Pope Benedict's reductio ad Hitlerum

I understand that there are historical reasons why when the Pope holds forth on a given topic, the world's media bends over backwards to report it. After all, his predecessors were once upon a time the most powerful leaders in the world. And yet it still bothers me that his banal brand of magical thinking is deemed newsworthy.

His latest encyclical, Spe Salvi, is being represented by many media outlets as a scathing attack on atheism, in response to the success of recent atheism-themed books by Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins. Talk about being hit with a wet newspaper . . .

The atheism of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is—in its origins and aims—a type of moralism: a protest against the injustices of the world and of world history. A world marked by so much injustice, innocent suffering, and cynicism of power cannot be the work of a good God. A God with responsibility for such a world would not be a just God, much less a good God. It is for the sake of morality that this God has to be contested.

Do we not hear in these words the echo of a thousand online "concern troll" theists? "I understand: you're an atheist because you're angry at God. It can't possibly be because of the lack of evidence that a God exists. So it must be the anger thing."

Since there is no God to create justice, it seems man himself is now called to establish justice. If in the face of this world's suffering, protest against God is understandable, the claim that humanity can and must do what no God actually does or is able to do is both presumptuous and intrinsically false. It is no accident that this idea has led to the greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice; rather, it is grounded in the intrinsic falsity of the claim. A world which has to create its own justice is a world without hope.

No, Benedict: a world which has to create its own justice--and is aware of that fact--is a world that has finally weaned itself off the teat of religious dogma, cast aside the security blanket, and grown up. The cruelty and violations of which you speak--namely those caused by totalitarian regimes in the twentieth century--are simply the fruits of one set of dogmas being replaced with another. I'll say that again so that it might sink in. The cruelty and violations of which you speak are the fruits of dogma, not atheism. Your mistake is in your severe tunnel-vision, which is such that you cannot begin to countenance the thought that we might cast aside dogmatic thought altogether.

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Vale Dogma Free America

Sad news on the atheism/freethought podcasting front: Dogma Free America is no more. It celebrated its fiftieth and final episode on November 22nd, with producer and host Rich Orman claiming that the podcast was taking up too much of his time. DFA's shows weren't theme-based or guest-based like Freethought Radio and The Non-Prophets, and mainly consisted on commentary on the latest news concerning magical thinking and theocracy. DFA also canvassed more international (read: non-US) news than other podcasts, and often ran stories on religious violence in sub-Saharan Africa (usually perpetrated against individuals suspected of "witchcraft"), as well as atrocities perpetrated by theocracies in the Islamic world. Hence, Christian listeners might (I imagine) have found it more even-handed than other non-theist podcasts.

For mine, however, the pick of the podcasts is still The Atheist Experience, which is actually a live cable access TV program screening in Austin, Texas. The Atheist Experience, as the site indicates, is "geared at a non-atheist audience," with a view to clearing up misconceptions about atheism as well as countering religious apologetics (current host Matt Dillahunty is an ex-fundie and his Biblical knowledge is very effective in this regard), addressing church-state separation issues and commenting on the latest in fundamentalist idiocy. Very entertaining--especially when the presenters engage with religious callers.

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I see now What's So Great About Christianity

Rightwing pundits keep trying to tell me What's So Great About Christianity. Well, I think I understand where they're coming from, now.

In the remote Penza region of Russia, a group of Orthodox Christians has barricaded itself inside an underground bunker to await the Apocalypse, which it believes will come to pass in May next year. Better still, the group contains in its number four children, including an eighteen-month-old baby, who are obliged to await the Apocalypse in temperatures dropping to minus 10 degrees Celsius.

The group has nothing in the way of sound empirical evidence to support the claim that the world will end in May 2008. But that's OK, because "While reason helps us to discover things about experience, faith helps us discover things that transcend experience."

And yes, the leader of the cult--under whose orders the Penza group are sitting out the end of the world in an icy cave--may be currently undergoing evaluation in a psychiatric facility, but surely all this means is that he now sees "in color what we previously saw in black and white." And isn't this whole episode a demonstration of the fact that "Christianity makes of life a moral drama in which we play a starring role and in which the most ordinary events take on a grand significance?"

And sure, you could always make the argument that these cultists have an ethical duty to look after the welfare of the children in their care--and that this duty involves not indoctrinating them and holding them hostage in below-freezing conditions. But Christians, you see, live sub specie aeternitatis. And isn't it "better [for those kids] to suffer wrong than to do wrong?" And if the kids die of exposure out there, why should we worry? "The secular person thinks there are two stages for humans: life and death. For the Christian, there are three: life, death, and the life to come. This is why, for the Christian, death is not so terrifying."

Face it, heathens. The people in that cave in Russia are "pursuing [their] higher destiny as human beings. [They] are becoming what [they] were meant to be," because Christianity "not only makes us aspire to be better, but it also shows us how to be better." By barricading oneself in a remote cave to await an event one has no reliable evidence will come to pass, stockpiling weapons, holding children against their will in below-freezing conditions, and threatening to blow oneself and one's fellows up if anyone tries to intervene.

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The Religion Pander: Stephen Crittenden and Alister McGrath

This week's Religion Report featured an interview with Christian apologist Alister McGrath on Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion. McGrath has debated Dawkins on several occasions, as well as Christopher Hitchens, and on such occasions has always had his arse handed to him. So it was with great disappointment that I listened to presenter Stephen Crittenden treat McGrath's arguments with kid gloves in this interview.

The format of the programme was ridiculously one-sided, for starters:

1. Crittenden plays a grab of Dawkins from an Oxford University debate (with McGrath),
2. Crittenden elicits from McGrath a long-winded criticism of Dawkins--invariably prefaced by his signature phrase "I think what I'd want to say . . ."--and then eagerly joins in,
3. Crittenden fails to submit McGrath's claims to the same level of scrutiny.

Crittenden was positively testy with Sam Harris when he appeared on TRR in December last year, and on an earlier show had opined that "people like Dawkins are just as fundamentalist as any southern Baptist, just as ignorant about religion as your southern Baptist is about science, and perhaps guilty of promoting, fuelling movements like Intelligent Design, because of their fundamentalism." But he could at least, in his capacity as a journalist, have tried to play the Devil's Advocate with McGrath.

Instead--having himself remarked that "Dawkins makes so little of Islam, even when he's writing about religious violence. He's really focusing much of this book on Christianity, isn't he?"--he allows McGrath to get away with pearlers like these:

Well he is, and I think that in many ways Dawkins finds that he can't criticise Islam directly because that would be politically really quite dangerous, and therefore he prefers to concentrate on soft targets, and there's no softer target than Christianity, so he and these other writers seem to be focusing on Christianity as being the easy target. It's really been very well received in certain parts of the public, because there is this very deep sense of alienation from what the Christian church has been saying.

Dawkins doesn't criticise Islam? Did McGrath really just say that? On pages 24-27 of The God Delusion Dawkins attacks the "incitement to mayhem" throughout the Muslim world (which he also describes as "hysterical") arising from the Danish cartoon controversy--he notes that "if you don't take [Islam] seriously and accord it proper respect you are physically threatened, on a scale that no other religion has aspired to since the Middle Ages." Elsewhere in the book he attacks blasphemy and apostasy laws in Muslim countries (he cites the case of Abdul Rahman, sentenced to death in Afghanistan in 2006 for converting to Christianity, and who is now in hiding in Italy), and the Taliban's destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan. He suggests Ibn Warraq's Why I Am Not a Muslim could be retitled The Myth of Moderate Islam. Regarding the London bombings, he approvingly cites another author's suggestion "that the young men who committed suicide were neither on the fringes of Muslim society in Britain, nor following an eccentric and extremist interpretation of their faith, but rather that they came from the very core of the Muslim community and were motivated by a mainstream interpretation of Islam." Shall I go on? In 2001, four days after Sept. 11, he remarked: "testosterone-sodden young men too unattractive to get a woman in this world might be desperate enough to go for 72 private virgins in the next."

Why might Dawkins pay more attention to Christianity than to Islam in The God Delusion? "Unless otherwise stated, I shall have Christianity mostly in mind, but only because it is the version with which I happen to be most familiar. For my purposes the differences [between the Abrahamic religions] matter less than the similarities." Simple as that.

Next, Crittenden and McGrath tackle Dawkins' claim that there is a real conflict between science and religion:

Stephen Crittenden: Indeed, is that one of the biggest weaknesses in Dawkins' book, that he doesn't acknowledge the role of the churches and religious believers in the history of science: the Jesuits in astronomy and seismology, and medicine, for instance; or the fact that the Big Bang theory was first proposed by a Belgian priest. And of course the general public doesn't know all that much about this history either.

Alister E. McGrath: Well that's right. I mean Dawkins has this very simplistic idea that science and religion have always been at war with each other, and he says only one can win, and let's face it, it's going to be science. But the history just doesn't take into that place. The history suggests that at times there has been conflict, but at times there has been great synergy between science and religion and many would say that at this moment, there are some very exciting things happening in the dialogue between science and religion. What Dawkins is offering is a very simplistic, slick spin on a very complex phenomenon. It's one that clearly he expects to appeal to his readers, but the reality is simply not like that at all.

I'm not sure that there is too much to get excited about in the dialogue between science and religion. Endeavours to demonstrate the efficacy of prayer in the science lab have invariably led up blind alleys. On the other hand, the emerging science of neurotheology suggests that the capacity for religious belief may be hardwired into our brains.

While it is possible to oversimplify the historical relationship between religion and science, the role played by religion in suppressing science is undeniable. But McGrath misses Dawkins' point, as articulated in a 1997 article:

Science is based upon verifiable evidence. Religious faith not only lacks evidence, its independence from evidence is its pride and joy, shouted from the rooftops. Why else would Christians wax critical of doubting Thomas? The other apostles are held up to us as exemplars of virtue because faith was enough for them. Doubting Thomas, on the other hand, required evidence. Perhaps he should be the patron saint of scientists.

That is the crux of the issue between science and religion.

Crittenden continues:

Stephen Crittenden: There's one particularly outrageous moment in his book where he talks about the great scientist Gregor Mendel, and suggests that he became an Augustinian monk in order to support his scientific research. I'm not sure how he could know that.

Alister E. McGrath: I think this is Dawkins' rewriting of history to suit his own agendas, to be frank.

Rewriting history--really? Dawkins actually says (on p.99): "Mendel, of course, was a religious man, an Augustinian monk; but that was in the nineteenth century, when becoming a monk was the easiest way for the young Mendel to pursue his science. For him, it was the equivalent of a research grant." Which is true: Mendel, the second son of peasant farmers, was a brilliant student in his youth, but his parents lacked the means to pay for his higher education. So he entered an Augustinian monastery. Dawkins isn't "rewriting" anything here.

Stephen Crittenden: It seems obvious, on the other hand, that religion - I mean this is almost too obvious to say - that religion has indeed been in retreat before science, as science has answered more and more questions about the physical world.

Alister E. McGrath: Well I would certainly agree with that. And I think one of the issues we have here is that in the past, religious people have very often overplayed their hand, and said in effect, 'Look, we can tell you everything'. And then science has begun to encroach on that, and they had to retreat. What I'd want to say is - and I think many would agree with this - that science is wonderful when it comes to explaining the relationships we observe in the material world. But there are bigger questions of meaning and value. In other words, why are we here? What's the purpose of life? And I'd want to say very clearly that science actually can't answer those questions, and in fact if science does answer those questions, it's gone way beyond its legitimate sphere of authority.

The implication here is that if such questions do not fall within the "legitimate sphere of authority" of science, then they must be assumed to fall within the "legitimate sphere of authority" of religion. I'll let Dawkins speak for himself on this one:

It is a tedious cliche (and, unlike many cliches, it isn't even true) that science concerns itself with how questions, but only theology is equipped to answer why questions. What on Earth is a why question? Not every English sentence beginning with the word 'why' is a legitimate question. Why are unicorns hollow? Some questions simply do not deserve an answer. What is the colour of abstraction? What is the smell of hope? The fact that a question can be phrased in a grammatically correct English sentence doesn't make it meaningful, or entitle it to our serious attention. Nor, even if the question is a real one, does the fact that science cannot answer it imply that religion can. (p.56)

But it is, as I said, rather disappointing that Crittenden didn't challenge McGrath on this point.

We then hear a grab of what is perhaps the most well-known argument advanced in The God Delusion: "There's a chapter on children, and what I regard as the abuse of children, which is the assumption, without the child's consent, that the child inherits the religion of its parents, and I've described that as a form of child abuse." Rather than address this argument directly, Crittenden suggests that Dawkins lacks "a theory of culture," and thus

Dawkins doesn't really understand the ethical and sociological dimension of religion. I'm talking about his idea that belief in God arises from a meme. That's a sort of anti-culture idea, a sort of biological theory of culture. I'm also thinking of his view that bringing up children in a religious tradition is a form of child abuse. That almost sounds like culture is something alien.

Alister E. McGrath: Well that's certainly a very fair point, and indeed one of the major criticisms I'd make of 'The God Delusion' is that he doesn't seem to be able to distinguish between belief in God, religion, world views and culture. These are very important distinctions to make, and certainly you mentioned this idea of the meme, which plays a very significant role in Dawkins' book The God Delusion, and really the key point here is that Dawkins seems to think that his idea of the meme explains away belief in God, that somehow you can give a biological explanation of why people believe in God and that shows it is wrong, it can be disposed of. And of course the point you've made is a good one. Actually there are very important cultural reasons why people believe in God, because there's a cultural mandate to think about these things, to begin to evaluate the evidence for belief in God and then if there is a God to begin to express that belief in certain cultural ways. For example, ways of behaviour, rituals, actions and so forth. And again, I don't see Dawkins really engaging with that, which gives I think his critique of religion a real vulnerability at that point

Of course there are sociological explanations, cultural explanations, for why people not only believe in God but choose to raise their children with such a belief. That doesn't go anywhere near addressing the idea that children ought not to be labelled and coerced in this way, and that they ought instead be allowed to develop their own ideas regarding religion--just as they are permitted to do when it comes to political ideologies or political parties. McGrath makes no attempt to justify, to say why it is right that children be referred to as "Catholic children" or "Protestant children;" he is either stupidly confusing an "is" with an "ought," or arrogantly doing so.

Stephen Crittenden: Now one of the most interesting areas in his book I think is the section in his book that deals with the links between religion and violence. Because after all, if you're right, and 9/11 was the trigger for the book in the first place, this really gets to the heart of the matter.

Alister E. McGrath: Yes, there's no doubt that the most persuasive part of the book is where Dawkins argues that religion seems to have this innate propensity to lead to violence. In other words, if you believe in God, you are much more likely to be a violent person than if you don't believe in God. And I think personally, that's one of the reasons why the book has had such an impact in Australia because you are nervous about violence, nervous about extremism, and Dawkins offers an extremely simplistic answer to those concerns: it's caused by religion, get rid of religion and these things go away.

Actually, Dawkins acknowledges (p. 259) that "Religion is a label of in-group/out-group enmity and vendetta, not necessarily worse than other labels such as skin colour, language or preferred football team, but often available when other labels are not." For Dawkins, though, religion is particularly problematic for three reasons:

1. Labelling of children. Children are described as 'Catholic children' or 'Protestant children' etc. from an early age, and certainly far too early for them to have made up their own minds on what they think about religion
2. Segregated schools. Children are educated, again often from a very early age, with members of a religious in-group and separately from children whose families adhere to other religions. It is not an exaggeration to say that the troubles in Northern Ireland would disappear in a generation if segregated schooling were abolished.
3. Taboos against 'marrying out'. This perpetuates hereditary feuds and vendettas by preventing the mingling of feuding groups. Intermarriage, if it were permitted, would naturally tend to mollify enmities.

Dawkins is only claiming that religious labelling exacerbates our propensity to violence; he is not claiming that if you get rid of religion, violence will disappear.

Stephen Crittenden: It's interesting that in Dawkins' book The Selfish Gene from the mid-1970s which is the book where he coins the term 'meme', we get Dawkins the social Darwinist, who suggests that selfishness and violence comes from our biology, and yet here he is in this book blaming it all on religion. It seems like an interesting contradiction.

Except he's not "blaming it all on religion." Shoddy journalism, Stephen. And here's where Alister McGrath makes one of his most outrageous statements:

Alister E. McGrath: Well it's an intriguing transition and certainly in the book The Selfish Gene he seems to say all these things are genetically programmed. But then right at the end of the book he says, 'Well somehow we can rise above this'. But I'd want to challenge him at this point I think and say Look, I have no doubt that some people who are religious, have done some very bad things, but I'd want to make a counterpoint very forcibly. And that is, this is not typical of religion. This is the fringes being presented as though they're the mainstream. And we saw that in his television program, The Root of All Evil, which many of your listeners may have seen, where he presented some extremists as if they were mainliners, and I think that's a very serious misrepresentation. I want to make it clear, I have no doubt there are some very weird religious people who might well be dangerous, but those of us who believe in God, know that, and we're doing all we can to try and minimise their influence. The centre needs to be reaffirmed, and Dawkins does not help us do that at all.

What an astonishing ignorance of history this man has, if he thinks the Crusades or the Inquisition were the work of "fringe" elements and not mainstream Christianity. What an astonishing ignorance of current events this man has, if in the wake of countless sexual abuse scandals in the Church--not least of which has been the Church's complicity in attempting to sweep it all under the carpet--he can talk about "fringes being presented as the mainstream" and keep a straight face. You can't get more mainstream than the Catholic Church, a denomination comprising one sixth of the world's population.

Stephen Crittenden: No. On the other hand, it's true isn't it, that there's a very strong powerful view in popular culture about the churches, and their history. It may be a caricatured view that starts with the Inquisition and includes the Crusades and so on, it's a very one-sided view of course, but it's very, very deep in the culture.

Alister E. McGrath: That's right. And Dawkins is able to point to this narrative of violence, the Crusades, the Inquisition.

Stephen Crittenden: What can the churches do about that?

Alister E. McGrath: Well I think there are two things they can do. One is they can make sure the other side of the story is told. They can talk about the narrative of violence in atheism in the 20th century, for example in the Soviet Union, where there were a whole series of absolutely abominable events, which again reflected the imposition of atheism on a fundamentally religious people, and that needs to be said.

Tu quoque. And wrong: Stalin's purges were not a logical consequence of the official atheist stance of the Soviet state. The prevailing dogma in the Soviet Union was not atheism--it was Stalinism. Christopher Hitchens has a great answer to the kind of canard being peddled by McGrath:

Wiener: The final killer argument of your critics is that Hitler and Stalin were not religious. The worst crimes of the 20th century did not have a religious basis. They came from political ideology.

Hitchens: That’s easy. Hitler never abandoned Christianity and recommends Catholicism quite highly in “Mein Kampf.” Fascism, as distinct from National Socialism, was in effect a Catholic movement.

Wiener: What about Stalin? He wasn’t religious.

Hitchens: Stalin—easier still. For hundreds of years, millions of Russians had been told the head of state should be a man close to God, the czar, who was head of the Russian Orthodox Church as well as absolute despot. If you’re Stalin, you shouldn’t be in the dictatorship business if you can’t exploit the pool of servility and docility that’s ready-made for you. The task of atheists is to raise people above that level of servility and credulity. No society has gone the way of gulags or concentration camps by following the path of Spinoza and Einstein and Jefferson and Thomas Paine.

In short, for McGrath's Stalin analogy to work, he would need to show how the atheism mapped out in The God Delusion--an agnostic atheism grounded in the virtues of critical thinking, skepticism, and free inquiry--leads inexorably to the atrocities perpetrated under Mao and Stalin.

McGrath continues:

But against that, we need to make this point, that does not mean that all atheists are evil, it certainly doesn't. Just as the fact that some religious people do violent things, does not mean that all people who believe in God do these things.

Strawman: nobody is suggesting that all people believe in God do violent things.

We finally come to the end of the interview, where the following excerpt from Dawkins is played . . .

Given that right and wrong is a very difficult question anyway, once again what on earth makes you trust religion to tell you what's right and wrong? I mean if you do trust religion, where are you going to get it from? For goodness' sake don't get it from the Bible, at least not from the Old Testament, and certainly aspects of the New Testament have very agreeable vibes for us today, but how do we decide which of those are agreeable and which are not? It is the case that since we are all 21st century people, we all subscribe to a pretty widespread consensus of what's right and what's wrong. Nowadays we don't believe in slavery any more, we don't believe in child labour, we don't believe in physical violence in the home, there are all sorts of things that people used to believe in and no longer do, and that is a general consensus which we all share to a greater or lesser extent, whether or not we are religious.

Now if you look at the Bible, either the Old or New Testament, you can pick and choose verses of the Bible which chime in with that decent moral consensus that we all share, and you can say Oh well, this comes from the Bible; this comes from the Bible. But of course you'll find plenty of other bits in the Bible which are simply horrendous by today's standards. So something other than religion is giving us this general moral consensus, and I haven't time to go into what I think it is, but whatever else it is, it's not religion. And if you try to cherrypick your Bible or your Qu'ran, your Holy Book, whatever it is, you can find good bits and you can throw out bad bits, but the criterion by which you do that cherrypicking has nothing to do with religion.

. . . which is studiously ignored by Crittenden and McGrath. The obvious question to put to McGrath would be: do you think we get our morals from the Bible, and if so, why? Crittenden, however, prefers to ask:

Alister the church seems more on the back foot than ever on this point of where values comes from. It sometimes seems to me that part of what's going on is that this is a very vibrant time for biology in particular, and we're seeing the kind of youthful exuberance of a new biological paradigm, as the biotech revolution gets under way. And religion creates a lot of problems for science at this particular time. It seems to me that one of the things that perhaps we've allowed scientists to get away with is the idea that science creates value.

Alister E. McGrath: I think that's a very important point. And actually Dawkins and I, I think, agree at one point on this. Because Dawkins is very, very clear that rightly, science cannot tell us what is right or wrong. In other words, that those who science creates a system of values are misunderstanding what science is all about. And I think we do need to challenge science at this point and say Look, the fact that something can be done, doesn't make that good in itself, that by doing something new, we very often open the door to possibilities that cannot be changed, that might actually be destructive. There's a real concern there. And certainly I want to affirm that science offers us many very good things. For example, better medical procedures. But we all know the dark side, that science is able to make available new methods of mass destruction that really can be enormously dangerous for humanity. So I think we need to be deadly realistic about what we're talking about here.

That's nice, but Dawkins was making a specific point which you have failed to address: wherever we get our morals from, it can't be from the Bible. He's not saying we get them from science--you acknowledge this yourself. So why not address his actual point?

Stephen Crittenden: Are the churches also perhaps on the back foot here? We've been through a period where there's been so much debate particularly about sexual politics and sexual morality, people are less inclined than ever to take their values from what the churches say.

Alister E. McGrath: I think the real difficulty is that we need values at this time more than ever. And the churches perhaps are feeling discouraged about trying to get their values heard in this secular culture. And very often the problem for the churches is that their values are simply heard to be No, to this, No, to that. That we need to really present Christian values in a positive, engaging way and say Look, it's not about negation, don't do that, it's trying to say Look, here is an understanding of who we are as human beings, but what our role is here on earth and in the light of that there are certain things we should be doing, and certain other things we need to be much more critical of. And we need to sell this big picture, not just individual Nos to this, that and the other, but rather a powerful, persuasive, compelling view of human identity, which enables us to show that there are certain things we should be doing, and certain things also that we should not.

Based on what evidence? What evidence is there to support this "powerful, compelling view of human identity" that you refuse to sketch out? What is our "role" here on Earth, and how do you know that it is our role, or that we indeed have a "role?" At some point McGrath needs to peel himself out of his comfortable armchair, desist with the hand-waving, and actually explain why he thinks Christianity is a good source of morality, rather than assume that it is.

Well, it all goes pear-shaped from here, I'm afraid, because even after McGrath has acknowledged Dawkins affirmation that science cannot tell us what is right and what is wrong, Crittenden introduces the dread strawman TEH DARWINIAN WORLDVIEW, upon which McGrath seizes with gusto:

Look, Darwinism presents us with a narrative which is about the strongest winning out. Can we transfer that to society as a whole, and say Look, let's let the strong win. And you can see that Darwinism does pose a challenge, not simply to some Christian values, but to some values that are deeply embedded in civilisation as a whole. And the real question is this. Do we just say Well Darwinism may help us understand what's happening in nature, but that does not have an impact on the way we ought to behave, either as Christians or simply as good citizens. And that certainly to me is a very important point. Darwinism is articulating a value system which if it were to be applied rigorously, would I think lead to the weak being marginalised, set to one side, so that the strong can simply overwhelm everyone else.

Strawman. Strawman. Strawman. (Or perhaps Projection, projection, projection.) There really is no better way of putting it. Who's articulating this "Darwinist value system," and advocating that the weak be marginalised, and the strong overwhelm everyone else? Certainly not Dawkins. And it is not a belief--as you yourself acknowledge--that follows from the acceptance of Darwinian evolutionary biology. So why introduce this red herring into the discussion at all?

Stephen Crittenden: A last question, Professor McGrath, is there a sense perhaps in which you and Dawkins share the same premises? You both come out of an English empirical philosophical tradition. Perhaps you as an Evangelical are just as caught up with propositions and proof as he is?

Alister E. McGrath: Well Dawkins and I are both men of faith. We both believe certain things to be true, and we know we can't prove them. Dawkins I think has perhaps an exaggerated sense of what he can show, but certainly when you look at him rigorously, he is a man of faith who believes certain things, that cannot actually be demonstrably so. And he and I both believe that we are telling the truth, and we both believe also that if we are right, this has a major implication for the way people live their lives.

Except that Dawkins is able to offer evidence in support of what he believes is true, while you, McGrath, refuse to do so, and Crittenden refuses to challenge you on this. That's poor journalism on Crittenden's part, and poor apologetics* on yours.

(*This is especially so considering that McGrath is currently in Australia, so the Religion Report tells us, to help evangelicals counter Dawkins arguments. Given that McGrath's brand of apologetics consists largely of obfuscations, misrepresentations, and logical fallacies galore, my advice to Australian evangelicals is: ask someone else.

And would someone please pin McGrath down on why he became a Christian? McGrath tells us "First, Christianity made a lot of sense. It gave me a new way of seeing and understanding the world, above all, the natural sciences." You can get the same effect from any number of exotic substances, not all of them legal. So what? Why does McGrath think Christianity--not just theism, but Christianity--make more sense than atheism? "Second, I discovered Christianity actually worked: it brought purpose and dignity to life." There's a lump in my throat. Really. So Christianity makes you feel better about yourself: you once woz lost but now iz found. Are you suggesting that atheists in general lack purpose and dignity in their lives, just because you feel you did when you were an atheist? Hasty generalisation fallacy.

You're an evangelical, McGrath. Who could you possibly hope to convert with such feeble reasoning?)

UPDATE: When he has been pressed on his reasons for believing in God (as he is in the Oxford University debate referred to in The Religion Report, his answers are not surprising. Fallacious, certainly, but not surprising:

. . . the very strong sense that this world is ordered, and that this ordering is something both excellent and beautiful in itself, but also that it needs to be accounted for. [Argument from design.] And again it seemed to me that one of the strong points of the Christian faith was this postulation of an ordered universe created by God, which we could begin to investigate and uncover. [Begging the question.] Second, there is a whole range of things to do with human experience, experience with our own lives, of culture, which very often involves, for example, this very unusual sensation of a longing for transcendence [wishful thinking]: in other words, an idea you find in writers like Iris Murdoch, or even John Dewey [little Johnnyism], that there's something beyond us, which somehow brings legitimacy to some of our core notions both of morality and general philosophical ideas [argument from ignorance].

It's so tempting to transcribe the discussion as it proceeds from here. Dawkins presses McGrath on whether he--as a man of science--believes in miracles such as the Virgin Birth, and McGrath waffles on about ". . . different levels of explanation." It's beautiful.

Cross-posted at Punditocracy Watch.

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Shorter cruelty in the Bible: Steve Wells' She-bear challenge

Skeptics Annotated Bible provides a long list and a short list of cruelties in the Bible.

Steve Wells of Dwindling in Unbelief has issued a bit of challenge to his Bible-believing readers, and I thought I'd reproduce it here.

And he [Elisha] went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head. And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them. 2 Kings 2:23-24

Are there any Bible believers that are not bothered by this story? If so, I'd like to hear from them.

Well?

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More Unconvincing Arguments for God: Little Johnnyism

Little Johnnyism is a variant of the argument to authority with which I am sure we are all familiar. When we were kids, Little Johnny was that boy down the street that our parents were convinced we all wanted to emulate. “Little Johnny does the dishes,” “Little Johnny keeps his room clean,” “Little Johnny mows his parents’ lawn,” and so on. The idea is that since we have some attribute in common with Little Johnny—that of being little--we are more likely to be impressed by the moral examples he sets than by those of an older person.

Apologists use Little Johnnyism when they rattle off names of celebrated ex-atheists who have found Jesus and/or God--e.g. Lee Strobel or Anthony Flew—reasoning that, since all atheists obviously think alike, they are equally likely to be impressed by such conversion stories. Some apologists, like Kirk Cameron, will even cite (or, as I suspect, manufacture) their own atheist pre-history and subsequent conversion tale—call it “Little Kirkism”—and then claim to know what all atheists think (and presume to tell atheists what atheists think).

My correspondent Trey himself uses Little Johnnyism when he rattles off a list of scientists—I mean, atheists are bound to be impressed by scientists, right?--who have made affirmative pronouncements on the existence of God/the supernatural.

Robert Jastrow, an astrophysicist, says this in talking about the Big Bang theory and its implications, “Now we see how the astronomical evidence leads to a biblical view of the origin of the world. The details differ, but the essential elements in the astronomical and biblical accounts of Genesis are the same: the chain of events leading to man commenced suddenly and sharply at a definite moment in time, in a flash of light and energy.” In another interview he says, “Astronomers no find they have painted themselves into a corner because they have proven, by their own methods, that the world began abruptly in an act of creation to which you can trace the seeds of every star, every planet, every living thing in this cosmos and on the earth. And they have found that all this happened as a product of forces they cannot hope to discover…That there are what I or anyone would call supernatural forces at work is now, I think, a scientifically proven fact.” Arthur Eddington, a contemporary of Albert Einstein, said, “The beginning seems to present insuperable difficulties unless we agree to look on it as frankly supernatural.”

Sorry, Trey, but this proves nothing—other than the fact that even scientists are as prone to the argument from ignorance fallacy as the rest of us. And how does Jastrow know that the Big Bang was an act of creation? He doesn’t provide any evidence to support his claim—he simply asserts it. Creation implies a Creator. Add begging the question to that list of logical fallacies to which scientists might also be prone—particularly when they are speaking on matters that lie outside the purview of science, such as the supernatural. (Incidentally, it turns out that Jastrow also speculated that “the Big Bang may have been one of a series of cosmic explosions that alternate with cosmic collapses.” Ah, the pitfalls of quote-mining!) Trey goes on:

What they are talking about observing is that the universe and cosmos have a definite beginning. The Law of Causality tells us that everything that had a beginning has a cause. The cosmos have a beginning; therefore, it must have a cause. That cause must be eternal, timeless, infinitely powerful, etc. to have done this, which are characteristics remarkably like theistic God.

Firstly, while the Big Bang theory may suggest that the universe had a beginning, the cosmos is a different matter—google “multiverse theory.” Secondly, how does Trey know that whatever caused the cosmos did not itself have a beginning? How does he know that whatever caused whatever caused the cosmos did not itself have a beginning? And so on. Trey offers more scientists offering arguments from ignorance/incredulity:

Astrophysicist Hugh Ross took into account all the constants that are necessary to sustain life as it does not on earth, 122 in all, and what we know of the number of planets in existence, 10^22, and found that probability to be 1 IN 10^138. There are an estimated 10^70 atoms in the universe, so that number is absurdly high. Given that the universe is not eternal and did have a beginning, there is zero chance that natural nomena could explain existence. Nobel Laureate Arno Penzias said, “Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing and delicately balanced to provide exactly the conditions required to support life. In the absence of an absurdly-improbable accident, the observations of modern science seem to suggest an underlying, one might say, supernatural plan.” To which you say and many atheists would say, “Nu-uh, that event happened. Shutup, science!” and I and my theists buddies would say, “Good work science. Seems reasonable to me.” However, the fact that that event cannot be recreated means that we will never know exhaustively what happened. This means that, regardless of how much support we get, there will be a need for some amount of faith in any conclusions.

Astrophysicist Hugh Ross--note the Little Johnnyist marker-- is an old earth creationist, and a detailed critique of his ideas on fine-tuning can be found here (see also this post by P Z Myers), but he’s basically making a “God of the Gaps” argument (“I can’t explain it, therefore goddidit”), as is the Nobel Laureate Arno Penzias. Nothing to see here, people. Of course in science we will never know exhaustively what happened with regard to past events such as the origin of the Earth, the solar system, or the Universe—the best we can do is arrive at sound models based upon the evidence we have. Isn’t that better than simply throwing our hands in the air and proclaiming “we don’t know . . . therefore goddidit”?

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More Unconvincing Arguments for God: "Reason is just another kind of faith"

Many of the entries in my “More Unconvincing Arguments for God” series, while certainly inspired by the list at Friendly Atheist, are partly based upon email correspondence with Trey, a commenter at Unorthodox Atheism. (And I do wish to emphasise that not all of the arguments I am critiquing are those which Trey would necessarily endorse.)

I find that many of Trey’s arguments are based upon appeals to ignorance/incredulity--“I can’t explain how x happened, therefore God caused x (therefore God exists)” or “I find it very hard to believe that x can be explained naturally, therefore God caused x (therefore God exists)—-and I think I’ve pointed this out to him on several occasions, along with other logical fallacies in his argument. In response, Trey has sought to undermine the very notion of rational critique by defining reason as another kind of “faith”:

You use reason, correct? How do you know reason works? A circular argument would be that reason tells you reason works, which is insufficient. So how do you know? Could it be that you have faith in reason? In logic? How much of your own sentiments do you see mirrored in those of the scientists that “detest” the idea of God? Doesn’t that give you pause and make you at least think that you stance is not as founded on reason and logic as you would like to think?

Trey replied thus after I had endeavoured to explain to him the grounds of my atheism: “I'm an atheist because, there being no evidence of the existence of deities, there is no reason to believe in them.” Elsewhere, he has argued to the effect that I only demand evidence of God’s existence because I have naturalist “presuppositions”, and therefore I have no grounds to critique his presuppositionalism. (This, by the way, is an example of a tu quoque fallacy—but then fallacies are part of the vocabulary of reason and reason is just another kind of faith. Rinse. Repeat.) But let me respond to some of his comments above.

First, how do I know reason works? Well, it depends upon what I think reason is capable of. Can reason prove or disprove the existence of God? No. Reason is a method, not a doctrine or dogma—which is why it has routinely been used by theists and non-theists alike. Its purpose is not to prove the capital T Truth of a given claim, but to evaluate the arguments advanced in support of or against the claim. And if we posit the scientific method as reason/critical thinking par excellence, the history of modern science demonstrates that reason works very well, thankyou. Every Christian who opts to consult a physician, as opposed to a faith healer or shaman, when he or she is feeling unwell, is affirming the reliability of reason. (Whether or not he or she realizes it.)

Second, by attempting to undermine reason, Trey is shooting himself in the foot. He claims that reason doesn’t work because “a circular argument would be that reason tells you reason works, which is insufficient.” But if reason is unreliable as Trey is trying to show, then so too is the notion of a circular argument, non? In other words, he’s trying to demonstrate the unreasonableness of reason . . . using reason! So even Trey believes that reason works. Moreover, argument itself depends upon the idea that reason works—that reason is a reliable method for separating (in this case, theological/philosophical) wheat from chaff—and elsewhere Trey has cited some of the traditional arguments for God’s existence (very poor arguments though they may be) in support of his own beliefs. The point is this. If you enter into the kind of debate Trey and I are having, you make a tacit agreement to submit your arguments to rational critique. Some bloggers I have encountered take this kind of critique as a personal attack, but Trey, to his credit, has not. But I do think his attack on reason is little more than an attempt to avoid addressing some of the flaws/fallacies in his arguments.

(Trey might respond as many an apologist has done: he can use logic and reason because God invented logic and reason. But if such is the case, then square circles are possible. Why? Because if God invented logic, then he is not bound by its rules, and therefore has the ability to make square circles, which are logically impossible. Other apologists have argued that God’s omnipotence means only that he can do all that it is logically possible to do; and since square circles are not logically possible, God can’t make them. But on this view, God is bound by the rules of logic, and therefore cannot have invented logic. Quite the conundrum.)

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I demand a recount!

Last time I submitted my blog to the Gematriculator I was way, way more eviller!

Speaking of evil, here's Christopher Hitchens on "The Morals of an Atheist"


And Hitchens on "The Moral Necessity of Atheism"

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More unconvincing arguments for God: The Gospels as "eyewitness accounts."

Actually, this is more of an extension of #1 and #2 from the existing list, but the argument runs thus: The Gospels constitute eyewitness accounts of the events they describe (the Virgin Birth, miracles, the Resurrection, etc.), and just as juries are able give credence to eyewitness testimony in a modern court of law, so we ought to give credence to the "eyewitness testimonies" of the writers of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

The answer to this argument, of course, is that it presents a false analogy. Eyewitness testimony is never (or should never be) taken at face value in a court of law until the credibility of the eyewitness has been satisfactorily established. This is far easier to accomplish with eyewitnesses who are still alive, and whose existence is itself a demonstrable matter of record, than with those who are either millennia-dead or who may not have existed at all. Moreover, the reliability of the Gospels themselves as documents of historical fact is dubious in the extreme.

Another problem with the argument is that it gives undue credence to what is actually a very weak standard of evidence. As Austin Cline points out, "Juries place a lot of weight on eyewitness testimony, but this is because people place a lot more emphasis on personal stories than impersonal scientific data as a general rule. It’s unfortunate that people can be convicted solely on the basis of eyewitness testimony and without any corroborating evidence, but it has happened." Carl Sagan is famous for the maxim, Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence--a kind of corollary to Ockham's Razor and Hume's argument against miracles --and eyewitness testimony just doesn't cut the mustard. It can't, otherwise we would have to accept as fact a myriad of claims based on personal testimony, including alien abductions, UFO sightings, astral travelling, ghost sightings, tarot reading and so forth.

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HT: Friendly Atheist--"18 Unconvincing Arguments for God"

This post brought to you by . . .

BIBLEMAN: A FIGHT FOR FAITH*

(UPDATE: List now expanded to 21 unconvincing arguments)

How did I miss this? (I know: it's because I wasn't reading Friendly Atheist when he posted it.) The following, generated by August Berkshire of Minnesota Atheists and Atheist Alliance International, is a list of 18 unconvincing arguments for theism, along with their refutations.

(1) Holy Books - Just because something is written down does not make it true. This goes for the Bible, the Qu’ran, and any other holy book. People who believe the holy book of their religion usually disbelieve the holy books of other religions.

(2) “Revelations” - All religions claim to be revealed, usually to people called “prophets.” But a revelation is a personal experience. Even if the revelations really did come from a god, there is no way we could prove it. As Thomas Paine said, it is a revelation only to the first person, after that it is hearsay. People of one religion usually disbelieve the revelations of other religions.

(3) Personal Testimony / Feelings - This is when you are personally having the revelation or feeling that a god exists. Though you may be sincere, and even if a god really does exist, a feeling is not proof, either for you or for someone else.


(4) The “God Part” of the Brain - Some religious people argue that a god must exist, or why else would we have a part of our brain that can “recognize” a god? What use would that part of our brain be otherwise?

However, imagination is important for us to be able to predict the future, and thus aids our survival. We can imagine all kinds of things that aren’t true. It is a byproduct of being able to imagine things that might be true.

As a matter of fact, scientists have begun to study why some people have religious beliefs and others don’t, from a biological perspective. They have identified certain naturally occurring chemicals in our brains that can give us religious experiences.

In studies of religion and the brain, a new field called neurotheology, they have identified the temporal lobe as a place in the brain that can generate religious experiences.

Another part of the brain that regulates a person’s sense of “self” can be consciously shut down during meditation, giving the meditator (who loses his or her sense of personal boundaries) a feeling of “oneness” with the universe.

(5) “Open Heart” - It will do no good to ask atheists to “open our hearts and accept Jesus” (or any other deity). If we were to set aside our skepticism, we might indeed have an inspirational experience. But this would be an emotional experience and, like a revelation, we’d have no way to verify if a god was really speaking to us or if we were just hallucinating.

(6) Unverifiable “Miracles” / Resurrection Stories - Many religions have miracle stories. And just as people who believe in one religion are usually skeptical towards miracle stories of other religions, atheists are skeptical toward all miracle stories.

Good magicians can perform acts that seem like miracles. Things can be mismeasured and misinterpreted. A “medical miracle” can simply be attributed to our lack of knowledge of how the human body works. Why are there never any indisputable miracles, such as an amputated arm regenerating?

Regarding resurrections, atheists will not find a story of someone resurrecting from the dead to be convincing. There are many such legends in ancient literature and, again, most religious people reject the resurrection stories of other religions.

Modern resurrection stories always seem to occur in Third World countries under unscientific conditions. However, there have been thousands of people in modern hospitals hooked up to machines that verified their deaths when they died. Why didn’t any of them ever resurrect?

(7) Fear of Death / “Heaven” - Atheists don’t like the fact that we’re all going to die any more than religious people do. However, this fear does not prove there is an afterlife – only that we wish there was an afterlife. But wishing doesn’t make it so.

There is no reason to believe our consciousness survives the death of our brains. The mind is not something separate from the body. Chemical alteration and physical damage to our brains can change our thoughts.

Some people get Alzheimer’s disease at the end of their lives. The irreversible damage to their brains can be detected by brain scans. These people lose their ability to think, yet they are still alive. How, one second after these people die, does their thinking return (in a “soul”)?

(8) Fear of Hell - The idea of hell strikes atheists as a scam – an attempt to get people to believe through fear what they cannot believe through reason and evidence.

The only way to approach this “logically” is to find the religion that punishes you the worst for disbelief, and then believe that religion. Okay, you will have saved yourself from the worst punishment that exists – if that religion is the “true” religion.

But if that religion (with its punishment) is not the true religion – if the religion that has the second or third worst punishment for disbelief is the true religion – then you have saved yourself nothing.

So, which religion’s hell is the true hell. Without evidence, we can never know.

(9) “Pascal’s Wager” / Faith - In short, Pascal’s Wager states that we have everything to gain (an eternity in heaven) and nothing to lose by believing in a god. On the other hand, disbelief can lead to a loss of heaven (i.e. hell).

We’ve already noted that heaven is wishful thinking and that hell is a scam, so let’s address the issue of faith.

Pascal’s Wager assumes a person can will himself or herself into having faith. This is simply not the case, at least not for an atheist. So atheists would have to pretend to believe. But according to most definitions of God, wouldn’t God know we were lying to hedge our bets? Would a god reward this?

Part of Pascal’s Wager states that you “lose nothing” by believing. But an atheist would disagree. By believing under these conditions, you’re acknowledging that you’re willing to accept some things on faith. In other words, you’re saying you’re willing to abandon evidence as your standard for judging reality. Faith doesn’t sound so appealing when it’s phrased that way, does it?

(10) Blaming the Victim - Many religions punish people for disbelief. However, belief requires faith, and some people, such as atheists, are incapable of faith. Their minds are only receptive to evidence. Therefore, are atheists to be blamed for not believing when “God” provides insufficient evidence?

(11) The End of the World - Like the concept of hell, this strikes atheists as a scare tactic to get people to believe through fear what they can’t believe through reason and evidence. There have been predictions that the world was going to end for centuries now. The question you might want to ask yourselves, if you’re basing your religious beliefs on this, is how long you’re willing to wait – what amount of time will convince you that the world is not going to end?

(12) Meaning in Life - This is the idea that, without belief in a god, life would be meaningless. Even if this were true, it would only prove we wanted a god to exist to give meaning to our lives, not that a god actually does exist. But the very fact that atheists can find meaning in their lives without a belief in a god shows that god belief is not necessary.

(13) “God is Intangible, Like Love” - Love is not intangible. We can define love both as a type of feeling and as demonstrated by certain types of actions.

Unlike “God,” love is a physical thing. We know the chemicals responsible for the feeling of love.

Also, love depends upon brain structure – a person with a lobotomy or other type of brain damage cannot feel love.

Furthermore, if love were not physical, it would not be confined to our physical brains. We would expect to be able to detect an entity or force called “love” floating around in the air.

(14) Morality/Ethics - This is the idea that without a god we’d have no basis for morality. However, a secular moral code existed before the Bible: the Code of Hammurabi.

In Plato’s dialogue called Euthyphro, Socrates asks a man named Euthyphro whether something is good because God says it is, or does God announce something to be good because it has intrinsic goodness?

If something is good because God says it is, then God might change his mind about what is good. Thus, there would be no absolute morality.

If God merely announces something to be good because it has intrinsic goodness, then we might be able to discover this intrinsic goodness ourselves, without the need for god belief.

Christians can’t even agree among themselves what’s moral when it comes to things like masturbation, premarital sex, homosexuality, divorce, contraception, abortion, embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia, and the death penalty.

Christians reject some of the moral laws found in the Bible, such as killing disobedient children or people who work on the sabbath. Therefore, Christians must be applying their own ethical standards from outside the Bible to be able to recognize that these commandments in the Bible are unethical.

Other animals exhibit kindness toward one another and a sense of justice. Morality is something that evolved from us being social beings. It’s based on the selfish advantage we get from cooperation, and on consequences.

(15) Altruism - People sometimes say that without a god there would be no altruism, that evolution only rewards selfish behavior.

However, it can be argued that there is no such thing as altruism, that people always do what they want to do. If they are only faced with bad choices, then people choose the thing they hate the least.

Our choices are based on what gives us (our genes) the best advantage for survival, including raising our reputation in society.

“Altruism” towards family members benefits people who share our genes. “Altruism” towards friends benefits people who may someday return the favor.

Even “altruism” towards strangers has a basis in evolution. This behavior first evolved in small tribes, where everyone knew each other and a good reputation enhanced one’s survival. It is now hard-wired in our brains as a general mode of conduct.

(16) Free Will - Some people argue that without a god there would be no free will, that we would live in a deterministic universe of cause and effect and that we would be mere “robots.”

Actually, there is far less free will than most people think there is. Our conditioning (our biological desire to survive and prosper, combined with our experiences) make certain “choices” far more likely than others. How else can we explain our ability, in many cases, to predict human behavior?

Experiments have shown that our brain makes a “decision” to take action before we become conscious of it!

Some believe that the only free will we have is to exercise a conscious veto over actions suggested by our thoughts.

Most atheists have no problem admitting that free will may be an illusion.

This issue also brings up a conundrum: If a god who created us knows the future, how can we have free will?

In the end, if we are enjoying our lives, does it matter if free will is real or an illusion? Isn’t it only our ego – our healthy self-esteem that is beneficial for survival – that has been conditioned to believe that real free will is somehow better than imaginary free will?

(17) Difficulties of Religion - It has sometimes been argued that because certain religious practices are difficult to follow, nobody would do them if a god didn’t exist. However, it is the belief in the existence of a god that is motivating people. A god doesn’t really have to exist for this to happen.

Difficulties can serve as an initiation rite of passage into being counted one of the “select few.” After all, if just anybody could be “saved,” there might be no point in having a religion.

Finally, the reward for obedience promised by most religions – a heaven – far outweighs any difficulties religion imposes.

(18) False Dichotomies - This is being presented with a false “either/or” proposition, where you’re only given two alternatives when, in fact, there are more possibilities.

Here’s one that many Christians are familiar with: “Either Jesus was insane or he was god. Since Jesus said some wise things, he wasn’t insane. Therefore, he must be God, like he said he was.” But those are not the only two possibilities.

A third option is that, yes, it is possible to say some wise things and be deluded that you are a god.

A fourth possibility is that Jesus didn’t say everything that is attributed to him in the Bible. Maybe he didn’t actually say all those wise things, but the writers of the Bible said he did. Or maybe he never claimed to be God, but the writers turned him into a god after he died.

A fifth possibility is that Jesus is a fictional character and so everything was invented by the authors.

Here’s another example of a false dichotomy: “No one would die for a lie. The early Christians died for Christianity. Therefore, Christianity must be true.”

What’s left out of this is that there is no evidence that anyone who ever personally knew Jesus (if he even existed) was ever martyred. We only have stories of martyrdom.

Another explanation is that the followers had been fooled, intentionally or unintentionally, into thinking Jesus was God, and so they were willing to die for a lie (that they thought was true.)

Another point is that if you believe you’ll end up in a heaven after to die, then martyrdom is no big deal.

Finally, does the fact that the 9/11 bombers were willing to die for their faith make Islam true?

(19) God-of-the-Gaps (Medicine, Life, Universe, etc.) - The god-of-the-gaps argument says that if we don’t currently know the scientific answer to something, then “God did it.”

God-of-the-gaps is used in many areas, but I’ll focus on the three main ones: medicine, life, and the universe. You’ll notice that God never has to prove himself in these arguments. It is always assumed that he gets to win by default.

Here’s a medical example: A person experiences a cure for a disease that science can’t explain. Therefore, “God did it.”

But this assumes we know everything about the human body, so that a natural explanation is impossible. But the fact is, we don’t have complete medical knowledge. Why don’t we ever see something that would be a true miracle, like an amputated arm instantaneously regenerating?

Several studies of prayer, where the patients didn’t know whether or not they were being prayed for, including a study by the Mayo Clinic, have shown prayer to have no effect on healing.

(This raises the question of why we would have to beg an all-powerful, all-loving god to be healed in the first place. It seems ironic, to say the least, to pray to a god to be cured from diseases and the effects of natural disasters that he himself created. It also raises the Problem of Evil: If God is all-powerful and all-loving, why does evil exist in the first place?)

An example of god-of-the-gaps as it applies to life is creationism and “intelligent design.” It says we don’t know everything about evolution, therefore “God did it.” This ignores the fossil and genetic evidence and also fails to explain the many poor and sub-optimal “designs” we find in nature. Is “God” an incompetent or sloppy designer?

The final and most popular example of god-of-the-gaps is the universe. But to say we don’t know the origins of the universe – if the universe even had an ultimate beginning – does not mean that “God did it.”

And, of course, it begs the question: Who created God? If complex things need a creator to explain their existence, then “God,” who by the traditional definition is far more complex than the universe, and is even more in need of a creator.

(20) “Fine-tuning” of the Earth - Some religious people argue that the Earth is positioned “just right” in the solar system (not too hot, not too cold, etc.) for life to exist. Furthermore, the elements on Earth (carbon, oxygen, etc.) are also “just right.” These people claim that this couldn’t have happened “by accident,” so a god must exist to have done the positioning and chemistry.

We should be able to recognize a god-of-the-gaps argument here. But an even better rebuttal exists. If Earth was the only planet in the universe, then it would indeed be remarkable that our conditions turned out to be “just right.”

But most religious people acknowledge that there are probably thousands, if not millions, of other planets in the universe. (Our own solar system has eight planets.) Therefore, by chance, at least one of those planets will have conditions that will produce some kind of life.

We can imagine religious purple creatures with four eyes and breathing carbon dioxide on another planet also falsely believing that their planet is “fine-tuned” and that a creator god exists in their image.

(21) "Fine-tuning” of the Universe - Some religious people argue that the six physical constants of the universe (which control such things as the strength of gravity) can only exist within a very narrow range to produce a universe capable of sustaining life. Therefore, since this couldn’t have happened “by accident,” a god must have done it.

Again, this is a god-of-the-gaps argument. But beyond that, this argument assumes that we know everything about astrophysics – a field in which new discoveries are made on almost a daily basis. We may discover that our universe is not so “fine tuned” after all.

However, the best rebuttal is that there may exist multiple universes – either separately or as “bubble universes” within a single universe. Each of these universes could have its own set of constants. Given enough universes, by chance it is likely that at least one will produce and sustain life.

We know it is possible for at least one universe to exist – we are in it. If one can exist, why not many? On the other hand, we have no evidence that it is possible for even one god to exist.

Conclusion - Religious people have a tough, if not impossible task to try to prove a god exists, let alone that their particular religion is true. If any religion had objective standards, wouldn’t everyone be flocking to the same “true” religion? Instead we find that people tend to believe, to varying degrees, the religion in which they were indoctrinated. Or they are atheists.

*Yes, Bibleman is legit. HT: Outchurched.

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Do atheists have a burden of proof?

Being away from the blogosphere for so long (relatively speaking) has put me at some remove from current debates regarding atheism, and I am only just beginning to catch up. I will mention in passing one trend that appears to have developed as The God Delusion, God Is Not Great, The End of Faith, Breaking the Spell and others have gained in popularity and notoriety--and, it seems, atheism with them. It seems that all one needs to do nowadays to refute atheism is to put the modifier "militant" in front of it--and hey presto! the argument is won. Darwin's Beagle has noted this very trend:

As an experiment, I decided to do a search of Google news using a variety of search terms that included "militant" in their name and comparing what "militant" meant when applied as a modifier to other groups. There was no hits for the search terms "militant Christian", "militant Jew", "militant Judaism", or "militant fundamentalism". There was one hit for "militant Christianity", three hits for "militant fundamentlist", 137 hits for "militant Islam", 90 hits for "militant Islamist", and 15 hits for "militant Muslim". There were 6 hits for "militant atheism" and 5 hits for "militant atheist".
So Islam and its derivatives swamp the number of news articles in which the term "militant" is used. Browsing through the articles, I could not find a single one where the adjective "militant" was used to refer to an Islamist that argued passionately for the acceptance of Islam. Every article dealt with factions of Islam that openly advocated killing Americans, infidels, non-believers, or was in some way or another connected with terrorism.

I myself have been labeled a "Militant Fundamentalist Atheist," even though I am in possession of no bombs or weaponry, have had no military or paramilitary training or experience, and cannot for the life of me see what there is in atheism (particularly the agnostic atheism I espouse) to be "fundamentalist" about. FSM forbid that an actual argument could be allowed to elbow its way past the ad hominems.

What I'd like to do, however, is direct you to the blog of Matt McCormick, from the Philosophy department of California State University, who is teaching that university's first ever seminar on atheism. What I want to draw your attention to, though, are two posts of his where he suggests that, in a predominantly Christian epistemic context such as that which prevails in the US, "the lion’s share of the burden of proof" will be on atheists. That is, in a culture in which God-belief is the prevailing belief,

You can’t just opt to believe otherwise at will and be epistemically inculpable. Even if everyone around you believes something completely mistaken like “The sun orbits the earth,” their believing it, and so many of them believing it, puts an tremendous burden of proof on you if you are going to break ranks and form a contrary opinion.

In case you were thinking otherwise, McCormick is not engaging in Christian apologetics, or at least he is not trying to. (I think.) As a coherentist, his point is that we are justified in believing that which is coherent with prevailing beliefs, and if our beliefs do not cohere with prevailing beliefs, the onus is on us to show how the prevailing beliefs are wrong. To the objection that we should check that our beliefs correspond with objective reality, McCormick replies:

Evidence, for the most part, is what a person takes it to be. Evidence doesn’t just exist out there on its own. Some phenomena only becomes evidence in virtue of being taken to be indicative of some conclusion by some person. And obviously, different people can take the same phenomena as evidence to contradictory conclusions. Or they can appear to be observing the very same phenomena, but they are actually taking note of very different details and drawing the same or different conclusions from it.

In other words, McCormick is arguing that it really won't do for the atheist to simply declare that, in the absence of evidence for the existence of a god, there is no reason to believe that god exists. This merely raises two questions: (i) what would the atheist count as evidence of god's existence?, and (ii) since many theists do believe evidence exists for the existence of god, why should the atheist's interpretation of the evidence trump the theists'? Everything turns, then, on the justification and coherence of one's beliefs. It is up to atheists to show how atheism is more coherent than theism as a worldview.

What do you make of McCormick's argument? My own response is mixed. On the one hand, to return to McCormick's geocentrism example--in which one would be justified in believing that the sun orbits the earth if that is the prevailing belief of one's culture--can we really be justified in believing a falsehood? And I don't accept the claim that even in a god-fearing milieu the atheist bears the lion's share of the burden of proof. The lion's share rests with the party advancing a positive knowledge-claim: this certainly applies to the theist, and it also applies to the strong atheist. It doesn't apply to the weak/agnostic atheist, who lacks belief in gods because there is no evidence that gods exist. Sure, he or she would not be able to say definitively what such evidence would look like, but here's the thing: neither could the theist.

On the other hand, I agree with McCormick that it is not enough for atheists to simply rest on their laurels and expect theists to do all the argumentative leg-work. For one thing, they won't, given that (in societies where theism predominates) they consider theirs to be the default position. Furthermore, to demand reflexiveness on the part of theists whilst neglecting to practice such reflexiveness ourselves is a double-standard. If we have a compelling justification for our position, as McCormick maintains we do, we ought to be out there advancing it.

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In lieu of a short story: "Kissing Hank's Ass"

I came across this cheeky piece of counter-apologetics for the first time this morning, but I gather its been doing the rounds for a while. Click here for the PDF or read the whole thing below the fold.

From JHuger.com:

This morning there was a knock at my door. When I answered the door I found a well groomed, nicely dressed couple. The man spoke first:

John: "Hi! I'm John, and this is Mary."

Mary: "Hi! We're here to invite you to come kiss Hank's ass with us."

Me: "Pardon me?! What are you talking about? Who's Hank, and why would I want to kiss His ass?"

John: "If you kiss Hank's ass, He'll give you a million dollars; and if you don't, He'll kick the shit out of you."

Me: "What? Is this some sort of bizarre mob shake-down?"

John: "Hank is a billionaire philanthropist. Hank built this town. Hank owns this town. He can do whatever He wants, and what He wants is to give you a million dollars, but He can't until you kiss His ass."

Me: "That doesn't make any sense. Why..."

Mary: "Who are you to question Hank's gift? Don't you want a million dollars? Isn't it worth a little kiss on the ass?"

Me: "Well maybe, if it's legit, but..."

John: "Then come kiss Hank's ass with us."

Me: "Do you kiss Hank's ass often?"

Mary: "Oh yes, all the time..."

Me: "And has He given you a million dollars?"

John: "Well no. You don't actually get the money until you leave town."

Me: "So why don't you just leave town now?"

Mary: "You can't leave until Hank tells you to, or you don't get the money, and He kicks the shit out of you."

Me: "Do you know anyone who kissed Hank's ass, left town, and got the million dollars?"

John: "My mother kissed Hank's ass for years. She left town last year, and I'm sure she got the money."

Me: "Haven't you talked to her since then?"

John: "Of course not, Hank doesn't allow it."

Me: "So what makes you think He'll actually give you the money if you've never talked to anyone who got the money?"

Mary: "Well, He gives you a little bit before you leave. Maybe you'll get a raise, maybe you'll win a small lotto, maybe you'll just find a twenty-dollar bill on the street."

Me: "What's that got to do with Hank?"

John: "Hank has certain 'connections.'"

Me: "I'm sorry, but this sounds like some sort of bizarre con game."

John: "But it's a million dollars, can you really take the chance? And remember, if you don't kiss Hank's ass He'll kick the shit out of you."

Me: "Maybe if I could see Hank, talk to Him, get the details straight from Him..."

Mary: "No one sees Hank, no one talks to Hank."

Me: "Then how do you kiss His ass?"

John: "Sometimes we just blow Him a kiss, and think of His ass. Other times we kiss Karl's ass, and he passes it on."

Me: "Who's Karl?"

Mary: "A friend of ours. He's the one who taught us all about kissing Hank's ass. All we had to do was take him out to dinner a few times."

Me: "And you just took his word for it when he said there was a Hank, that Hank wanted you to kiss His ass, and that Hank would reward you?"

John: "Oh no! Karl has a letter he got from Hank years ago explaining the whole thing. Here's a copy; see for yourself."

From the Desk of Karl

1. Kiss Hank's ass and He'll give you a million dollars when you leave town.
2. Use alcohol in moderation.
3. Kick the shit out of people who aren't like you.
4. Eat right.
5. Hank dictated this list Himself.
6. The moon is made of green cheese.
7. Everything Hank says is right.
8. Wash your hands after going to the bathroom.
9. Don't use alcohol.
10. Eat your wieners on buns, no condiments.
11. Kiss Hank's ass or He'll kick the shit out of you.

Me: "This appears to be written on Karl's letterhead."

Mary: "Hank didn't have any paper."

Me: "I have a hunch that if we checked we'd find this is Karl's handwriting."

John: "Of course, Hank dictated it."

Me: "I thought you said no one gets to see Hank?"

Mary: "Not now, but years ago He would talk to some people."

Me: "I thought you said He was a philanthropist. What sort of philanthropist kicks the shit out of people just because they're different?"

Mary: "It's what Hank wants, and Hank's always right."

Me: "How do you figure that?"

Mary: "Item 7 says 'Everything Hank says is right.' That's good enough for me!"

Me: "Maybe your friend Karl just made the whole thing up."

John: "No way! Item 5 says 'Hank dictated this list himself.' Besides, item 2 says 'Use alcohol in moderation,' Item 4 says 'Eat right,' and item 8 says 'Wash your hands after going to the bathroom.' Everyone knows those things are right, so the rest must be true, too."

Me: "But 9 says 'Don't use alcohol.' which doesn't quite go with item 2, and 6 says 'The moon is made of green cheese,' which is just plain wrong."

John: "There's no contradiction between 9 and 2, 9 just clarifies 2. As far as 6 goes, you've never been to the moon, so you can't say for sure."

Me: "Scientists have pretty firmly established that the moon is made of rock..."

Mary: "But they don't know if the rock came from the Earth, or from out of space, so it could just as easily be green cheese."

Me: "I'm not really an expert, but I think the theory that the Moon was somehow 'captured' by the Earth has been discounted*. Besides, not knowing where the rock came from doesn't make it cheese."

John: "Ha! You just admitted that scientists make mistakes, but we know Hank is always right!"

Me: "We do?"

Mary: "Of course we do, Item 7 says so."

Me: "You're saying Hank's always right because the list says so, the list is right because Hank dictated it, and we know that Hank dictated it because the list says so. That's circular logic, no different than saying 'Hank's right because He says He's right.'"

John: "Now you're getting it! It's so rewarding to see someone come around to Hank's way of thinking."

Me: "But...oh, never mind. What's the deal with wieners?"

Mary: She blushes.

John: "Wieners, in buns, no condiments. It's Hank's way. Anything else is wrong."

Me: "What if I don't have a bun?"

John: "No bun, no wiener. A wiener without a bun is wrong."

Me: "No relish? No Mustard?"

Mary: She looks positively stricken.

John: He's shouting. "There's no need for such language! Condiments of any kind are wrong!"

Me: "So a big pile of sauerkraut with some wieners chopped up in it would be out of the question?"

Mary: Sticks her fingers in her ears."I am not listening to this. La la la, la la, la la la."

John: "That's disgusting. Only some sort of evil deviant would eat that..."

Me: "It's good! I eat it all the time."

Mary: She faints.

John: He catches Mary. "Well, if I'd known you were one of those I wouldn't have wasted my time. When Hank kicks the shit out of you I'll be there, counting my money and laughing. I'll kiss Hank's ass for you, you bunless cut-wienered kraut-eater."

With this, John dragged Mary to their waiting car, and sped off.

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