Terry Eagleton has demonstrated why Verso found it worthwhile putting out a book of his book reviews in his latest piece on Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion. Eagleton is acerbic, to put it mildly.
Imagine someone holding forth on biology whose only knowledge of the subject is the Book of British Birds, and you have a rough idea of what it feels like to read Richard Dawkins on theology. Card-carrying rationalists like Dawkins, who is the nearest thing to a professional atheist we have had since Bertrand Russell, are in one sense the least well-equipped to understand what they castigate, since they don’t believe there is anything there to be understood, or at least anything worth understanding. This is why they invariably come up with vulgar caricatures of religious faith that would make a first-year theology student wince. The more they detest religion, the more ill-informed their criticisms of it tend to be. If they were asked to pass judgment on phenomenology or the geopolitics of South Asia, they would no doubt bone up on the question as assiduously as they could. When it comes to theology, however, any shoddy old travesty will pass muster. These days, theology is the queen of the sciences in a rather less august sense of the word than in its medieval heyday.Dawkins on God is rather like those right-wing Cambridge dons who filed eagerly into the Senate House some years ago to non-placet Jacques Derrida for an honorary degree. Very few of them, one suspects, had read more than a few pages of his work, and even that judgment might be excessively charitable. Yet they would doubtless have been horrified to receive an essay on Hume from a student who had not read his Treatise of Human Nature. There are always topics on which otherwise scrupulous minds will cave in with scarcely a struggle to the grossest prejudice. For a lot of academic psychologists, it is Jacques Lacan; for Oxbridge philosophers it is Heidegger; for former citizens of the Soviet bloc it is the writings of Marx; for militant rationalists it is religion.
Dawkins is both stuck in a nineteenth century mindset where science and religion are incompatible rather than incommensurable, and also an awfully illogical mindset which wrongly assumes because some religious people are violent or nutty then religion itself must be the cause of human misery. As Eagleton observes, another militant atheist, Karl Marx, had a much more nuanced view.
Where atheism gained its cultural significance and the purchase it still has on our social imagination was with the dawning of the Enlightenment. A lot of social-scientific and humanistic disciplines as we know them today are effectively anti-theologies, having their origins in an attempt to overturn theology’s position as Queen of the Sciences. Similarly, the drive to topple God from his throne (or decentre him as a universal referent for all knowledge) is closely bound up with the emergence of freedom as a key political value in Liberalism.
But modern social science is able to demonstrate that there are a range of complex factors which lead to violence and human misery. While Marx was wrong that it’s all about the economic, Dawkins is wrong that it’s all about the religious. It’s incredible, as Eagleton argues forcefully, that he’s able to write a polemic claiming to be scientific without any attempt to engage in anything other than broad and unsupported generalisation, and reductive and illogical views of causation.
There’s no difference in logical structure between Dawkins’ arguments and those of the civilisational warriors who want to damn all Muslims and Islam itself because some claim Islam as an inspiration for violence.
While one legacy of the Enlightenment in this sphere – the separation of religion and politics, or liberal secularism – is well worth fighting for, Dawkins’ sloppy polemicism is not the weapon it could be. Dawkins needs to move beyond disputes as to whether science or God can provide meaning to the life and the universe, because those questions are not either/or ones. And his position would be greatly strengthened if he demonstrated some scientific rigour himself on these subjects.
Elsewhere: A different view is put by skepticlawyer at Catallaxy, and Nick Gruen over at Troppo also enjoyed Eagleton’s piece.
If you’re arguing that Theo doesn’t exist, why would you pay heed to Theology?
Put it this way. His God is mostly a strawman. As is his picture of the relationship between reason and faith. No one much would claim that God is a “scientific hypothesis” or base an argument on the philosophical proofs of God. And in any case, Pascal was always right – he famously wasn’t interested in the “god of the Philosophers” but the “God of Abraham and Isaac”. Believing in God is not like believing that 2 plus two equals four. You could accept one of the philosophical proofs (I don’t), and it need not make any difference whatever to your life.
Anyway, Eagleton explained it better than I can at this hour, Leinad. I’d urge you to read his review.
Anyway, my big disappointment is that it’s such a sloppily argued book.
Eagleton really is a superb reviewer.
Great post.
God is man’s way of explaining why he seems such an insignificant part of the web of life. Its a comforting delusion at times – great architecture, literature and music. At at other times it drives men to madness – world wars and global destruction. Women don’t need god – but the patriarchy rules so they must try to get along, or else. Bearing life, caring for life, and being there at the end of other’s lives gives women a bigger understanding of our place in the universe. Children are born atheists and have their innocence ruined by religious imprinting. Religion is a male existential delusion and women and children are its victims.
Dawkins is not prejudiced on religion. He is post-judiced. He’s considered the evidence and the claims of the religious and finds them wanting. Claiming that he hasn’t considered theoligical claims when no-one has shown that theology isn’t based on fraud misses his point. In other words, why worry about the study of god or gods when there are no facts to base such a study on.
Zarquon,
Theology is the philosophy of the existence and nature of God. Claiming (correctly) that there isn’t any scientific evidence for God is in itself theology. Saying otherwise is sophistry.
Hmmm a couple of points in Eagleton’s rant struck me, most notably the repeated assertion that
“theology’s position as Queen of the Sciences” – that’s news to me – I guess the universities have changed a bit, and theology has now become a part of the Science faculties ?
I think not – Theological study has always been in the realm of the humanities, which are crammed with pseudo sciences such as economics and sociology – just because such disciplines use some aspects of scientific methodology does not, IMO make them “science” – the major difference from “science” being that such disciplines deal with intangibles which cannot be dealt with by the “scientific method” which is, after all, what defines a “science”. (Disclaimer : I make no judgments as to the worth of such studies, merely their categorisation as “science”)
The assertion that one must study theology in order to dispute it is nonsensical – and could only be justified if there were convincing hypotheses for the existence of a deity, which could be subject to testing – and as far as I am aware, this is not the case.
Tyro – ???
How can you reason about the existence and nature of gods without facts to anchor the reasoning? The premises for any theological argument will remain arbitrary and subjective and can lead to any conclusion the theologian desires. The success of science is based on getting the grounding in facts correct then reasoning to theories that encompass those facts. It’s the lack of such grounding that so much theological argument leads to schism rather than consensus.
Yeah, Eagleton slaps down Dawkins effortlessly.
But he’s much less successful at proposing a counter argument.
Paintings on rock walls, great statues, and a multiplicity of “holy scriptures” all indicate that humans have conceived of a startling diversity of gods, many of which share traits deemed to be “divine”, all of which have at least one trait that contradicts at least one of the traits of at least one of the other gods.
Thus, objectively, only one of these gods can possibly be the true god.
But which one to choose?
I don’t know whether Eagleton claims to be Christian, but his sole focus is a description of God as derived from the Jewish tradition. Yet never anywhere does he explain why he should choose that tradition in preference to one of the multitude of other traditions.
If all gods were identical, then Eagleton’s assumption of a Biblical god wouldn’t matter. But as I said earlier, all gods are unique, and are deemed to be extraordinarily jealous of their uniqueness to the point of smiting worshippers of alleged “false gods”.
I assume that Eagleton universalises his god, because his god is the one he knows and loves. But this clearly isn’t good enough.
All other believers in all other gods do exactly the same universalising trick as Eagleton.
By definition, only one of them can be right. Why, therefore, should we believe Eagleton?
And until there is general agreement among theists about the nature of god, we atheists are better employed doing more useful things than arguing general points against specific cultural artifacts aka “gods”.
So c’mon theists. Instead of pussy-footing around each other, let’s have the mother of all stoushes among believers to determine once and for all time the singular nature of the real god.
It’s always so easy to knock God(s) and the spirituality of the virtuous, but it’s rare to find a militant rationalist who’s confident enough to knock the Devil, or at least the existence of evil, on an equivalent theological head. A merciful God’s just not going to take it out of you if you’re wrong, right atheists?
It’s all around you and any grown adult with eyes can look around and see it—and enjoy all of the benefits of naughtiness. Have a beer, enjoy the attentions of the opposite sex (and ask them what’s with the umbrella). Thus, I refute the Enlightenment.
If theology is a science then theology, as Zarquon suggests, is one massive exercise in begging the question.
No wonder a professional theologist would get antsy at someone with Dawkins’ broad appeal pointing this out. So he’s getting on his I-was-here-first high horse. Sure, the guy can write, but it sure sounds precious (not to mention ad hominem).
That said, Dawkins is really shooting fish in a barrel here, and is not going to convince anyone who doesn’t already agree.
However I disagree that his God is a strawman. He’s just stating the obvious – that the philosophical ‘proofs’ for God are bunk, so if you want to believe in God then you better be comfortable with the fact that it’s irrational and delusional to do so. Just admit (as many do) that your faith has nothing to do with truth-claims – that it is of a qualitatively different character to your other beliefs (i.e. empirically or logically derived ones).
“So c’mon theists. Instead of pussy-footing around each other, let’s have the mother of all stoushes among believers to determine once and for all time the singular nature of the real god.”
Good call, Katz. ICBMs at high noon. Actually, let’s give it 20-30 years so’s we can retire to our godless plexiglass dome on Mars to relax and adjudicate.
DD:
That umbrella lady has nice boobies.
See, FDB, you’re a believer after all. Praise boobies, hallelujah!
I would just like to take this opportunity to wish all my Christian friends a very Merry Christmas.
Since we did this to death on Troppo I won’t go into details again, but I found Eagleton’s review bad tempered and incoherent. I reject the argument that you can’t dismiss religion without engaging with its more sophisticated expositors. These expositors are not intellectual pioneers. They are apologists for one or other pre-existing body of superstition, and proliferate when the belief system is in retreat. This is the opposite of Copernicus and Darwin, who battled to gain acceptance for unpopular and counterintutive theories. People were converted to their ideas by the force of their logic and evidence. No religious doctrine ever gained a foothold in society through its irresistible appeal to reason.
On the other hand, if Dawkins attributes all or the majority of wars to religion, that would be unfair. But does he in fact do that?
Ah no thanks Katz. I’m an atheist and while Eagleton is a skilled writer I’m in Dawkin’s corner. However there’s no scientific method or compelling argument in the world that would force me to go to the opposite side (short of you know, the Flying Spaghetti Monster touching me with his noodly appendage), and I kinda reckon the theists think the same thing.
However, unlike Dawkins, if you guys all wanna keep being theists, I don’t care. I don’t think that removing religion from the human mind would do anything to solve the world’s problems, because people would just find new excuses to be awful to one another.
Frankly, sometimes I envy people of faith. They’ve got it all sorted. I reckon they’ve got it sorted wrong, but at least they’re sure of it. Me, all I’m sure of is that this, the great here-and-now, is all I’ve got. So I better make a good shot of it, and make my tiny moment here count for something.
Also, I’m going out to buy the God Delusion RIGHT NOW. Okay, possibly this weekend.
This is rubbish. Dawkins does not see science and religion as incompatible. It would be closer to characterising his position to say he sees logic and religion as incompatible.
And it’s quite ironic, accusing Dawkins of being stuck in the nineteenth century.
He also makes no such claim as religion being the cause of human misery – he does say religion is responsible for misery (I don’t think there’s much arguing with that) – he does not say it’s responsible for all misery, or for human misery generally, or anything else remotely along those lines. Did you read the book, or just the ascerbic review?
You misunderstand me Kate.
My request was much more modest than that.
I merely, suggested that those who believe in god already find some way of coming to an agreement between their good selves about the actual nature of that god.
Then, reinforced by even greater certainty they could take on the atheists with enormous confidence.
In short, I’m asking the theists to get their act together.
Why this fixation on singular Gods, Katz? It’s not like the deities’ve got dibs on spiritual potential existence or temporal explanatory power.
I can hear a whole lot of Manichean ghosts getting cross right now, or is that just the poking and burning? Who can tell.
Also, if I was to say, live your life atheistically and with your own socially-contingent individual ethics, or in the Crowleyan fashion “do what thou wilt”; that’d be just as much a commandment on faith and disbelief as any Holy Book—just that you’d be betting that there wasn’t an afterlife or eternal reward/punishment. Is it time for a beer yet? 10.42am in my current time zone. I promise nothing bad’ll happen if you do crack (another) one open. Promise.
I hope not, Kate! If they have, they haven’t got faith!
Indeed. I have been subjected to the violence caused by religion vs violence caused by secular ideologies argument on numerous occassions and find it to be something of a cheap pissing contest. It seems to me that the common factor in all violence is people, and that even in a world totally bereft of religion people would simply find other reasons to kill each other.
Perhaps, but as Dawkins points out, it’s much LESS likely that there’s a god than that there isn’t. So at least if you’re betting there isn’t an afterlife, the odds are with you.
Yes, but Dawkins does NOT argue that it’s all about the religious. Anyone suggesting he does has seriously misunderstood the book.
It’s not my fixation DD.
To perceive is not to endorse.
I was identifying and defining the fixation of others, notably theists.
I note that we share a time zone. Can you smell brimstone too? Or is that the sulphurous nose of my particularly cantankerous Victorian shiraz?
Come on,
SantaSatan.You can’t seriously be saying that “don’t believe anything that doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny from your senses and intellect” is the same as “believe [insert claptrap fairytale here] or you won’t get to sit on a cloud with Hendrix and Audrey Hepburn”.
I agree that people will probably kill each other anyway. However, having something ‘beyond reason’ as your main moral driving force means that you can always resist properly examining your motives. If we were forced to recognise our base violence for what it is, instead of packaging it as God’s work, then we’d have a much better chance of doing something about it.
That’s the impression I formed from reading the book, Rebekka. I’m prepared to concede that my hostility to his argument might be an issue. How would you characterise his claim about the link between religion and violence?
Fuck! My stinkin’ workplace just sent out for bacon&egg rolls and coffees without asking me. I’ll take your advice DD, and start early on the Friday bevvies.
What must I do to convince you all of My existence?
Sorry Guv. I thought you was Gandalf.
God, if you want to prove you exist, do something that proves you exist. Giant hands coming out of the sky and poking at St Peter’s Basilica would probably suffice.
That’s right, Rebekka, though I’m not sure who’s in charge of setting his odds. I’d be interested to know the technicalities of calculating probability out of the existence and non-existence of an afterlife, and what Pascal’d think about this upstart Dawkins. As to gambling, God doesn’t throw dice, but I do. Wanna play craps against the House?
Katz and FDB, I think you’ll find a fruity verdelho goes down nicely as a breakfast aperitif—though naturally you should choose your own poison. I’ve sometimes been a fan of stout on weet-bix.
He claims there is a link. He never claims that – as you characterised it – “religion itself must be the cause of human misery”
And there clearly is a link between religion and violence – the Taliban springs to mind. So do the Crusades, so does the Inquisition, so does the Arab/Israeli conflict. But pointing out this link between religion and violence is not the same as saying all violence is based in religion.
If someone pointed out a link between alcohol and violence, you wouldn’t immediately assume that they were arguing that no teetotaller had never thrown a punch, would you?
This is Mother Earth speaking. How about those bushfires? If you think that’s armageddonish, you ain’t seen nothin yet.
Dawkins devotes a chapter to the odds – suggest you read it
My opinion of the book is quite obviously different from Mark’s. I loved it.
Being limited to what I can nab from the fridge at work, it’ll be a Cooper’s Sparkling for me.
Verdelho – fruity is cool, but I don’t dig it unless it finishes nice and dry. I’m a pretty hard man to please with residual sugar – either cloying and sticky for sipping or bone dry for me. The only exceptions have been two pricey Kraut drops me old man tried to convince me with – a Gewurtz-Traminer and a Spaetlese Riesling. The ones I can afford won’t cut it.
Rebekka, just as there are usually other factors than alcohol in violence when people are drunk, there are also other factors than religion when violence is done in faith’s name.
FDB, you’ll be pleased to know we here in WA are doing a good line in dry verdelhos. I just wrote a story about it. Seek out a Talijancich verdelho from 1997 and you won’t be disappointed.
Nah, I’m like Elle McPherson, I never read anything I haven’t written myself.
There is a link between alcoholism and violence, by the way. It’s not causally direct in either direction, and there’s a lot more to it than that, but there’s undeniable correlation.
Here’s Dawkins:
http://www.beliefnet.com/story/136/story_13688.html
These are childish and stupid arguments.
No.
But Dawkins is arguing because some violence is associated with religion, there should be no religion because sometimes it leads to violence.
I think that’s a pretty big over-simplication of Dawkin’s argument, Mark. I think he’s pointing out that without religion, a big excuse and motivator of a lot of the world’s violence would be removed, and not that religion should be got rid of because it leads to violence.
Oversimplification, Kate?
In the interview I’m quoting him from, he says that without religion there’d be a “paradise on earth”…
Do people agree with him that there’d have been no s11 without religion?
Kate:
Sweet!
Or rather not so sweet. I’ll be over there in 5 days, so maybe I’ll pick one up for the old fart. Probably cheaper here though!
Way back in 94/95 I came across a loverly Verdelho at a cellar door in the S/W. Hay Shed Hill, or Happs? Something with an ‘H’. Are they still up to scratch?
Pretty sure it was Happs, I have this recollection of a dark, sunken tasting room rather than H.S.H’s big shiny barn.
The Economist sums up his position:
http://www.economist.com/books/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7939629
I borrowed the book from the library, so I apologise for not quoting from it directly. I didn’t intend to write a post reviewing it, but to draw attention to Eagleton’s review and some issues I think arise from Dawkins’ arguments.
Without religion people would simply find another cause to believe and then use that as an excuse to kill the “non-believers” so if that is indeed what Dawkins thinks then he hasn’t been paying attention to the 20th century.
Exactly, Shaun.
Anyway, better go do some work…
Did it smell sulphurous? If it did, I can’t believe you were down my way and didn’t say hello.
No Mark, I think what he’s saying — given that I’ve only read interviews of Dawkins and not his book — that if everyone embraced secular rationalism, there’d be a paradise on earth. His argument isn’t just about abandoning religion, but that religion is one of the ways in which humans are NOT rational and sensible. And a pretty major way.
I don’t know if I agree with him in that way because frankly I don’t have a great deal of faith in humanity’s ability to be that rational, with or without religion. Atheism wasn’t that great in China. Get rid of God/s and people just find other excuses to be shitty.
I do agree with Dawkins that religion is irrational and that a lot of harm is done in it’s name. As I said, I don’t think getting rid of religion will solve much, but I do think if everyone in the world did suddenly wake up and decide to be a rational secular humanist the world would be a much, much better place.
FDB, but sure about that one but there’s a few producers doing nice dry verdelhos over here, I’m sure you’ll find them.
I think Dawkins hammers on about religion as if it were that simple a bit too much, but as a matter of degrees. Of course he spends his life being lied about and abused by Christians so a bit of venom is perhaps understandable.
His argument is against irrationality, of which relgious belief is a major manifestation. (and the one he is most interested in since it overkaps with his professional life.) So is dedication to extreme political ideologies. If we taught ourselves and our children better defences against slipping into magical thinking in every sphere, reasons for hating people who think differently would be much diminished, yes (I think.)
Not gonna happen, of course but it would be nice.
DD – now that you mention it, it was a tad warm in there. I would’ve had the Vasse Felix cellar as your domain though. The owner would certainly be on side!
Yeah, wasn’t suggesting there wasn’t – was just pointing out that (as with religion and Dawkins’ argument), the connection is not an argument for assuming a sober person will never throw a punch.
Mark, no, he’s really not. You’re misrepresenting the argument. Dawkins’ is arguing here (although it is NOT the central argument of the book) that there should be no religion because it does more harm than good. There’s no such thing as what the quote you posted from The Economist calls ordinary, âsensibleâ? religious people – there’s a reason why they’ve put “sensible” in quotes. Religion is anything but.
And dismissing Dawkins’ arguments as
- is that what you call an adult and coherent argument?
Oh, the irony.
Yes, religion played a major part in motivating that specific incident. I do, however, believe that there would still be plenty of terrorist violence in a world without religion.In any case, as Dawkins says, there isn’t much chance of such a world developing any time soon.
Perhaps so, Kate.
But every time I’ve read anything by Dawkins or seen or heard him interviewed, he comes across as bombastic, self-satisfied and intolerant. I don’t think he’s a very good poster boy for the rational secular humanists!
If he’s been bagged by religious types, the rational response would be to refute them with calm argument. The fact that he writes overblown polemics suggests either that emotional violence has other sources than religion.
I read him as very dogmatic. I’ve made the point in several posts before, and this is what I’m getting at with my point about nineteenth century perspectives – science and religion don’t do the same thing. For fundies to say “archaeology proves us right” is an irreligious attitued, but for scientists to say “science provides meaning to life” is also an unscientific attitude.
Anyway, happy stoushing, everyone! Really better go back to working.
One of religion’s big ticket attractions was explanatory power. Nowadays, it has precisely none. All that’s left are proscriptions on behaviour and half-baked contradictory social theories.
But that’s my point, Rebekka.
He doesn’t distinguish between religious faith and violent fanaticism. He argues that the first leads to the second. The claim that we’d be better off without the first logically implies that there’s some sort of slippery slope where anyone with religious belief is potentially a violent fanatic.
It’s reductive monocausality, it’s logically fallacious and it’s a mockery of any claims to be scientific in his writing about these issues.
As I’ve said, it’s exactly the same argument which holds that if some Muslims say their violence is religious, we should treat all Muslims as potentially violent. Using his “rationality”, you could justify everything that most liberal humanists would oppose in terms of discrimination against people because of their group membership rather than their individual actions.
I’m not saying there aren’t reasons to discuss reason and faith, or to be critical of religion, just that Dawkins is an appallingly bad example of rational humanism. In fact I don’t think he is one at all, because his arguments are irrational, and his conclusions hardly humanistic.
Just sayin…
Anyway, work beckons!
The book *is* about religion – it’s perhaps not altogether surprising that he’s focusing on it, in that context!
FDB, I have actually spent a bit of time there. Funny that.
They’re unreconstructed Oz-wine traditionalists, I have to say. Chardonnays so chunky they might as well feature in dog food commercials, shirazzes that taste like a punch in the face with a barbecued chop, and cabsavs that ooze chattering class. (Doesn’t mean I wont’ drink ‘em, though).
Oh, and the original terrorists were rational secular humanists. Spirit of Man, human rights, guillotines, ça ira and all that.
I agree, Rebekka. This book is in the polemical vein but there is a place for that, if you read his other books you will find beautifully written, calm, thoughtful argument with evidence galore. I actually think so widespread and insidious is the irrational all around us, there is definately an important place for strongly put argument and no-apologies defences rather than pussyfooting faux-compromise.
The discoveries and methods of science give my life a great deal of meaning, BTW.
No, that’s wrong.
Religion as a cosmology prior to the Enlightenment didn’t have “explanatory power” because we didn’t have a scientific view of the world and of causes. Rather it was the backdrop of knowledge itself. Going back up to pterosaur’s point way up the thread, theology was the “Queen of the Sciences” because it was the foundation of knowledge in the medieval University. Science didn’t mean an experimental and rational method of enquiry, but knowledge – scientia. Science in our sense kicks off in the 16th and 17th centuries.
This idea of religion as behind and within everything – or rather, the divine, because the notion of religion had quite a different meaning in terms of conduct rather than belief – is not dissimilar to what it means in Taoism or Hinduism – the distinctive contribution of the Christian West was to render it amenable to reasoning.
But it’s worth observing that Newton and all his buddies didn’t erect the hard walls between science and irrationality that their modern epigones do. Newton saw himself as revealing the laws of God’s creation (and that’s before we get into alchemy, astrology etc…).
The response of many religious thinkers in the nineteenth century was to accept the terms of the (then) scientific argument and try to defend religion as a form of knowledge having explanatory power. It’s not. It is a ground for one’s life. It’s not a way of knowing.
It would be really helpful in these debates if people read something of the history of both religion and science.
Aarrgghh!!! I am now no longer going to let this thread distract me!
Dawkins’s primary argument against God is mostly concerned with asserting the fallacies of the arguments for God’s existence.
Dawkins’s secondary argument is that belief in God has had unfortunate consequences.
These two arguments should never be conflated. It is possible to conceive of a divine being whose central purpose is to produce a universe of unfortunate consequences. And the existence of unfortunate consequences may be in that case a somewhat persuasive a postieri argument for the existence of that divine being.
Eagleton’s critique of Dawkins in the review is mostly concerned with the feebleness of Dawkins’s argument against God’s existence. And in that sense Eagleton nails Dawkins’s naive logical positivism.
Wittgenstein, who once spent some time (like me when I was doing first year philosophy) muddling his brain with the ontological argument for the existence of god, ended up concluding that the arguments (=”philosophical proofs”) had no implication for anyone’s life even if they were logically valid.
Which is right because faith, as Mark has been arguing, is not a form of knowledge. Eagleton is right to say that it’s relational. There’s doubt, because what you love isn’t fully disclosed to you. But isn’t that a metaphor for all human love and relationships anyway?
And I hate to sound like C.L. but didn’t Lenin and Stalin consider themselves to be “rational secular humanists” too?
That’s a serious point, btw.
/runs away
Indeed, Katz. The Gnostic Demiurge.
Good stuff.
I think I agree with of the critique that this book is disappointing because it should be better.
I find that Dawkins defends himself against a lot of this critique by saying “God believers will say….that I am the anti Christ or that I am stupid or that I am well what ever…..
This is precisely the sort of special-pleading that he rails against with regard to religion. Pretty poor stuff really.
HOWEVER my point (here) is that this is an important book even though it is facile because it has obviously caught the popular imagination. It is difficult to rebut in a simple way, and the general public aren’t really interested in serious intellectual argument (I cite the Chariots of the Gods idiocy of the 70s ….this was found not only to be poor scholarship but also fraudulent but the average Fred and Freda vouldn’t care less.
It is fascinating that you have got such an enoromous number of comments on this topic….which is my point.
Can I just say, Mark, not that you need to respond, I don’t think it’s the atheists who are generally clueless about religion and science? Most of us do actually give this a lot of thought. We are, after all, the ultimate contrarians in a world full of belief. Most of the human population of the world are religious in some way or another. We’re a tiny and relatively new historical phenomenon.
There isn’t a lot in the way of atheist reading material out there in comparison to religion and it’s apologists, either, so I’m prepared to cut Dawkins a fair bit of slack for being an angry polemicist, just as I’m prepared to cut feminists a whole lot of slack for being angry polemicists. Dawkins is the face of a deeply unpopular and hugely hated movement, especially in the US.
However, I’m not so sure that the vast majority of religious fundamentalists give much thought to the opposing perspective. It’s the people who think the earth actually is 6000 years old and get riled up when you talk about evolution because ‘they’re not descended from monkeys’. It’s people who stone women to death for being raped due to some ridiculous notion of religiously and culturally-inspired ‘shame’. They’re the enemy.
Maybe Dawkins is wrong about tolerant ‘sensible’ religious people being part of the problem not the solution. I tend to think he’s right, because so many ‘sensible’ religious people go through life never questioning their ideas and their faith and never learning or promoting learning.
In short, I respect your views, Mark, because you’ve given them thought and you’ve read and studied. But I can’t honestly respect the views of someone who has never even read the bible they profess to follow. (And I have read that bible.)
DD – uncanny! How did I know? Elementary, my dear
WatsonHolmes(a Court). Let’s talk about wine while this thread sorts out the finer points of theology, eh?I agree whole-heartedly on Vasse Felix’s heavy-handedness. I don’t want a Chardonnay I have to chew. I blame the gin-gin clone vines. It’s a frickin’ caricature. Pierro’s acclaimed Chardonnay from just down the road is even less subtle. I’m just sticking to the semillon/sav blanc while I’m over there this Xmas.
Kate, I agree with you about who the enemies are, but you have to pick your fights. Dawkins fights on a much too broad front – all religious people are potential fundies. Same as some feminists I don’t like – “all men are potential rapists”.
To the degree that he calls for all people to be more reflective and subject their beliefs to criticism, that’s very much to be welcomed.
But not all agnostics or atheists are people who are reacting against a religious upbringing. There are a lot now who haven’t had any religious upbringing and never think about this stuff (that goes for a lot of the nominally religious too).
I don’t think it would be right (not that I think you are suggesting this) to suggest that atheism and agnosticism are de facto always thought out positions, just as you recognise that religious belief isn’t always unreflective.
There’s far too little thinking and reflection in the world!
Where Dawkins doesn’t do himself any favours, I think, is that a lot of the time he’s shadowboxing with straw people and ideas.
Something to read.
I’d love to see Eagleton get up in front of the vast majority of theist congregations on Earth and explain to them how their conception of an interventionist, personal God is a naive, simplistic strawman. That would be fun to watch.
When are you in Perth, FDB?
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So we can dispute epistemology without ever studying it?
My point: Arguing that God doesn’t exist because there is no evidence is simply a form of theology (a logos in regard to the deus) – one that calls it to the account of empiricism (not rationalism as others said).
That may well be the correct approach to theology. Of this I offer no argument against. But it does one’s argument a lot of good if you can show you have at least a passing familiarity with the other arguments in the field.
NB I am a materialist.
Anna:
Dec 19th-28th.
Fark all free time, ‘cos my sister’s over from San Fran with a shiny new bairn and a 3-year-old. The little lady’s sis has a pup too, and with two sets of divorced parents that all adds up (in the immortal words of Flava Flav) to a fuckin’ situation.
Plus me old band is doing a reunion show, having not played together in 3 years. EEEK!!!
The Fascist Fair Go Party and guests, Rosemount Hotel Dec. 27th. Ridiculous cabaret political satire and loud shouty stuff with multimedia extravaganza (read: PowerPoint presentations and old clips from previous gags recycled).
Hey, I put mock-HTML around that plug denoting it as such. Does actually mean something? I guess it must, ‘cos I just wrote it again in between ‘does’ and ‘actually’ and nothing shows in the preview. No wait, it does that with anything. Now I’m all confused.
How does Dawkins answer that. Hey? Rahner on grace. The killer punch. Atheists ain’t got anything that can touch Rahner on grace.
But still, I dips me lid to Eagleton. It’s a superb polemic.
Mark re:
I disagree. When science offers by the theory of natural selection, that the meaning to life is the propagation of the species, it might be regarded as “unsatisfactory” to theists or philosophers, but it is based on the strongest scientific evidence applicable from a single celled amoeba to human beings. I’d be interested in your definitions of “scientific attitude” and the “meaning of life.”
Of course when it comes to how and why the universe was created, far beyond Darwinian theory, that’s an entirely different question which encompasses for example scientific hypotheses: multi-universes, unified “string theory,” the creation of matter as a zero sum equation and the like.
Of course it all depends on what one regards as the “meaning of life”, which is why I loved that line from the movie of the same name:
Kim re:
Again I disagree. I think that’s an oversimplification. Dawkin’s argument is mainly that “moderate” theists give a cover to the fundies. That’s why he has adopted the policy of not wanting to “work” with mainstream theism to counteract the fundies. He seems to my mind to focus on questioning the fact that attacking all religion is seen as a no go area, not polite, culturally unacceptable: whatever. Part of that is that unwittingly, moderates in all religions give a cover, a background in which extremism flourishes. Remove religion, hey presto, no more cover.
Indeed, “picking the fight” is an issue Dawkins has even with some fellow atheists. I’m not yet convinced he’s wrong in that approach.
For those interested Dawkins website is here: (there’s heaps of argy bargy there)
http://richarddawkins.net/home
Dawkins has this to say about the god of the old testament, in “the God Delusion” who is:
I’ll go with that reductionism.
That description of God above, is quite apposite of another central character in this little tale.
Harry Sapiens.
Indeed wbb.
“Mankind” (sic) was created supposedly in “the image of god.”
But I think it’s painfully obvious it was the other way around.
Mark from way back up the thread:
“These are childish and stupid arguments.”
Absolutely. It’s kindergarten stuff.
I’m with Mark on that point and on the thread.
I’ve always been a Gouldian and found his approach to religion far more palatable. His concept of Nonoverlapping Magesteria was unfairly maligned and it is sad that Gould did not get to develop the idea more.
I’ll come back to the rest of the arguments you make, Peter, but as Kim said, you have to pick your fights. Dawkins pisses off a lot of potential allies in the fight against the fundies. But I don’t think it’s actually a strategic choice. I think he is somehow personally offended that anyone can hold religious beliefs. That’s his problem, not mine.
Exactly.
I’d go with Eagleton’s assessment rather than Peter’s reductionism.
But hey, what would I know.
James, it is a strawman if you ask tricky faux smart questions like Eagleton’s crud about “how can God be everywhere listening to prayers simultaneously”?
As Eagleton said, Christians meet their God in the person of Christ.
And if that was all there was to it no-one would give a rat’s.
But somehow this leads to anti-evolution, anti-education, anti-contraception, anti-prophylaxis, anti-semitism, anti-women and anti-human beliefs.
Did anyone notice in the recent “conscience” vote on stem cell research that Peter Garrett (along with Kevin Rudd) voted to keep the ban? This is the kind of damage that religion does to an otherwise progressive mind.
Peter Garret : Peacemaking for Christians in the 21st Century.
seems apt, imho.
While I agree with Dawkins in that I think whoever was impersonating God in the Old Testament should have been exorcised, Peter Kemp is overdoing reductionism in claiming that propagation of the species is a scientifically delivered meaning for our lives.
Although a scientist by profession and a Voltaire-style atheist (i.e. I have no need of that hypothesis), I don’t expect science or anything else to be able to give meaning to all minutiae of my existence. I’m not very interested in propagating the species. So that connection is broken. Science is also pretty useless for explaining my musical tastes, mood swings, voting habits, or why I feel happier if I try to make the world a better place than I found it. This, despite the fact that the latter feels MUCH more like a prime source of purpose in life.
I don’t see that some supernatural entity would not provide me with any support, encouragement or direction on ethics beyond what I can generate myself. Others evidently differ.
But beyond that, I fail to understand why anyone would want to confuse ethical direction by a quasi-parental deity with a source of data on the incredibly far-off and almost irrelevant beginnings of the Universe, Solar System, Earth and Life, or with a right to intefere in the day-to-day lives of others. Looking for a single source for all these highly disparate things leads people into very bizarre mindsets.
The Christian churches would retain more credibility if they modelled themselves more on Christ of the Gospels, and abjured both creationism and the tendency to seek influence over temporal law and mores. Planks and motes come to mind. Similar points could be levelled at the other Abrahamic faiths.
How about, we go with science’s marvellous, gradually articulated, self-correcting stories on the scientifically explainable, while at the same time celebrating the inexplicably human as something that is an integral part of mature, responsible, thinking human beings, and accepting that the two don’t mingle well, since nobody ever fell in love with anyone else through solving their Schroedinger equation?
The universe contains very big and very small things, very fast and very slow things, and no single way of looking at it describes all of these at a useful level of detail at the same time. We’ve got the brains, eyes and words to appreciate it multimodally, so that’s what we should do.
And, while we are at it, stomp bigots, promulgators of ignorance, and judgemental hypocrites wherever we find them, whatever grousp they claim to belong to.