to religious behaviour would not invoke philosophical arguments such as NOMA, or dismissive arguments such as labelling behaviours practised by the majority of the human species as a "mass delusion".

guygurari2• 15 years ago

As pointed out by others, Dawkins does consider the evolutionary mechanisms behind evolution. In The God Delusion he offers additional possible mechanisms to the one you mention. But Dawkins' goal is not to understand the mechanism by which religion came about. Rather, it is to show people that religion is both wrong and harmful.

You see, even if you find the spot in the brain that causes people to believe in God (if such a thing exists), it will not convince anyone that there is no God. The believers will simply say that God put it there. If you want to convince, logically, that there is no God, you have to do so at a philosophical level like Dawkins does. Having said that, I think it that there are more effective ways to achieve this goal than to ram people with the truth head-on like Dawkins does.

FD3SA3• 15 years ago

"religion is both wrong and harmful"

This is akin to saying that human sexuality is wrong and harmful, or male competition is wrong and harmful.

It is taking a purely evolutionary phenomenon and assigning it a nebulous moral value. Religious behaviour is a direct result of natural selection. Comparable phenomena include homosexuality and extra-marital pairing. As scientists, we cannot make value judgements on these natural phenomena. If we do so, we must clearly leave the realm of science and enter the realm of advocacy.

raptorex• 15 years ago

"Yet, Dawkins continues to treat religion as a philosophy, and attempts to tackle it philosophically. As many philosophers have pointed out, this is not Dawkins' strong point and he comes off sounding like an extremely misinformed amateur at best, and an inflammatory pundit at worst."

I've heard this before but I don't know much about religion or philosophy so to me Dawkins usually seems to make sense. Can you explain why you think he comes off as an amateur?

abredow• 15 years ago

Ha, I did not know that he had a forthcoming children's book! This should be good.

shithead• 15 years ago

Would this "bashing" be tolerated against any group other than Christians?

The 'intellectual fight' for 'enlightenment' is the thin veneer the anticlerical Jacobins lay on their murderous ideology. Loot the Church, rape the nuns, kill the christians - started here, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_the_Vend%C3%A9e, repeated too many times in many places over the last couple of centuries.

And when their legitimate heirs Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot murder a few score million people, these Jacobins start talking about the "crimes of the Inquisition".

Good going.

freemarketteddy2• 15 years ago

> Would this "bashing" be tolerated against any group other than Christians?

Yes..A lot of groups are more tolerant than Christians(on average)...but if you assume that the only 'groups' that exist are Abrahamic religions only then your hypothesis would be true.

davesims16• 15 years ago

Dawkins doesn't bother me any more than any other atheist I've read. The fact that he lives and is popular in my time makes him no more threatening to my faith than Thomas Paine, Voltaire, Lucretius, A.J. Ayer or Bertrand Russell. I know where my faith fits in the history of ideas, and I'm comfortable in the capacious intellectual house it affords me. Dawkins is amusing at best, annoying at worst. As a philosophical atheistic thinker I find he's small beer indeed and I'd rather read Nietzsche.

In my own intellectual journey (not necessarily the same as my journey of faith), I find no attraction to reductionism of any kind. It's always seemed to me a truncated worldview, artificial and strained, ignoring the real content of our deepest intuitions of meaning, beauty, love and justice. I side with Plato and Cicero contra Lucretius, Aquinas contra Bacon, etc. (yes, Bacon was a Christian, I disagree with his metaphysics). I believe the Scientific Revolution was a necessary reform on the excesses of Aristotelian Physics, but in many ways we through the baby out with the bathwater when we chucked Formal and Final causes out by fiat. But that's another discussion...

I write that preface to provide some context on what my real concern is with regards to Dawkins and the legions of young enthusiastic atheists that I run into, in person and on the web: the absolute philosophical illiteracy of so many naively confident advocates of reductionist science and the silly caricatures of faith they hold to. Mostly what I find in this generation of non-believer is not reflective, self-conscious atheism but rather an inherited, brittle and angry atheism that assumes the final triumph of reductionist materialist science has been accomplished. For these dogmatics the mere existence of faith or religion of any kind is really appalling and a cause for anger and aggression. There's simply no difference between, say, Wendell Berry and Pat Robertson, C.S. Lewis and Jerry Falwell, Dostoevsky and Fred Phelps.

It's just flat strange and saddening to me, to know that there are those who truly think that the Santa Clause analogy would have been devastating to St. Augustine or Tolstoy or Tolkien. That the existence of reflective intellectual Christians like Annie Dilliard, Flannery O' Connor or Walker Percy so long after Darwin is merely an anomaly to be ignored.

This kind of naivety makes not only for fruitless engagement across the theistic/atheistic boundaries, but for increasing hostility and social disintegration. When I read Dawkins and those that find his simplistic reductions of religion intellectually appealing, I'm not offended as a believer, I'm not threatened intellectually, but I am discouraged about the future of community. If the main participants in the the great God Debate (which is really no more acute now than at any other time in history, and probably a good bit less than late 19th Century Britain at least) don't have the intellectual resources or emotional charity required for deep engagement of such a weighty matter, then we not only have more anger, hostility and misunderstanding, but we become more impoverished in our self-understanding on both sides.

burgerbrain5• 15 years ago

"Santa Clause analogy"

"It's just flat strange and saddening to me"

This is why the analogy is used.

Not this: "would have been devastating to St. Augustine or Tolstoy or Tolkien."

It's simplistic. And as an argument against specific dogma and teachings, it is quite effective. It's not meant to make a profound philosophical statement, it's meant to elicit exactly your response. Atheists are subjected to seemingly endless shitstorms (see: banana argument, peanut-butter argument, etc), it feels good to return the favor. Most of us know that we're never going to get through, so we might as well have fun.

phuff2• 15 years ago

Not sure you understood that his point was that an atheist using the Santa Claus argument sounds like a philosophical n00b...

davesims16• 15 years ago

Not sure I follow you. Are you saying its content is simplistic (meaning an argument that oversimplifies an issue by ignoring complexities) but rhetorically useful to get a rise out of your opponent? How is that productive? This was the point I was making: all too often the specific brand atheism that Dawkins' writing seems to inspire is more interested in tweaking fundamentalists than engaging faith as such. Hell, I love to tweak fundamentalists as much as the next guy, but where does that get us? Might as well go cow-tipping...

jarin4• 15 years ago

As the person who made the Santa Claus argument, I'll say that this is spot-on.

I feel like I can hold my own in a serious discussion, but it really does get tiring making the same arguments over and over again, especially to people who tend to argue logic with non-logic.

Apologies to anyone who mistakenly saw a Q.E.D. at the end of my Santa Claus story.

naner• 15 years ago

There's simply no difference between, say, Wendell Berry and Pat Robertson, C.S. Lewis and Jerry Falwell, Dostoevsky and Fred Phelps.

Is this sarcasm? Maybe it's too late for me... Robertson, Falwell, and Phelps will be rightfully lost in the tides of history but C.S. Lewis and Dostoevsky had important things to say and conveyed them quite well. (I don't know Berry.)

I am a non believer, not quite interested enough to be an "atheist", but I never paid much attention to the arguments atheists made. They seemed contrived and unnecessary. When I attended college and started meeting people from many different backgrounds, I couldn't help noticing that there are hundreds of different faiths. Which one any given person belongs to depends more on their friends, family, and geographic location than anything else. This is pretty arbitrary for something ostensibly so important and serious. So it seemed to follow that all religions must have been made up over the years.

As the years have worn on since college I've discovered that the reason I fell out of faith so easily probably had to do with how my mind worked. Like Dawkins in this respect, I had a hard time taking theology seriously. I just though it was an offshoot of history and literature but it seems people believe there is actually some philosophical credibility to it. I can actually read texts from the history of modern religion/science (like Aquinas and Lucretius) and find them interesting but modern theology I cannot digest for some reason. So it is particularly difficult for me to engage with serious theists.

That being said, I also don't read atheist texts. Seems like a waste of time. And I don't need an encyclopedia of arguments for something that seems plainly true to me.

msg• 15 years ago

He was trying to say, leading from the preceding sentence:

"[For dogmatic people] there's no distinction between [acclaimed artist/thinker] and [Bible-thumper/wanker]. [but there is for me]"

You might have the causation exactly backwards for friends. I've heard of cases where the causation is backwards for geography too (Mormons move to Utah, evangelicals move to Colorado, Muslims move to Dearborn).

In general, sure, faiths are correlated with original geography and race and class and what have you. That isn't, however, a well-formed argument against their ultimate truth or untruth. It might be a well-formed argument about how they spread.

davesims16• 15 years ago

Sorry, I wasn't saying "there's no difference", I was lamenting that there are those who think "there's no difference."

I don't disagree with pretty much anything you've said. There's a huge geographic and societal component to religion, and that seems...undemocratic? I guess it would seem more 'fair' that every individual would arrive at their worldview purely from a 'rational' standpoint devoid of influence.

But of course it doesn't work that way for any worldview religious or otherwise. It never could work that way. Even those of us who fancy we have an 'examined life' and are attempting to be intellectually honest come at these questions with an existing interpretive framework inherited from family and society. And I don't think this is any less true of atheism or agnosticism than religion.

Nevertheless we try, right? Try to be objective, try to engage questions with honesty and courage and be as reflective as we can. Both negative and positive experiences with religion influence this. What's strange is I've met a number of Chinese over the last few years who grew up under communist, atheist rule and are now disenchanted with it, and deeply curious about religion and Christianity in particular.

What does it mean? Not sure. What to do? Not sure there either. I seem to have faith, you don't. I don't know what that means. I see the world a certain way, I can't help it. I like exploring and articulating that worldview, I want to have as much integrity within it as I can, I know that there are certain points of view that I disagree with, but ultimately, to quote David Byrne -- how did I get here? That remains mysterious and pretty humbling to me.

drivebyacct22• 15 years ago

I've never once see an Atheist imply that Phelps and Lewis should be judged equally, just as I've never even conceived of someone dismissing someone's accomplishments purely because of their faith. Likewise, I'd like to thank you for reinforcing the notion that Atheists are angry. As one who feels persecuted, I often do feel angry about it. But to assume that I'm not versed in religious, theological, or philosophical texts is irritating. Have you ever actually engaged these people you refer to, to explore if they have this depth of knowledge you seem to require them to have to have an opinion?

Are you equally scathing of the millions that vote to keep me from having rights because their preacher on Sunday that they blindly listen to, tell them I'm a filthy sinner? Ignorance is not unique to any side, and well-versed-ness is not a requirement for having an opinion. And from where I'm sitting, Robertson, Lewis, Falwell, Phelps, the Greeks, the Romans, they all make the same fundamental mistakes in logic as far as I'm concerned. Of course, I'm not going to get riled up about it unless the live half way across town and I have to see them with their signs on my drive to work twice a week.

For what it's worth, I don't even find Dawkins to be that terribly reductive. Much of his talks and writings revolve around very real, palpable, tangible and timely issues. He addresses them at high levels and reduces them and disassembles them. Also, I don't understand your first sentence at all, it seems like just another attempt to lump and dismiss atheists.

It's all anecdotal, no doubt, but the Atheists I know are FAR, FAR better versed in the Bible than the typical Christians that we come across who want to shout at us, insult us, call us names or inform us of the tortures we'll endure after we perish. Similarly, I'm shocked at the droves of people on my campus that haven't been to church in years, haven't read the Bible, are generally not good people, and can't even enumerate reasons why they cling to their faith, but happily rush out to vote for anti-gay Republicans. We can talk about the sad state of theological discussion in our society, but I see a far less intellectual "default" position in place.

davesims16• 15 years ago

From reading a couple of replies now, I'm thinking that I didn't express myself well. I respect atheists, especially ones that have taken the time to think about the world and their place in it and the nature of truth. Most atheists are engaged with the big questions and that's more than I can say for most. I probably have more in common with the average atheist, in terms of our desire to engage big questions and draw conclusions, than most of my Christian friends on that count.

I also realize in my post that I haven't adequately taken into account how persecuted most atheists probably feel. It's a problem of perception on both sides -- both feel attacked and misunderstood. But I can definitely see how an atheist in America might feel marginalized.

I respect the atheist if nothing else for the simple fact that they have the integrity to hold to a conviction, the intellectual curiosity to engage the biggest questions and then the courage to stand with that conviction in a society that doesn't tend to hold with such opinions. With such atheists I can have long discussions and good beer. Beer seems to be a recurring theme with me here...

TheRevoltingX4• 15 years ago

I'm sorry, but you say that you're versed in scripture? Well, clearly you're not. You would know that we are ALL sinners and that Jesus Christ died for our sins. You are not versed in scripture, nor do you have knowledge of what sin is.

jmathes2• 15 years ago

"I find no attraction to reductionism of any kind. It's always seemed to me a truncated worldview, artificial and strained, ignoring the real content of our deepest intuitions of meaning, beauty, love and justice."

Every piece of technology you use was built on insights provided by reductionism. Nothing you do is benefitted by the reductionist-less grand metaphysical musings of Zeus worshippers. In every age of humanity, there have been reductionists slowly advancing the state of the species, and high-concept self-proclaimed thought leaders using intuition to make eventually-meaningless but feel-good declarations about things like beauty, love, and justice. Of course reductionism doesn't feel attractive - it requires the surrender of the ego in pursuit of fact. It makes sense that you wouldn't feel threatened by alien ideas if you allow yourself to disregard reason.

davesims16• 15 years ago

Ah, here we go. Don't really have the space here to unpack the metaphysics behind this, but I'd start by pointing out that there's a difference between pursuing causality on one plane of experience, and demanding dogmatically that every aspect of reality will always and must always submit to the reductionist program.

I humbly suggest to you there are other philosophical points of view that don't necessarily involve Zeus worship. You can reject dogmatic reductionism without any religious cant whatsoever -- the Enlightenment and modernity are replete with thinkers that do so. Spinoza, Leibniz, Berkeley, heck even Descartes himself to some degree. Contemporaries like Husserl, Bergson, Whitehead and Hans Jonas all have a robust view of Science and the power of Baconian observation, but also reject dogmatic reductionism. In particular I'd point to Whitehead's famous essay on the history of Science in _Science and the Modern World_, and Jonas' essay "Is God a Mathematician?" as good examples of purely philosophical rejections of reductionism that don't entail any religious dogma whatsoever.

berntb• 15 years ago

>>the absolute philosophical illiteracy of so many naively confident advocates of reductionist science and the silly caricatures of faith they hold to.

(I can agree that Dawkins doesn't really have the background to do the theological/philosophical detailed arguments.)

I just note that to be religious is to make claims about the world ("reality", for some form of meaning) that is not based on reason or proof of facts.

So I really can't see a reason to take any religious belief more seriously than Son of Sam's world view.

I'd be more impressed if you weren't limited to insults for a motivation of what makes your supernatural creatures more likely to exist than the flying spaghetti monster.

davesims16• 15 years ago

Whenever I see the Great FSM, I feel nothing except the need for Parmesan and a fork. Would that be like Mass for Pastafarians?

J3L2404• 15 years ago

I have always been a firm atheist viewing the church as "architecture and hypocrisy" but lately I try to be more open minded about other peoples beliefs. The marquee on the church down the road reads

"Freedom of the mind is the beginning of all other freedoms".

Great quote, and it reminded me that I have been too judgemental, which is what has bothered me most about religion.

bane2• 15 years ago

Beautifully written. As somebody who could probably best be described as some flavor of agnosticism (I've heard my viewpoints described as Apathetic Agnosticism) I agree with many of your points about the shrillness of Atheists.

I was raised in a highly religious home and at a very early age, six or seven, found myself quickly asking questions that were not answerable by even the most educated theists in my family (I have two doctors of theology in my extended family) -- or rather were answered with what could be summarized succinctly and disappointingly as "because God says so".

I can understand the beauty that such belief can create -- and the nostalgic view of that beauty that can color ones worldview...even if in the end their deep explorations into the questions of faith is met only with more and more elaborate phrasings of "because God says so".

There is a beauty in the brilliant work and mental energies gone into constructing elaborate philosophies and edifices of the soul justifying that simple phrase.

I've found many atheists capable of enjoying that beauty on many levels, but with so many being the first generation of their ilk, have lived a life of persecution, disaffection, dissatisfaction and disappointment blended with feelings of betrayal often end up as harshly rejectionary of anything that smells like something they've already defended themselves and dismissed thousands of times every day.

Personally, as a person of math, science and engineering, I've come to the conclusion that "is there a God?" is a non-question in the same vein as "should trees take accounting classes?" and find atheist consumption with answering that question with a "NO!" to be both tiresome and wasteful, but I understand why they feel the need to answer it, and why they need to answer it in a shout.

patternexon• 15 years ago

Why they feel the need to answer it, and why they need to answer it in a shout

I think that is what Richard Dawkins does in a way which makes him popular - and in the end thats what the OP is about popularity/notoriety.

etherael• 15 years ago

This argument is getting really tired and I'm very disappointed to see it at the top of this thread. It's a lot like star wars fanatics claiming that people who have no interest in star wars have not considered the intricacies of canon with regards to who shot first, Han or Greedo, or the finer points in the psychological narrative of the prototypical journey Luke Skywalker finds himself on. It's worse, even, because at least star wars fans generally understand that their obsession is fictitious.

If you completely reject the foundation of superstition that underlies all religion by nature, what mullions they adorn their respective windows with becomes less and less interesting at the same time. This does not make you a dirty unwashed peasant not fit to breathe the same air as the fine milliners who have clothed the emperors noble brow; it just makes you someone who is aware that the emperor has no clothes.

Enjoy your delusions.

cappsjulian1• 15 years ago

"You're not a whole person unless you read enough science...to understand why you exist in the first place."

tzs• 15 years ago

As an atheist, I am uncomfortable with Dawkins' brand of atheism. It can get too close to the Thought Police for my liking. See this article of his: http://boingboing.net/2011/01/24/should-employers-be.html

If a scientist is producing good research that is getting published in peer reviewed journals and is generally acknowledged to be contributing to the advancement of the field, I don't care how weird his personal beliefs are.

tuxcanfly• 15 years ago

If educating people is though-policing, so be it.

tallanvor• 15 years ago

I think the concern Dawkins tries to show in that article is that it is very difficult to trust people with religious beliefs in certain fields because those beliefs necessarily introduce a bias.

xavoy9• 15 years ago

Everyone is bias. Even if you are an Atheist you are bias. You have a cultural bias, a sexual bias, etc etc. Your everyday experiences condition you to react to particular situations in particular ways.

Obviously sometimes people have a vested interest in the results of a study, but that's something different, and doesn't only apply to people of faith.

mmavnn• 15 years ago

It has to said that Dawkins is one of the most heavily baised authors I've ever read.

It makes it very difficult to trust his arguments about other religions, because he is so heavily biased towards his own... (and yes, I do think that when atheists hold such closed views as Dawkins that they are effectively religious).

_urga2• 15 years ago

The argument often centers on evolution vs creationism.

Yet Atheists and Christians would do well to pay more attention to Christ's resurrection, did it happen in history? Are there primary and secondary sources? How many of these sources are independent of each other and to what degree are they coherent, neutral, biased or opposed? How soon after the event were they written? Have they survived intact?

As the apostles themselves declared:

"And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead." - 1 Corinthians 15:14-15

_urga2• 15 years ago

Stalin's Russia, Hitler's Germany, Mao's China: all examples of states who have exemplified Dawkin's anti-religious secularization and education in the utmost extreme. Thought-policing and religious intolerance have always lead to the massacre of countless thousands.

ceejayoz• 15 years ago

Stalin, Hitler, and Mao replaced (or in Hitler's case, supplemented) religion with cults of personality that might as well be called religion.

This is a far cry from what Dawkins advocates - free thought.

Richard Dawkins: A Knack for Bashing Orthodoxy

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