Atheist propagandists?
I don’t think this is quite right. I think it misses the mark.
I’d like to say his heart is in the right place, unlike the current crop of atheist propagandists, but the trouble is that, as with many Episcopalians, it is more mind than heart…I have no use for anti-Darwinian campaigners, but I do have a lot of respect for popular skepticism. The people do not trust those who present themselves as elite…[R]ead any of the self-indulgent, virulent atheists in circulation today – Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens being just two. Contrary to their professed intentions, such writers buttress the faithful; their loathsome arrogance shields evangelical churches from doubt. That part of the American population that believes God made man in His own image has a heartfelt contempt for know-it-alls. I am inclined to say, God bless the people, even when they get it wrong.
Harris and Hitchens being just two; two out of perhaps five; but Ian Hacking (for it is he), like so many people, gives the impression that there is a crowd. It’s all too familiar – first poison the well by mentioning ‘atheist propagandists’ and saying their hearts are not in the right place, then imply that there are hordes of them, then call them self-indulgent and virulent, then refer to their loathsome arrogance and imply that they are know-it-alls. Well – who is the propagandist here?
But more precisely – does the theist part of the American population really have a heartfelt contempt for know-it-alls? I would say it doesn’t. Why? Because believing ‘God made man in His own image’ tends to correlate with voting for Bush, and what is Bush if not a know-it-all? And the worst kind of know-it-all at that, the kind who in fact doesn’t know anything. I’m not making a joke here, I’m flat serious. I think there’s something badly skewed about calling a tiny handful of atheist academics know-it-alls while flattering fans of the most blatantly arrogant and self-indulgent know-it-all in the country, if not the world. Bush is orders of magnitude more arrogant and know-it-all than any of them or all of them put together, because he has the arrogance to think he knows enough to do the job he went after. So – why is Ian Hacking enraged at the ‘loathsome arrogance’ of five atheist writers but apparently approving of the people who think Bush is adequate? If theists really had a heartfelt contempt for know-it-alls, how could they possibly vote for such a glaring example of one? (Surely Hacking isn’t fooled by the ridiculous folksy airs and syllable-dropping (‘I kspect Merkans to…’) into thinking Bush really isn’t a know-it-all? Surely he can’t be so silly as to confuse pseudopopulist fakery with genuine humility?) I really wonder. I find it odd.
This is not necessarily to say that the atheists in question are not arrogant, but it is to ask if they are more arrogant than, say, know-nothing fundamentalist preachers. I don’t think they are. Fundamentalist preachers pretend to know things that they can’t possibly know, while atheists merely point out that they can’t know what they pretend to know. The two are not equivalent.
I think that “know-it-all” in this sort of context, and in American culture, means about the same thing as “pointy-headed intellectual” – someone who is always spouting stuff that we ord’n’ry Merkans can’t make head nor tails of, just to try to make us ashamed of our lack of book-larnin’ and our hayseed manners.
There is still a large part of the population with that sort of attitude, though it is perhaps decreasing (perhaps, I say, given the high percentages of creationist believers and folks who can’t find their own country on a map, much less anyone else’s).
So I don’t have any quarrel with Hacking on that point, but what in the name of all that’s not holy does he mean by saying “I am inclined to say, God bless the people, even when they get it wrong”? Surely he’s an overeducated intellectual himself? Is he trying to say that he now thinks he has wasted his life in the academy, when he should have spent it kickin’ cow-pies in the pasture, or sumpin’?
Yes but do Dawkins and Hitchens and Harris and Dennett fit that description? Are they always spouting stuff that we ord’n’ry Merkans can’t make head nor tails of? They’re all popularizers, not jargonizers! So I don’t think it adds up even on that level.
And then of course, as you say, he’s an intellectual himself.
Really, none of it adds up. I don’t get it. Hacking’s not silly. It just looks gratuitous.
Looking back, that was not nearly as coherent as intended. I was in a rush. Oh well, you get the gist.
I found it very coherent G.although I would point out that the 50s critics were very often communists hence the labels, although this was taken to extremes during the 50s and 60s. I also doubt that the critics of Dawkins, Hitchens ect are motivated by self interest,I think it is more because outspoken atheists seem unable to recognise any positive value to religion especialy christianity and often go as far as equating christianity with islam when discusing the negative effects of religion.
Speaking as a foreigner who reads some of the between-the-line commentary from the US, I find the claims about Bush completely ludicrous. His record speaks of personal humility because he knows he has quite a lot to be humble about. (Would that it were not true…)
What I find really worrying is the slavish imitation and recycling of nutty American ideas by foreigners, starting with work colleagues here but pervasive to the extent that even bin Laden now parrots the the anti-Bush claque.
I agree Cris throughout his administration he has concistantly surrounded himself with people smarter than he is, that speaks more to a man aware of his own limitations than a know it all. Margret Thatcher would be my definition of a know it all politician.
Again, Richard, it’s not the problem of unashamed atheists that you seem to have some kind of cartoon dialectic in your head where Jesus is a caricature of pure good and Mohammed is a caricature of pure evil.
From the standpoint of an outsider the truth claims of all religions are equally false. What good aspects do exist have nothing whatsoever to do with the supernatural garbage. We refuse to take delivery of a giant heap of dung because it might have a few pearls in it.
Richard,
It’s the week-end and I’m going to allow myself a cheap shot.
‘he has consistently surrounded himself with people smarter than he is,’
How could he not? And yet…
‘Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.’
And a whole other discussion on what those smarter people have been up to.
Chrisper,
I didn’t understand your last para.
“His record speaks of personal humility”
That’s a joke. If he had a shred of personal humility he would not have run for governor, let alone president. It’s not humility to put yourself forward for executive office and then hire people who are smarter than you are (along with other people who are almost as dumb as you are).
The one and only qualification necessary for anyone to have a job in the Bush administration is LOYALTY – generally demonstrated in drumming up campaign contributions. Willingness to render unquestioning obedience to the powers that be gets you a job, whether you can do the job or not. Ideological purity (to a really God-awful ideology, pun intended) is also important, but you needn’t be pure in your ideology as long as you put obedience first. Competence? Not an issue. Intelligence? Real intellect is typically (although not always) an obstacle to unquestioning obedience, so it’s generally a negative. Ethics? Absolutely not! If you, for example, take the rule of law or the primacy of the Constitution to be more important than executive orders, you aren’t qualified to work for the Cheney administration – whoops, I meant “Bush” administration.
Come to think of it, these are pretty much the same sorts of qualities you find in the sort of people who keep generating these populist-pandering, thoughtless, baseless, ill-considered, purely rhetorical attacks on publicly outspoken atheists (whom I refuse to call “New”). They are people who know (or think they know) whose cultural “side” they’re on, and anyone who criticizes their side is clearly the enemy therefore must be attacked. If you can’t attack them for what they actually say, make something up that people who haven’t read their works might believe they’ve said (though they haven’t), then insult their character for saying such things (though they haven’t).
What’s irritating is that Hacking is a respectable and accomplished philosopher of science. So why does he feel compelled to distort? Take this, for example:
Dawkins is ALWAYS going on about how evolutionary biology is an exciting, growing, always-ongoing process of discovery. The only dead issues – long since settled and established beyond any shadow of doubt – are the very concepts that Hacking himself is saying are so wonderfully central to biology: That there is one tree of life – that all life is descended from a common ancestry – and that the diversity we see is a result of natural selection acting on random variation. Of course, those central concepts are “dead” only in the sense that there is no scientific controversy over the truth of them – but there is still very much to learn and dispute over the details!
No, the one who is “loathsomely arrogant” is Hacking: He clearly either has not actually read the books of Dawkins or Harris, or has read them and is still willing to misrepresent them willfully and with malice aforethought. If there’s arrogance afoot, I’d say that’s where to start looking.
Hacking’s shameless pandering to populist anti-intellectualism should be a complete puzzle, coming as it does from a working academic who would no doubt be dismissed as a pointy-headed arrogant intellectual by any of the people he praises for their “skepticism.” But really, it isn’t that puzzling: It’s the posturing of someone who doesn’t want to be seen as an outsider and a critic of the status quo (even though he is both), so he establishes his insider creds by attacking the most outspoken critics of the status quo – without basis, on pure rhetoric, in total ignorance (willful or otherwise) of what the critics actually have to say.
Note that, after saying that Kitcher’s explanation for why the anti-evolution movement is so strong in America doesn’t convince him, Hacking doesn’t actually give any plausible explanation for the phenomenon himself. He points out that the creationists put a lot of effort into their movement, and says that “Movements need perspiration and organization, but they also need uptake by the people.” But he then completely fails to give any account of why the American people have taken up creationism! I mean, his explanation is that the people have a contempt for know-it-alls? WHAT THE FUCK? That’s not a plausible sociological, psychological, or any other logical kind of explanation. It’s Hacking expressing his unvarnished personal opinion: “I am inclined to say, God bless the people, even when they get it wrong.”
Why? What’s so great about the populace rejecting out of hand (without any consideration or evaluation) the evidence and arguments of people who actually know something about a subject (in this case, biology)? This isn’t skepticism, it’s unadulterated knee-jerk anti-intellectualism. The same people whose “popular skepticism” Hacking says he respects would also completely and contemptuously dismiss what Hacking himself has to say in this very essay without any consideration or evaluation of his arguments – yet he, presumably, would not include himself among the arrogant know-it-alls (despite the fact that he, quite accurately, calls intelligent design “silly”). If he is not one of those arrogant know-it-alls, yet his argument would surely be rejected out of hand by the “skeptical” populace he praises, his own explanation of why the people reject scientific arguments and accept creationist arguments must surely be false.
And, as always, when otherwise smart people offer obviously incorrect and even mind-numbingly stupid arguments, I have to look to their motivations for saying such errant nonsense (because the arguments themselves could not have persuaded them). Here, all I can see is Hacking making the same sort of criticisms of creationism – and by implication, criticism of the fundamental irrationality of creationists – that atheist critics broaden to religion as a whole: But Hacking doesn’t want to be seen as criticizing religion (because that would be bad for him), so he has to insult the atheists to show that he’s not on “the wrong team.” Further, he has to say good things about willfully ignorant people so they’ll like him in spite of the fact that he says their beliefs are silly: So he applauds their “skepticism” and shows that he agrees with them that those nasty atheists who criticize religion are bad, arrogant people – although he gives no actual reasons for his applause or agreement, because there are none to be given.
By hopping on the atheist-denigrating bandwagon, Hacking tries to disguise his criticism of religious irrationality as somehow not really being a criticism of religious irrationality at all. When all is said and done, he’s so desperate to avoid any appearance of being critical of religion that he pretends that creationism is really rooted in some sort of healthy American dislike for being told what to think and has very little to do with religion as such. This is errant nonsense on the face of it: Creationism is all about religion, and the story of the fundamentalist religious movement in America (which Hacking cites himself) is hardly compatible with any notion of a people who are so strong-willed and independent-minded that they resent being told what to think!
The whole thing is fundamentally dishonest, but perhaps rhetorically effective. Perhaps this is what Nisbet means by “framing”?
ob – I’m surprised that you aren’t more interested in that essay. It is a very cool essay, in my opinion, especially in making the (I think correct) assumption that Darwinism’s life – as opposed to dead science – is in the many controversies that take place within it. Hacking is making an important point, one that the egregious Stephen Fuller seemed to miss utterly in his testimony at the Pennsylvania anti-evolution trial. I think G. is making too much heavy weather of one phrase about Dawkins, for Hacking obviously is not talking about his books about evolutionary theory, like the Blind Watchmaker, but his more polemical work. I am more suspicious, pace Stephen Jay Gould, of the tree of life metaphor than Hacking, though, but otherwise I like the pluralism Hacking promotes.
As to the arrogance issue. Here’s my two bits. One of the radical innovations of Christianity, in the ancient world, was the notion of conversion. Metanoia, being changed utterly. It gave Christians a great weapon – they were not just arguing, they were expressing love that would result in one’s conversion.
To argue against Christianity, then, is to argue against that form of love, or so it could seem if you absorb that Christian notion. And to cut oneself off from love for one’s dialect partner can seem very arrogant.
I don’t think there is a way around this except to say that this form of love, this desire to convert, is a perversion of love, and the progenitor of the many passive aggressive forms of love that are produced in that weird combination of God and coercion. It isn’t common to all religions, but Christianity and Islam have put conversion at the very center of their belief systems. Buddhism seems to tend that way, but never went so far as Christianity and Islam. There is a form of atheism that sprang out of that conversion culture which is about the metanoia moment too – but I think Hacking thinks that there is an atheism that does without the conversion impulse. That doesn’t mean it has no persuasive message, but it is just that this message isn’t the most important thing in your life.
Don G.W.B may be many things but he is not stupid, he has a good degree from Yale, he has got his wings as a fighter pilot,he made a modest sucses in buisnes,he beat a popular incumbent to become govenor of texas and his current address is Pensilvania ave! if he is stupid then he is very lucky!
roger, I think that what you’re saying about metanoia is very relevant to why Christians default to seeing atheists as automatically being arrogant just by virtue of being atheists. But there is no evidence whatsoever that this has anything to do with Hacking’s position as he presents it in this essay.
I have nothing bad to say about Hacking’s scientific critique of creationism. As I pointed out, he is right to say that intelligent design is silly. And his discussion of Lienesch’s work about the organized movement behind American fundamentalism is interesting and insightful. But what struck me is how radically out of place and wholly unnecessary to Hacking’s argument the passing swipes against atheists are.
When confronting the question of why creationism has such a hold on the American public, Hacking in essence blames atheists: He doesn’t just criticize Dawkins, he also takes shots at Hitchens, Harris, and H.L. Mencken. Does Hacking actually believe that the primary reason why so many people embrace creationism is that they are just reacting negatively to such “know-it-alls”? That’s ludicrous, but there’s no other way to read the relevant passages in his essay.
There’s a compelling circularity to Hacking’s argument here. He heaps torrents of abuse on outspoken atheists: He talks about “the monstrous self-confident complacency” of Mencken, and labels Harris and Hitchens “self-indulgent, virulent atheists.” Dawkins is an “arrogant religion-baiter.”
Having savaged outspoken atheists, Hacking then strangely valorizes creationists. While he points out that creationism is simply wrong and silly, he mitigates the criticism by admiring the impulse which moves it: “I have no use for anti-Darwinian campaigners, but I do have a lot of respect for popular skepticism. The people do not trust those who present themselves as elite.” And who are these villains who present themselves as an elite? Obviously, none other than all the critics of religion whom Hacking has been vilifying.
But the question is, does the distrust of “the elite” have anything substantial to do with the motivations for creationism? Hacking unites them through his rhetoric, but the history of the movement as he himself discusses it just a paragraph or two earlier shows that this is exactly backwards: The search for truth that is the heart of the Enlightenment project and the foundation for science is simply anathema to fundamentalists. Fundamentalists don’t search for truths – The Truth is REVEALED in The Bible, period. It’s not any kind of “popular skepticism” that motivates fundamentalism and creationism: Rather, fundamentalism motivates and underlies their “skepticism” – which shouldn’t be called skepticism at all, it should be called what it is: rabid anti-intellectualism, rejection of searching for knowledge in favor of Revealed Truth.
The real and obvious reason religious people distrust and dislike people like Mencken, Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens is simply that they forthrightly criticize religion. What I’ve been trying to figure out is why Ian Hacking is attacking them. And I still think the argument I present above accounts for that. Hacking is using cheap rhetorical tricks to bolster the pretense that criticisms of creationism and creationists really have no connection to any broader criticism of religion. Hacking resorts to cheap rhetorical tricks because, I suspect, he knows as an expert in epistemology that the real problem at the heart of creationism is religious epistemology, i.e. faith as a way of knowing (or, to be accurate, a way of not-knowing). He’s trying very hard to keep the world safe for faith while still fighting the good fight against creationism. Why, I can only guess.
We should all be so lucky as to be born into wealthy and powerful families with plenty of political connections, Richard.
No, Hacking is definitely not advocating the metanoia theory – that’s my theory. I was responding to two things in ob’s post.
As for your reading of Hacking, well, I don’t think Hacking means popular scepticism to be conflated with creationism or fundamentalism. I think he means – and I certainly agree with him – that one should be skeptical of claims that are validated by authority. I’ll give an example outside of creationism. In the fifties, people living downwind of atom bomb tests in Nevada complained about the effects of the radiation. Those complaints were met by reassurances from the AEC, or were simply shouted down by physicists in the nuke industry like Edward Teller. We now know that those people were right. We know that the AEC severely underestimated the harmful effects of radiation, and, when research showed that the radiation was actually doing serious damage, conspired to cover up that research. Or, to take another instance, when Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring, many chemists, aligned with various pesticide companies, attacked her book as unscientific. It wasn’t. She was right about the effects of DDT spraying. But the argument there, as with radiation, once again referenced the authority of science, rather than any specific argument.
So, I think it is important to remember that there are more encounters between scientific establishments and the public than just creationism.
That said, Hacking is not making an argument that is soft on creationism, but that does seek to describe, objectively, why it flourishes in the U.S. His argument is that from Mencken to Hitchens, the polemical tone of atheism has buttressed fundamentalism. I’m not sure I agree with him here – Mencken and Hitchens are, among other things, having fun. I think the rough and tumble of their prose is not meant to convert anyone, or at least that is true of Mencken. It is meant to confront, to fight, and to engage the reader in the thrill of a good fight, and to generally lift the appalling sanctimony with which things religious are treated in America.
However, I think Hacking is right that the confrontational atheists are not going to win against the fundie intelligent design freaks. They will be defeated by cooler heads, concentrating on the science, and not science as authority but science as something popular skepticism converges with.
Well, roger… Hacking’s attempt to describe, objectively as you say, why creationism flourishes in America is anything but objective. It is polemical and slanted. Hacking uses rhetoric that is by turns over-heated and sly on the very subject about which you claim he is being objective. I call bullshit on him, and you’re not giving me any reason to change my mind. I made an argument based on what Hacking actually wrote – on what he says and how he chose to say it. Your attempts to let him off the hook with variations on “what he means is” don’t convince me.
You see, Hacking doesn’t simply say that one ought to be skeptical of claims that are validated by authority, which of course is a general principle I also wholeheartedly endorse: Hacking talks about the skepticism of the public specifically about evolution, and he does so in the context of talking about the American fundamentalist movement. In case you hadn’t noticed, fundamentalists are NOT people who are skeptical of claims validated by authority in any general sense. Fundamentalists generally and creationists in specific ONLY ACCEPT claims based on (religious) authority, and EXPLICITLY REJECT claims based on evidence and reason. They might engage in a mockery of argument based on cherry-picking and distorting evidence to justify pre-determined conclusions, but that’s as close as they get.
Further, it is far too generous to suppose that perhaps Hacking intended to cite the general principle of doubting authority, but of course he thinks it’s misapplied by creationists – because the ONLY EXAMPLES he gives of people whose “authority” provokes skepticism are – you guessed it – those mean ol’ elitist atheists. He only brings up the idea of being skeptical of authority in the context of blaming outspoken atheists for in some sense ‘egging on’ the fundies. But since, as he discussed two paragraphs before, the fundamentalist religious movement which gave birth to creationism was started by dedicated religious activists and spread through their hard work and dedication, what the hell do popular skepticism and atheism have to do with that? Hacking only brings up this notion of popular rejection of “elitists” in the first place to set up his smears against outspoken atheists: Atheists’ arrogance encourages and strengthens the true believers, Hacking claims, as if (1) the atheists’ arrogance and elitism and generally horribleness were simply an establish fact instead of his unvarnished personal opinion, and (2) as if the fundamentalists wouldn’t be just as self-righteously certain about any- and everything if it weren’t for the pernicious influence of those know-it-all atheists. What total and utter bullshit! Self-righteous certainty and ideological rigidity is the primary characteristic of fundamentalist religious belief, and the presence or absence of outspoken atheists has fuck-all to do with it.
As to your final point: I’m not sure I know what it is to “win” against creationism. On the arguments, creationism loses because it ignores evidence and eschews reason. In court, creationists have lost repeatedly (and will continue to lose) because what they are trying to do – teach religion in schools – does in fact violate our 1st Amendment on every sensible reading and on decades of court precedent that even the current appalling Supreme Court is not going to overturn. In the hearts and minds of the American public, creationism will continue to win as long as religion keeps getting a free pass from any and all criticism. So Hacking’s rhetorical barbs targeting atheists – in what I can only interpret (based on what he actually wrote) as an attempt to keep the criticism of creationism and the criticism of religion radically separated – seem to be entirely mis-aimed.
Just for the record, roger, I actually am interested in that essay; I agree with you that it’s cool overall. But I think the particular section of it under examination here is bizarre – tendentious, inaccurate, unfair.