Let’s start with vocabulary
A very interesting discussion last week at the Valve. Similar to many discussions we have, but also different, on account of different people conducting it. It’s about Dawkins and what the Valve poster, Bill Benzon, finds ‘bothersome’ about him. He puts it this way:
As far as I can tell, my target is a certain kind of discourse, a kind which Dawkins exemplifies particularly well, but others participate in it as well. And what bothers me about this discourse is not that it is against religious belief, but that it is against the religious as well.
That’s not as clear as it might be, but I think what he’s saying is, people who are sharply critical of religious belief are ‘against’ (attacking, hostile to, unfair to, aggressive toward, offensive to, unkind to) religious believers themselves. In other words it’s yet another voice swelling the already deafening chorus saying ‘shut up about religion because it is offensive to be critical about it because it’s not possible to be critical about it without attacking the people who believe in it.’ It’s saying that it’s not morally respectable to discuss religion in frank terms because there is no way to do that without insulting – without ‘being against’ – religious believers. I dislike that chorus, for several reasons, which I’ve referred to now and then: among them are the fact that that doesn’t apply to other beliefs, and the fact that it simply adds to the already very heavy social pressure to be extra extra extra-special kind about religion.
Most commenters, I’m happy to say, share my dislike, and do an excellent job of arguing. A biggish chunk of the morning flew away while I read the comments; I recommend them. John Horgan – the ‘end of science’ guy – drops in; so does PZ; so do other interesting people. Dan Green (a Valve author who is also a B&W author) notes:
It’s puzzling to me that otherwise smart, non-mystical people like Bill Benzon, Jonathan Derbyshire, and, indeed, Thomas Nagel have come down so hard on Dawkins’s book and its “deperate arrogance.” It suggests that atheism is still far from acceptable even in “intellectual” circles.
Just so; and that’s why this kind of thing is annoying and depressing. There shouldn’t be all this pressure to closet the atheism even in ‘intellectual’ circles. It shouldn’t be a consensus. It’s a consensus even among people who claim not to like consensus. Very odd.
Muriel Gray at the Herald is not silenced.
…a nutcase Britain utterly obsessed with religion. People were threatening Jack Straw with violence; some woman (we think – for all we know it could have been Paul Gascoigne under that niquab) was claiming her right to mumble lessons at children while wearing a bag over her head, and the pope had made the hilariously Monty-Python esque declaration that he was “considering” abolishing limbo for unbaptised babies, no doubt making intelligent Catholics squirm with embarrassment at the screaming silliness of heavenly admission by human whim.
Yes, but also giving me something to write a teasing N&C about. It’s an ill wind, etc.
Let’s start with vocabulary. Let’s stop describing these tax-funded establishments as faith schools. They are superstition schools, for that is what they teach. Alongside hard facts, innocent children are hoodwinked into accepting as real the mythology of virgin births, gods who regard women with bare heads as wicked harlots, that Noah’s Ark was real and that Darwin was wrong. It’s clear that, given the rising tide of superstition sweeping our country, no politician will help end this state-funded child abuse, and so it is time to try and fight back.
But be sure to do it without being, or appearing to be, ‘against the religious.’ Thass forbidden.
Once we got our schools and started churning out multiracial youngsters free from any kind of manipulation, save that of being taught to question everything, we could start our political lobbying. Why should religious concerns be put above ours? Why shouldn’t we have the right to be appeased when we are offended by religion, the way the religious whine like toddlers when someone shakes a stick at their myths? Why shouldn’t we be consulted and treated with respect as a community? Why are the sincerely held beliefs I’ve outlined inferior to those of a Christian, Jew or a Muslim?
Why indeed. I would very much like to know.
Fair enough.
This reminds me of two things: the feeling of being a gun owner under the PC hate campaigns of 1996-1999, which thosed not interested did not even realise was vicious;
and the acceptance of alternative medicine, New Age and activist silliness of all kinds. We politely don’t diss the mental capabilities of people who think, or pretend to think, all kinds of crazy stuff.
cynical arrogant shrill rant nihilistic amoral not fair because it’s faith and you just shouldn’t respect default respectable tradition family/values and anyway you’ll go straight to hell if you don’t stop you’re making the baby jesus cry..
There. That’s about as coherent as you’ll find anywhere else, I think.
Oohh! “Against the religious” (!) How dare anyone suggest that the religious are at least one brick short of a full load?
Like one of the two (yes, two,now ugrrr…) churches near me – who were trying to accost passers-by with their blackmailing lies, and who had hung a little poster on the wall of someone’s front garden – without asking permission.
I tore it down & broke it up.
You should have heard the ranting about how I was going to die and go to hell …
Almost as sad and funny as the time the other lot (Potters House) were having a wedding, and someone had managed to drop their car-keys down the grid. I suggested, as loudly as possible, that they should pray to Jesus for a miracle to raise the keys up again.
Complete sense-of-humour failure: – I really can’t see why, since they are always on about “
Jesus’ power”.
Hmmmm …..
I always love it when Muriel Gray gets going. But we still have a lot of work to do, don’t we? Some of us are already able to state openly that we demand respect for the fact that we find religion offensive, while others are still so deep in the closet they haven’t yet figured out that it has a door (that can be opened from the inside, even if those outside don’t want it opened).
I don’t get it either. Am I allowed to criticise murder but not murderers, rape but not rapists? Isn’t it the NRA that says it isn’t guns that kill people it’s people who kill people? Well they’ve got that right, and by the same logic I should criticise the religious, because without them their wouldn’t be any religion.
As I suggested in an earlier posting it’s precisely because Dawkins has focussed on this that his book is creating such a storm.
“Just so; and that’s why this kind of thing is annoying and depressing. There shouldn’t be all this pressure to closet the atheism even in ‘intellectual’ circles. It shouldn’t be a consensus. It’s a consensus even among people who claim not to like consensus. Very odd.”
This is a tiny bit dishonest in th contect of crityicism of Nagel, Derbyshire et al. No fair reading of their criticism of Dawkins ccould present it as an attempt to ‘closet atyheism’ or to insist on any sort of consensus. Their criticisms are reasonable complaints about a specific polemic produced by a particular individual. I think you are guilty here, OB, of what you complain about. You seem (to me at lest) to be suggesting (slyly) that any criticism of any atheistic postion, regardless of the content of that particular position or the way in which it is expressed, or the specificity and fairness of the criticism is necessarily wrong because it represents ‘pressure’ to ‘closet’ atheism in some way. It isn’t all that far away from those clerics who call upon the faithful to keep their doubts to themselves because they encourage the infidel.
Thanks John M. – that’s exactly right. Ophelia, surely you don’t want to say that any criticism of any given atheistic position leads to closeting? I don’t imagine for a moment that’s what you think, though it’s an inference that’s easy to draw from what you say here – the stuff about “closeting” atheism and so on. I’d have thought quarantining Dawkins’ arguments from fair-minded scrutiny is the last thing we ought to be doing.
Could an alternative explanation not be that Dawkins is letting the side down by making weak arguments against strawmen and ineffective polemic? I know that was certainly what he did when he wrote some frankly embarrassing articles on behalf of the “Stop the War Coalition”. Continuing the analogy that Jonathan Derbyshire picked up on, I’m personally against American imperialism, against wars of aggression, in favour of global economic justice and in favour of a fair go for the Palestinians. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to defend George Galloway, who is by anyone’s assessment one of the most prominent and aggressive advocates of all of these positions, but also by anyone’s assessment a hell of a dickhead.
George Gaollway isn’t just a dickhead.
He supports Hezbollah – an openly Nazi organisation.
And Hamas, who want to lill all the “Zionists” – meaning every “jew” in Isreal.
Ugrrrr ….
Dquared writes:
Could an alternative explanation not be that Dawkins is letting the side down by making weak arguments against strawmen and ineffective polemic?
Yes it could.
I would add my own particular reason for not being enamoured by TGD. I disliked it because I enjoyed it too much. It is the intellectual equivalent of ‘easy listening’ — too much fun, not enough punishment.
I think the downside of bashing and mocking people who are one’s intellectual inferior (not difficult for IQ-170 Dawkins) is that it may adversely affect one’s own reasoning powers.
Small, er, criticism.
I don’t think it is necessarily impossible to criticize religion and not criticize the religious. There is a difference between the producers of religion and the consumers. It is easy to argue that many consumers simply don’t know any better, and are the equivalent of lost sheep, etc, etc.
One comes dangerously close to polemic when one compares consumers of religion to murderers and rapists. Producers, yes. They can be safely compared. But consumers should be treated more as victims than perpetrators.
Fair enough, John M. You’re right about the Nagel review; I discussed it admiringly here myself. I should have stipulated that when quoting Dan Green – I was agreeing with his point but not necessarily with all the examples.
Jonathan, no, quite right, I don’t want to say that any criticism of any given atheistic position leads to closeting. But I don’t think Dan was wrong to include you in that list; your review wasn’t of the ‘closeting’ variety but I think some of the blog comments were. This one for instance –
“In the comments box over at Butterflies and Wheels, Daniel Davies asserts that Richard Dawkins is “to rationalism what George Galloway is to anti-imperialism”. I think he’s right – especially after reading Dawkins’ dreadful new book The God Delusion.”
Ha! I daresay you’re not entirely surprised that I don’t consider that remark as quite on a level with Nagel’s review. (Not to mention the epigones remark in a later post.)
And there’s this one –
“In my review of Richard Dawkins’ new book, I tried to account for the tone and texture of his atheism – the attitude that is sometimes described as “bullying” or “hectoring”. I suggested that Dawkins wrongly supposes that atheism requires or entails a blanket disdain for religion and all its works. [UPDATE: Mary Midgley makes much the same point in a letter to the Guardian today: “Dawkins sees no real difference between George Fox and Torquemada, between Rowan Williams and Osama bin Laden.”]”
I do think that at least tends toward a kind of moral pressure – in fact toward a (mild) hectoring or bullying of its own. And I think that, in turn, rests on an odd double standard, that gives a pass to incessant bullying and hectoring from religious believers while applying (mild) pressure to atheists.
And you (apparently admiringly) quote from that awful, evasive Eagleton review, a review which is a classic bit of shut up or closeting. So – yeah, I think Dan was right to include you with Bill Benzon. I think your tone in the blog posts is quite similar.
dsquared,
“Could an alternative explanation not be that Dawkins is letting the side down by making weak arguments against strawmen and ineffective polemic?”
Strawmen? Ineffective polemic? That from you? In your last appearance here you declined to give examples of religion’s “many extremely important contributions to our understanding of the world” on the grounds that my request for examples was obviously rhetorical. One, it wasn’t; two, I said it wasn’t and asked again for examples, with no result; three, it’s rude to assume that a question is rhetorical, especially when there’s no obvious reason to think so; four, it’s ludicrous to make an extravagant claim like that and then just disappear when asked for specifics; five, you don’t get to turn up again a week later and ignore the whole thing. You can answer the question or piss off.
In that letter to the Guardian I quoted above, after saying Dawkins sees no real difference between Rowan Williams and Osama bin Laden, Midgley goes on to say
“In fact, large-scale criminals always use existing value-systems as their cover and other ideologies (including science) serve them every bit as well as religious ones.”
That’s some skillful rhetoric, complete with deniability. She doesn’t actually say, but she leaves the impression, that science is a value-system and an ideology in the same way religion is. In fact…if (to quote her) “Dawkins sees no real difference between between Rowan Williams and Osama bin Laden” (which I think is false), one could retort that Midgley sees no real difference between religion and science.
It’s getting a bit tense in here and it probably won’t help much if I butt back in nd say that I think dsquared is broadly right in his criticism of Dawkins (regardless of dsquared’s personal demerits). Many people have pointed out that dawkins’s secular sermons on religion seem to be aimed too much at the choir. It is very hard to imagine that any sincerely religious person would be persuaded by anything he has to say given the manner in which he says. So we are left with the suspicion of bad faith and that undermines the case that he represents. It lets his intellectual opponents off.
On the subject of religions contributions to our understanding of the world, would Bach’s Matthew Passion count? You never think of the world in quite the same way after you have heard it.
“That’s some skillful rhetoric, complete with deniability. She doesn’t actually say, but she leaves the impression, that science is a value-system and an ideology in the same way religion is.”
I don’t think that is fair, really. She isn’t saying much more than ‘beware of taking people who go about murderingother people at their word: they will always find an excuse to do what they do’. Of course, many people have been slaughtered in the name of freedom and justice, but we don’t denigrate freedom and justice as ideas because of that. The same follows for religion or science.
Oh, it’s not all that tense. I think dsquared is, not to put too fine a point on it, cheating, and he can either stop or get lost; but that’s nothing new. And I don’t necessarily disagree about Dawkins’s book. (Mind you – preaching to the choir is not always all bad. People have been expressing feelings like relief to him on the US book tour [as reported by him, to be sure]. Sometimes isolated or marginalized or closeted people really want a good loud obvious blast of the trumpet. But a good loud obvious blast doesn’t necessarily make the best possible book. There are tensions.)
“On the subject of religions contributions to our understanding of the world, would Bach’s Matthew Passion count?”
Well, I wouldn’t put it that way – I wouldn’t call it a contribution to understanding, exactly. But as a contribution that nothing but religion could have made, and that we wouldn’t be without, yes. There’s a lot of that – a vast amount of music and visual art, and architecture and ritual, for which there is no secular equivalent. I wish there were but there isn’t. But what I balked at was the word ‘understanding’. I really (not rhetorically) can’t think of anything. I think real understanding is just what religion doesn’t contribute to. But I could be wrong. I wouldn’t even be terribly surprised to be wrong. Maybe religion has contributed to understanding about psychology, or the will, or grief. But…what?
Sorry, but I disagree about the Midgley quote – partly because it fits a pattern of hers; it fits into a long history. It also fits into a broad cultural pattern of anti-science rhetoric. That little throw-away parenthesis, tucked into the end of a complicated sentence, is meant to do a lot of work and do it by stealth. Science-phobes do that kind of thing – imply or declare without argument that science is the equivalent of other ideologies. In other words, she’s right in one way, as you point out, but she’s wrong in another, and it’s the wrong one she wants to leave people with. It’s a kind of bait and switch – that’s what I meant about deniability. She can always say she meant merely that people can use anything for a pretext, but the impression she leaves is that science is Just Another Ideology.
Sigh. Sneaky rhetoric. It’s everywhere.
Ophelia, you’re certainly right that there’s a difference between a blog post and a newspaper review. And I don’t see why it isn’t perfectly acceptable to say I think Dawkins’ book is awful in a blog post, as long as that’s not all I say – which it isn’t (or wasn’t). And you’ll notice (though this isn’t to your rhetorical purpose) that I refer to a tone that is sometimes *called* bullying or hectoring. I’m mentioning those terms, not using them.
“Of course, many people have been slaughtered in the name of freedom and justice, but we don’t denigrate freedom and justice as ideas because of that. The same follows for religion or science.”
It’s a bit much to lump all that together. Freedom and justice are things we aspire to (some of us). We (some of us) think they are good things worth striving to have, whether or not they are easily attainable. They’re not things we maintain exist whether they do or not (some of us). Neither science nor religion are in the same category. Both make truth claims. Science backs them up, or changes what it claims. Religion offers no evidence and sticks to dogma. Let’s get rid of the names for a second and remember something: we’re not talking about two different ways of knowing things; we’re talking about the difference between deriving claimed knowledge from the real world or from an imaginary one. Science is not infallible, but it does tell you how it arrived at what it states. Religion does claim infallibility and makes its way of knowing anything either a complete mystery or the subject of blind obedience to an existing text. They’re not alternatives: one makes sense, the other doesn’t (and has the effrontery to claim that that, too, is a virtue).
Jonathan, I don’t think I said anything about what is or isn’t acceptable, did I? I talked about a tone, about pressure, and the like – much as you do when you write posts about Dawkins.
“And you’ll notice (though this isn’t to your rhetorical purpose) that I refer to a tone that is sometimes *called* bullying or hectoring. I’m mentioning those terms, not using them.”
Are you sure? The whole sentence is
‘In my review of Richard Dawkins’ new book, I tried to account for the tone and texture of his atheism – the attitude that is sometimes described as “bullying” or “hectoring”.’
Yes, you say the attitude is sometimes described as, but first you say you tried to account for the tone of his atheism – the attitude sometimes described as etcetera. You’re saying you think the tone and the attitude are there, and need accounting for – then you tell us how they are sometimes described. Surely it’s clear enough that you think there is something at least dubious, at least worrying, about that tone and attitude. So you’re not using the descriptives directly, but you’re also not simply neutrally reporting others’ opinions – you’re using others’ opinions (entirely legitimately of course) to clarify what you’re getting at.
Which is perfectly reasonable (she added). I’m just saying I wasn’t cheating – I don’t think I was.
“Both make truth claims. Science backs them up, or changes what it claims. Religion offers no evidence and sticks to dogma.”
Exactly my point. Exactly why it’s a cheat to call science an ideology in that sly parenthetic way. That kind of cheating gets very tiresome.
Since apparently you aren’t allowed to comment here unless you follow the debates every single day, I think I will take the second option offered to me by Ophelia. If anyone is genuinely interested in my answer to her question I daresay I will post it at my own blog some time soon.
Bullshit. What you aren’t allowed to do is make an accusation of bad faith and then not reply. If you make an accusation, then yes, you ought to pay attention to the response. I consider that an ethical obligation, if you like, or good manners, if you like. You have a habit of making accusations and then ignoring replies. Uncharming.
Ophelia, I thought your question was rhetorical and said so. That isn’t an “accusation of bad faith” – it’s not wrong to ask rhetorical questions. Apparently, you then said it wasn’t a rhetorical question, but since I don’t read your website every day I didn’t read that until today. But on the other hand, you’ve now given me a straight choice – to answer your question right now or to stop commenting here – and I’ve made my decision, which is that since nobody here wants me to comment and it’s not wonderful fun for me either, I’d rather stop. In order to make this perfectly clear, I don’t mean anything by this other than the literal meaning of the words – it’s OK to ask someone to stop commenting on your weblog and it’s OK to do so when asked (or even off your own bat if not asked).
Since you asked a question and it apparently wasn’t rhetorical, I’ll provide my answer, in my own time, on my own weblog. If, say, a month goes by (which is reasonable given the frequency with which I update that site on questions that interest me) and I haven’t, do feel free to publicly shame me.
By the way, you can probably look forward to a disappointment when you see my answer, since you apparently wanted me to provide a list of insights from religious thought that couldn’t possibly have been achieved otherwise. It was this follow-up that made me think that the original question was rhetorical, because I think it’s a wholly illegitimate restriction (asking me to prove a negative) and it’s based on a claim I didn’t make and one which I don’t think I’m committed to – not least because if I believed that there were important truths about the world that could only be grasped by the religious, I’d be religious myself and I’m not.
But now I am coming close to commenting here, and I said I wouldn’t.
Daniel,
Really? Not an accusation of bad faith? Are you sure? Given the overall tone, and your usual tone with me? Well, maybe so. I’ll take your word for it.
(Of course I don’t expect you to read the site every day; I’m surprised you read it at all; I don’t think it’s true that nobody here wants you to comment though.)
“because I think it’s a wholly illegitimate restriction”
Really? But I think that’s central. I don’t quite see the force of your claim otherwise. (This isn’t rhetoric. I’m being flat-footed here.) Is your claim just that religious people have made contributions to our understanding? Of course I wouldn’t dispute that. But that can’t be your claim, because the discussion was of religion. So – is it just that religion contains contributions to our understanding that come from non-religious sources? Oh well, I shouldn’t be putting these in the form of questions, since you don’t want to comment. I’ll just say that I think my question was legitimate. Your point was to defend religion against simple-minded aspersions (I take it), partly by saying it contains contributions to our understanding; but if those contributions are not made by religion as religion then I don’t see how that’s a defense. In other words your defense at least looks like a claim that religion can produce contributions to our understanding that are exclusive to religion, and that’s why religion should be defended (against simple-minded aspersions). It’s not a defense of poetry to say that poetry contains the words ‘rubicund’ and ‘you’ because poetry is not alone in containing those words.
Again, flat-footedly, I really will be interested if you do have examples that have at least something about them that is unique to religion. (I take your point about the ‘couldn’t possibly’ – I didn’t intend that to set an impossible standard, but rather to note the inherent problem. That’s because I do think it’s a problem. It is difficult to know whether contribution X was made by religion as religion or because religion was on the scene at the time. I think that makes a difference to your claim.)
As for OB’s challenge, I think there is a middle ground between asserting that religion has uniquely made contributions to the human understanding, which could not have been made non-religiously (which DSquared rejects as accepting it would entail being religious) and, alternatively, that religion or theology is utterly and completely junk. Because on the one hand religion has made obvious contributions to the human understanding through theology and philosophy – by serving as a strong stimulus to deal with issues such as the relationship of mind and matter, the argument from design, the place of reason and logic in the world – up until the development of textual-critical methods in post-Reformation theology which snowballed into the hermeneutic methodology of the human sciences.
Of course, none of these entail a belief in God. At the same time, religion wasn’t necessarily wholly accidental to them either. Conceiving of a wholly non-religious history of human thought runs into massive difficulties (on the basis of what central, core text would above-mentioned critical methods develop? What would a non-religious Spinoza, Descartes, Hegel be like? Could dualistic and idealist philosophy be originally formulated non-religiously?). Even concepts such as “secularism” or “the Enlightenment” would lose meaning in a wholly non-religious alternate universe. So I think there are tremendous problems with the what-if scenario which seems to be contained in OB’s question.
So my brief answer to OB’s challenge would be that religion is a collorary of the ability to conceive of God, regardless of whether She exists or not; and that any counterfactual human beings who would be unable to conceive of a Deity would be rather dull, and possibly not quite human.
Well – I agree with you at least this far, Merlijn: human beings who were unable to conceive of any being better (wiser, kinder, more generous, less selfish, more creative, more helpful – better) than humans would be…worse than dull, I suppose. So maybe I am agreeing with you. I think one of the most important things humans can realize is how inadequate humans are, how much better we might be but aren’t.
But on the other hand I’m not sure I would consider that a religious thought or understanding. And it’s also rather distant from the kind of religion that (as I keep drearily saying) is at issue here.
“Even concepts such as “secularism” or “the Enlightenment” would lose meaning in a wholly non-religious alternate universe.”
Well, sure, but they also wouldn’t be needed.
Is it so hard to imagine people like the pre-Socratics just going on in the absence of Christianity (and Judaism and Islam)? Is it so hard to imagine metaphysical speculation about the origins of the universe that was wholly divorced from any idea of a personal god? I don’t think that’s so difficult. (A non-religious Descartes would be a guy who made millions by writing horror stories – an early Stephen King.)
Oh dear. I thought this was going to be a nice discussion and it seems rather intense.
Fisrt things first. I read – finished – WTM today and greatly enjoyed it. I was even moved to take some notes. I agreed completely with the sentiments even if I disagreed with some (very few) factual statememts.
Second. The reason for the poor reviews dished out to The God DElusion may simply be that it is a poor book. If I read a poor book by a Christian apologist – and I have read more than a few- I think they are poor. The same may well be true of TGD. I’ll find out for myself in a short while. But by all accounts it is not a patch on ‘The Selfish Gene’ or ‘The Blind Watchmaker”.
In between peeping through my hands at OB’s response to dsquared – I’m sure I’ve read him on other blogs – OB asked what had religion contributed to the understanding of the world, which quite a restrictive question -excluding religious art, sculpture (Michaelangelo’s Pieta, anyone?) architecture (countless cathedrals, churches, baptistries), music (hymns, any Mozart Mass, most Bach, sung Masses, gospel music) education (All the universities of Europe before the French Revolution were religious foundations),historical studies (Bede), philosophy (Aquinas, Erasmus etc).
Apart from the above, the one that I think is most obvious is the understanding of the equality of mankind.
Chritianity was/is not a mystery religion. Anyone could be a Christian. Women were equal in the Church. Slaves as well as free could be Christians. This understanding of the equality of all mankind was Christian, not atheist or pagan. I think it a pretty important understanding.
Thanks again for a stimulating book.
Best wishes
Dear me, it’s not that intense. Not so intense that anyone needs to hide under the seat.
“I’m sure I’ve read him on other blogs”
Heh! You probably have, Jeffrey. And this disagreement goes back a long way – a few years. I disapprove of dsquared’s tone, quite often.
Thanks about WTM! Glad you liked it.
I know about religion and art and music etc etc – I said all that in a comment not far above, and it wasn’t the question anyway. Do I have to mention that I’m violently fond of King’s College chapel (and Ely cathedral, and Salisbury, etc etc) and Rembrandt’s painting of the vision at Emmaus every time I say anything about religion? Can we just take music and art as read? I don’t dispute that.
As for equality – I thought of that, naturally. I know it’s one of the often-repeated claims, that Christianity was the source of the idea of equality. But for one thing that doesn’t exactly answer the question about contributions to understanding, and for another thing I don’t think it’s true. I have reasons, but the subject is too large for a comment.
And by the way, what do you mean women were equal in the church? No they weren’t. Slaves as well as free could be Christians, but they had to go on being slaves.
“This understanding of the equality of all mankind was Christian”
The trouble with that is that it’s not really an understanding, because it’s not a fact or a piece of knowledge; it’s a decision. And when talking about equality it works better to say ‘the equality of all humanity’ – more equal.
This understanding of the equality of all mankind was Christian”
Even if this were true (I’ve heard Melanie Philips use this idea on The Moral Maze, BBC Radio 4), Dennett’s idea of religion as a “nurse crop” for other ideas is useful,(See Breaking The Spell). Just as farmers somethimes plant a nurse crop to prepare the ground for another crop they wish to harvest, so religious ideas can create a context in which non-religious ideas can develop even when the religious justification for them has been discarded. Astrology formed a context for astronomy, but you won’t find Martin Rees writing horoscopes.
Ya. I’ve been turning over ideas along the same lines – that maybe religion contributed to the understanding of the world via asking questions. But that still has that same epistemic problem: how do we know it’s not that the questions come first, and then the religion? That asking the questions isn’t religion, it’s asking questions, and it only becomes religion when religion starts giving religious answers. People often do (still) refer to certain kinds of questions as religious questions, but that’s just a label. I don’t think religion comes in until the answers do.
Jeffrey, P.S., just to clarify – it was dsquared who said that religion contains contributions to our understanding of the world; my request for examples was in reply. I didn’t just haul off out of nowhere and demand such examples – that comment was left over from an old disagreement.
There is an essential difference between the historical significance of a phenomenon and its contemporary import. I spend much of my teaching life trying to make students understand just how critically important it is to know something of real, historical Christianity in order to understand how people felt and thought in almost any era before the 1960s: how, for example, millennial visions could be a form of social protest, and social protest could often include millennial visions. How, as is cliched, the British labour movement owed more to Methodism then Marxism. How it is necessary to understand systems of political legitimation grounded in a Christian metaphysic to understand pre-modern state-formation. Etc etc. I am fully conscious of the significance of the specifically Christian moral, cultural and political heritage of languages of equality and rights.
And if I ruled the world, I would relegate all religious practice to the private sphere at once. I sincerely believe that we have, in the course of our recent history, constructed systems for regulating political and social interactions that strictly do not require religious sanction, and that will and should operate much better, more justly, more reasonably, without the intrusion of religious opinions.
I see no contradiction between what I know historically to have been the case, and what I believe politically should be the case.
Nice one Dave; this is of course the difference between religious studies and theology – a distinction that even some contributors to this esteemed site fail to make.
Ophelia – congrats on speeding up the dsquared join – fight – sulk – leave cycle. Next time maybe it will be so quick we won’t even notice…
Slavery abolitionists avowed that under the Lord there is ‘neither bond nor free’, which was a Christian application of faith to the real world which had observable effects. I’m an atheist, but I feel this to be a rare but important example of moral and possibly even species improvement coming from organised religion.
Good debate by the way.
Nick: and they did so in a context in which many slave-owners justified slavery as a route to salvation for heathen Africans… That knife cuts both ways. One thing it indicates is that, if you wanted to have a debate about public morality in 1800, you had to have it in a religious context — there really was no other [scandalously atheist philosophical ramblings being, ipso facto, excluded from ‘respectable’ conversation.]
Dave, quite. It was communitarian shades of Christianity in the UK which laid some important (but by no means all) foundations for trades union and labour movements (assuming we accept these movements as good things; I certainly do). The supportive organising and cohesive principles of the methodist church during the industrial age kept many famillies fed, clothed and alive even while it bound them by severe and harsh behavioural dogmas. (It is that moral confusion that currently obfuscates debates on the ‘left’ about Islam and e.g the role of indoctrinal madrasas, womens’ rights; the divisive controlling power and yet socially cohesive strength of borne of observing religious traditions)
“One thing it indicates is that, if you wanted to have a debate about public morality in 1800, you had to have it in a religious context — there really was no other [scandalously atheist philosophical ramblings being, ipso facto, excluded from ‘respectable’ conversation.]”
Depends where you were though. Some people considered Jefferson an atheist, and he wasn’t excluded from debate in 1800.
“I don’t think it is necessarily impossible to criticize religion and not criticize the religious. There is a difference between the producers of religion and the consumers. It is easy to argue that many consumers simply don’t know any better, and are the equivalent of lost sheep, etc, etc.”
But a particular religions followers have been programmed to spread that particular meme.
WAKE UP.
Public morality in 1800, huh?
What about Thomas Paine, or Hume, or Jeremy Bentham – none of them what you might call religious.
Oops.
“This understanding of the equality of all mankind was Christian”
Erm …The rich man in his castle, the poor man at his gate, He made them high and lowly, and ordered their estate -all things bright & beautiful, etc …”
Yet more rcodswallop.
I don’t beleive I’m reading thios crap in a site where the intellectual level is supposed to be high, and ditto the level of education.
C’mon folks, what’s rotting YOUR brains?
Hume died in 1776. And his irreligion was indeed frowned upon and considered not respectable; he didn’t want the Dialogue Concerning Natural Religion published while he was still above ground. Bentham too was somewhat scandalous and marginal, as was Paine. Jefferson was, in a conspicuous way, somewhat more central, in 1800 in particular. But to be fair his religious views were indeed controversial, and used against him in political campaigns. That, and Sally Heming. Made quite a package.
But, Mr. Tingey: Your examples were quite rare and special cases. It’s hard to deny the prominent role religious thought played in almost all public debate prior to the 20th century. That’s not to deny that, for example, the “founding fathers” in the United States (and many Enlightenment figures in general) also understood the dangers of religious thought.
“I don’t think it is necessarily impossible to criticize religion and not criticize the religious. There is a difference between the producers of religion and the consumers. It is easy to argue that many consumers simply don’t know any better, and are the equivalent of lost sheep, etc, etc.”
I have a different problem with this argument: it assumes that people are indeed “sheep” to be trained by their intellectual betters. There is a strong prejudice among the educated that education and knowledge per se make one more moral, and that common folk are always benighted and need leadership and firm control. I’m not sure this is true.
I agree with you, however, that the idea of Christianity as being the source of egalitarianism, especially during “this world” is codswallop. Christianity was used by the State/Aristocracy as a tool of social control, it was not by any means in its dominant form a revolutionary philosophy or ideology..
Brian Miller:
I have a different problem with this argument: it assumes that people are indeed “sheep” to be trained by their intellectual betters. There is a strong prejudice among the educated that education and knowledge per se make one more moral, and that common folk are always benighted and need leadership and firm control. I’m not sure this is true.
I (obviously) agree, which is why I regard calls for “respect” as unbearably patronizing towards those people whose beliefs are supposedly in need of “respect”. Of course, the same thing does not mean I need to take any rant seriously as a criticism of religion – that’s another issue entirely. And the way a point is put definitely influences my initial stance towards it. Also another issue. But I think the last thing articulate religious believers should want is the same kind of “respect” accorded to children who believe in the Easter Bunny.
For much the same reason, I tend to get jumpy when ideas such as memetics are applied to religion. Because the important thing about religious beliefs has to do, I would insist, with their truth: how logically coherent are they, do they give us insight in the world, the human condition, etc. It seems to me that talk about “mind-viruses” and some such threatens to make the truth of beliefs irrelevant, and also externalizes them, making the holder of any given belief irresponsible for those beliefs. Which is objectionable to me: I feel very much responsible for the kind of beliefs that I hold.
G. Tingey:
The purpose of the statement was to make clear that there is a distinction between the preacher and the preachee. There are very very many passive consumers who go to church or mosque or synagogue because it makes them feel better, but feel no obligation to “spread that particular meme” per se.
Religion is no different from other societal arrangements where there are those who “Teach” and those who “Learn”. Those who “Learn” may indeed go off to “Teach” at some point, but by no means do they all do so.
The idea that the religious are “programmed” is a hopeless one for atheists who want to enlighten those around them. Just because someone is a consumer of religion does not mean they should be condemned to forever consume it.
Beyond that, I’m sure that those (many) of us who were raised in non-atheist households would resent being labeled as “meme spreaders” prior to their “enlightenment”.
Resent it all you like.
It’s still true.
I only just escaped from being thoroughly brainwashed by an evangelical preacher, at about age 14 – it was a close shave, I can tell you.
But, the religious are programmed: the “Potters House” sheep around the corner from her are daily (ugh) proof of this.
They are fleeced by their pastors (tithing) and go off to spread the word amonst all the other socieconomic class C2-D-E-F’s they can find.
JUst because you don’t like the evidence and the conclusions, is no reason to say it isn’t true.
Case in point: I was assured by my niece in the most desperately sincere terms that her adherence to religion and all it entails is entirely the result of her own thinking it through and subsequent decision. She strenuously denied it was connected to having been brought up unexposed to any other way of life (well, she knew about me, but I was always the subject of disapproval by all other family members, so it wasn’t unbiased exposure). And that was before she, with great regret, informed me she would be unable to recognise children from my side as being related to her (unless, of course, I were to have a few magic words etc. said over them, which would change everything…).
I think it is rare for someone to recognise they are programmed when they are programmed. Part of the programming includes a fear of looking beyond the prescribed horizons. That enables someone to say with utter conviction that they do know what they’re missing and have decided to omit it from their lives, when, of course, they lack any genuine intellectual freedom. Too few can ever break out of that kind of vicious circle.
Stewart that’s quite ghastly, if I read you correctly. An outcome perhaps of the intellectual apartheid which thrives to this day, under religion.
Despite the plethora of winsome nonsense in the media about all our nations’ diverse faiths being under constant attack from Darth Dawkins and the Evil Science-Nazis, I have yet to read about non-believing families ex-communicating members because of their religion…
d2: “Could an alternative explanation not be that Dawkins is letting the side down by making weak arguments against strawmen and ineffective polemic?”
Read the book then try making that argument again. At the moment you are simply doing what you accuse Dawkins of by arguing against things you are clearly clueless about.
If you are too busy elsewhere, at least read p156/157.
They have some bearing on both your evidence-free claim that Dawkins is simply repeating 19th century canards and your wishful thinking about Dawkins being unaware of contemporary theology.
OB: “I don’t think it’s true that nobody here wants you to comment though”
Absolutely. I’m with Edmund Blackadder on this one;
Blackadder – It is said, Percy, that the civilized man seeks out good and intelligent company so that by learned discourse he may rise above the savage and closer to God.
Lord Percy – [delighted] Yes, I’d heard that.
Blackadder – Personally, however, I like to start the day with a total dickhead to remind me I’m best.
Nick, I’m afraid you read me correctly. Non-believing families can have great difficulty accomodating to sudden religiosity in one of their members. Maybe they’ll fight, maybe bad blood will result. But they certainly don’t excommunicate because it’s dictated by a creed. In the phone call which was the last direct communication I had with my niece, two phrases kept recurring: “I know this isn’t what you want to hear” and “I know what I’m supposed to do.” And she accepts evolution (I grilled her about it during the same conversation), so is knowingly living with a pretty big contradiction: she acknowledges kinship with bacteria, but not with her first cousin.
G. Tingey:
Let’s assume for a moment that consumers of religion are indeed programmed. Since the programmed would not have the freedom to choose their actions, then could they be held responsible for their actions? (Decades of American case-law would say that they can not. That those who do not have the freedom to countermand directives (soldiers, slaves, etc.) cannot be held responsible for those directives. It is their superiors who are held responsible.)
The idea that the religious are somehow absolved from responsibility is abhorrent, yet that is exactly what you are suggesting by insisting that the religious are “programmed”.
‘That those who do not have the freedom to countermand directives (soldiers, slaves, etc.) cannot be held responsible for those directives. It is their superiors who are held responsible.)’
Nuremburg defence? Or, as WS put it;
Every subject’s duty is the king’s; but every subject’s soul is his own.
But I agree with your point that ‘The idea that the religious are somehow absolved from responsibility is abhorrent’
Even if god existed, and his instructions to commit a vile atrocity were clear and accompanied by some impressive phenonema, the responsibility is still yours.
Brian Miller:
I agree with you, however, that the idea of Christianity as being the source of egalitarianism, especially during “this world” is codswallop. Christianity was used by the State/Aristocracy as a tool of social control, it was not by any means in its dominant form a revolutionary philosophy or ideology.
I’m so sorry, but this is just ahistorical (=wrong).
Jesus was executed by the Romans (who ruled Judea at the time) at the behest of the ruling class of the Jews.
The early period of the Church was marked by persecution by the ruling class of the Jews (martyrdom of Stephen and James, brother of John, beheaded in 44AD), followed by the killing of James, leader of the Jerusalem church in AD 62 at the behest of Ananias, High Priest.
This was followed by the Neronian persecution, execution of Peter and Paul by the Romans, the imperialists of the day. Skip on to the Domitianic persecution (Domitian died AD96).
Christians were persecuted for not sacrificing to the emperor (see Pliny the Younger’s letters to Trajan – reigned AD98-117).
After the final fall and sack of Jerusalem under Hadrian (AD117-138) the emperor reportedly had a Temple of Venus erected over the site of the crucifixion (modern site of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre) and a grove dedicated to Adonis planted at the reputed site of the cave in Bethlehem.
There were regular persecutions and martyrdoms right up to the accession of Constantine in AD305.
So where comes this idea that the Church was used by the state/aristocracy as an instrument of control? Even after recognition/toleration by the State, there are plenty of examples where Church and State clashed. For modern times we could look at Catholic Poland under Tsarist rule and then Communism, or a similar story in Catholic Ireland. The survival of Christians in the Middle East until modern times was hardly due to State control or patronage. In the Middle Ages we could think of Henry II and Thomas Becket, or Henry IV at Canossa. Or maybe Ambrose publicly rebuking the emperor Theodosius for the slaughter of thousands of civilians.
As far as my statement about equality is concerned, although the legal status of Christians was unchanged (slaves could not be made free by virtue of Christianity while Christianity was a persecuted religion) men and women, slave and free, Gentile and Jew were all regarded as equal in the eyes of the Church. All could worship. There was no exclusivity to becoming Christian. This understanding was revolutionary.
OB, you’re right. I should have said humanity, not mankind.
Jeffrey, at least one thing you say is also ahistorical.
“Jesus was executed by the Romans (who ruled Judea at the time) at the behest of the ruling class of the Jews.”
You’re taking the gospel accounts at face value. Surely you know that account is (at least) highly tendentious, and that most scholars dispute it? That there are good grounds for thinking Jesus was executed by the Romans, period, and that ‘the Jews’ had little or nothing to do with it? That the gospel writers pinned it on ‘the Jews’ partly in order to convince the still-ruling Romans that they were not seditious, and partly because they themselves had quarrels with other Jews?
“(slaves could not be made free by virtue of Christianity while Christianity was a persecuted religion)”
Oh – but as soon as Constantine converted, all the slaves in the empire were freed? Uh…no. Okay but after another thousand or twelve hundred years had passed, no Christian would dream of enslaving another human being, right? Uh…no. Okay but by the 19th century anyway no Christian would dream of owning slaves or serfs, right? Uh…no. Okay but by that time at least no Christian would actually defend slavery, right? Uh…no.
“This understanding was revolutionary.”
Maybe, maybe. Up to a point. But then why did it have so little (if any) social effect? Why was Christian Europe so very very hierarchical for so very long?
Yes, the religious are programmed, but they are also people.
Remember the example of the Jesuit (!) who was converted to Atheism by Bertrand Russell.
Ophelia: Why was christian Europe so heirachical?
Well, try reading the “Bible” – “god” id supreme King and overlord, and everyone and everything else are his servants and vassals.
What power-structure does that then support?
I would have thought it fairly obvious.
BTW, have you seen this from Pharyngula…
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/11/this_is_a_start.php#comments
Particularly good is the decision tree comment, down at about number 12(ish) in the comments …
One can immediately think of similar question-sets to ask any religious beleiver, until their heads explode.
Great fun …
Oliver Kamm is wading into the debate over at his blog. Here are a couple of trenchant excerpts that I would endorse:
‘Yet after reading Dawkins’s philippic against theism, The God Delusion, I am not so sure. A life of obeisance to a deity one disbelieves in may be a price worth paying. Dawkins’s harangues in this life are assertive enough. In the unlikely event that there is a region of the hereafter reserved for us infidels, hearing them again at full volume without end would be one more reason for penitence.
[…]
‘The argument for atheism is not the same as deriding religion as the source of conflict. Dawkins’s polemics are to secularism what C.S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters is to religious apologetics: knowing, insular and sanctimonious. They are testament to how convictions about religion can lead serious scholars to intellectual disrepute.’
“‘The argument for atheism is not the same as deriding religion as the source of conflict.'”
To grossly, but not inappropriately, simplify: it’s not true and it’s harmful to boot.
Maybe my biggest beef really is with those who think it’s not true, but we should have it anyway.
John M. is wrong.
Has anyone here actually read any or all of Dawkins’ work?
(AFAIK, the only book I’ve missed is “The Extended Phenotype” – I still want a copy)
Has anyone heard/seen him speak – there’s a lot on YouTube etc now. ?
Because he comes across as mild-mannered, polite and considerate. And very powerful, intellectually.
So, all this stuuf about “aggressiv atheism, and bullying is quite franklly a load of lies and misrepresentations.
Given that all religions are based on moral/physical blackmail, and as far as I can see all religions promote hatered and killing or torture of “the other” =unbelievers ore heretics, then:
Whay should not the argument for atheism and the argument against religion, because of religions’ evil effects at least run in parallel
‘Because he comes across as mild-mannered, polite and considerate. And very powerful, intellectually.’
he does when he is talking bout the tyhing he unerstnds. We all tend to be conservative when we are talking about the things we understnd. When we wanders into the mater of religion he gets all overexcited and a bit embarrassing.
As Oliver kAMM POINTS OUT HE IS NOT THE FIRST INTELLECTUAL TO HAVE BEEN MADE TO LOOK AN ASS BY RELIGION, ALTHOUGH THE MANIA OFTEN TAKES THE OTHER COURSE. [Apologies for the caps lock]
I think whether or not he has been made an ass of by religion is still a matter of opinion, one which I don’t share.
Just because Kamm wants to narrow the responsibility for terrorism to Islamism and exempt the rest of religion, it doesn’t mean he’s right to do so. Nor do I find his use of Reagan as a test case to prove Sam Harris wrong unconvincing. Bush hasn’t nuked anyone either and who here thinks there is no cause for concern at the apparent goings-on at the White House? It isn’t so much that Kamm disagrees with Dawkins than that he’s ignoring the reasons Dawkins gives for considering all religion dangerous. And what the hell kind of line is this, in any context, even a humourous one: “A life of obeisance to a deity one disbelieves in may be a price worth paying.”
Hm, I thought that was a pretty funny line. Oh well.
Ooops. No, I meant I don’t find him convincing. Last-minute correction which was wrong.
Have I completely misread Oliver Kamm? Was it all a spoof, or is he genuinely pissed off that RD won’t let well enough alone?
I don’t think it’s a spoof. He sums up his own position today with a quotation from Sidney Hook, thusly:
“‘So long as religion is freed from authoritarian institutional forms, and conceived in personal terms, so long as overbeliefs are a source of innocent joy, a way of overcoming cosmic loneliness, a discipline of living with pain and evil, otherwise unendurable and irremediable, so long as what functions as a vital illusion or poetic myth is not represented as public truth to whose existence the once-born are blind, so long as religion does not paralyze the desire and the will to struggle against unnecessary cruelties of experience, it seems to me to fall in an area of choice in which rational criticism may be suspended. In this sense, a man’s personal religion justifies itself to him in the way his love does. Why should he want to make a public cult of it? And why should we want him to prove that the object of his love is the most lovely creature in the world? Nonetheless it still remains true that as a set of cognitive beliefs, religious doctrines constitute a speculative hypothesis of an extremely low order of probability.’ That is my view.”
Why does everyone seem to think Dawkins has it wrong on religion?
I don’t think he came on strongly enough, actually.
Given that an interventionist god should be detectable, and hasn’t been yet, ever.
And that religious beleivers have anappalling record of blood and suffering behind them, all in the name of the holy cause, then why are people moaning ablout Dawkins, who is, very politely (much more ploitely than I) pointing out these inconvenient and embarrasing truths?
Not even an interventionist God needs necessarily be detectable. A wholly transcendent God who fiddles around with natural laws to do miracles would be scientifically undetectable and unverifiable, as such miracles would necessarily be singular, experimentally unrepeatable occasions. Of course, miracles could be observed but the rational thing for the non-theist to do when observing one would be to disbelieve her eyes.
(Mind you, I do not believe in such a version of God).
The same thing would presumably go for Deity-human communication. Either it follows natural laws, in which case such communication might well be indistinguishable from natural processes. Or it doesn’t, in which case science will be silent on the matter.
(Personally, I am more drawn to non-interventionist, “panentheist” conceptions of God, in which case there would and could not be any communication and signal transmission as the world, and the human beings in it, and their thoughts would be part of God).
But we’re still on square one. In order for God to be a scientific, physical hypothesis, it must be a (limited) part of the scientifically investigable, physical world. God must be wholly subject to physical laws. This conception of God does not correspond with any religious or theological one I know of.
Methodological naturalism does not allow you to investigate the existence of God as a scientific hypothesis – to the contrary, it excludes such hypotheses from consideration.
Talking of Dawkins, does everyone want a really good laugh at the hideous hypocritical christians expense?
See here:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/11/haggard_goes_down_in_flames_an.php#comments
I still don’t think Merlijn gets the point.
His definition of “god” is that of the universal set, or very close to it.
If a god exists and he/sh/it/they communicate with people, then that communication will be detectable.
If not then not.
No exceptions no excuses no get-outs.
Quite frankly, it is deliberate obfuscating bullshit. Great fun, but still bullshit.
G. Tingey – saying so don’t make it so. Sorry. I can’t do anything about the fact that theists do not necessarily say what you think they say, or what you want them to say. Pounding your proverbial fist on the metaphorical table and crying “But God must be DETECTABLE!” isn’t going to help.
There could, in principle, be a miracle that was scientifically verifiable. For example, Keith Augustine’s MA thesis (and page down) discusses the case of a dead religious leader coming back to life and healing all disease. Or we might settle for Elvis.
As far as I know, however, all the miracles that the big religions claim are uniformly feeble, unimaginative, and without any long term benefit to anyone.
I would agree that in the case Keith Augustine discusses, we would have an example of something we would rationally have to accept as a supernatural event. However, and this sounds like nitpicking but I think the distinction is important, scientifically we would have to hold it an inexplicable event rather than a supernatural one. So I tend to agree with the Spiegelman Augustine argues against. I would draw the distinction between “natural” and “inexplicable” rather than between “natural” and “supernatural” which seems metaphysical to me. We don’t have a theory of supernatural causation. We have no scientific idea of what the supernatural agent causing the event might be like.
So I think that, at most, we may identify what seems to be a miracle, or a supernatural event. But I don’t think we can scientifically support a supernatural origin. Moreover, it would be scientifically unsupportable to posit a Theistic origin of an alleged supernatural event.