Religions > Atheism > No wonder atheists are angry: they seem ready to believe anything
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Religions > Atheism |
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08 Jan 2006 05:07:12 PM |
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No wonder atheists are angry: they seem ready to believe anything |
I don't see my post of this article on the thread that addresses
Dawkin's TV special, so will post it as a separate thread:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,1681235,00.html
No wonder atheists are angry: they seem ready to believe anything
Richard Dawkins's latest attack on religion is an intellectually lazy
polemic not worthy of a great scientist
Madeleine Bunting
Saturday January 7, 2006
The Guardian
On Monday, it's Richard Dawkins's turn (yet again) to take up the
cudgels against religious faith in a two-part Channel 4 programme, The
Root of All Evil? His voice is one of the loudest in an increasingly
shrill chorus of atheist humanists; something has got them badly
rattled. They even turned their bitter invective on Narnia. By all
means, let's have a serious debate about religious belief, one of the
most complex and fascinating phenomena on the planet, but the suspicion
is that it's not what this chorus wants. Behind unsubstantiated
assertions, sweeping generalisations and random anecdotal evidence,
there's the unmistakable whiff of panic; they fear religion is on the
march again.
Article continues
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------The=
re's
an aggrieved frustration that they've been short-changed by history; we
were supposed to be all atheist rationalists by now. Secularisation was
supposed to be an inextricable part of progress. Even more grating,
what secularisation there has been is accompanied by the growth of
weird irrationalities from crystals to ley lines. As GK Chesterton
pointed out, the problem when people don't believe in God is not that
they believe nothing, it is that they believe anything.
There's an underlying anxiety that atheist humanism has failed. Over
the 20th century, atheist political regimes racked up an appalling (and
unmatched) record for violence. Atheist humanism hasn't generated a
compelling popular narrative and ethic of what it is to be human and
our place in the cosmos; where religion has retreated, the gap has been
filled with consumerism, football, Strictly Come Dancing and a mindless
absorption in passing desires. Not knowing how to answer the big
questions of life, we shelve them - we certainly don't develop the awe
towards and reverence for the natural world that Dawkins would want. So
the atheist humanists have been betrayed by the irrational, credulous
nature of human beings; a misanthropy is increasingly evident in
Dawkins's anti-religious polemic and among his many admirers.
This is the only context that can explain Dawkins's programme, a piece
of intellectually lazy polemic which is not worthy of a great
scientist. He uses his authority as a scientist to claim certainty
where he himself knows, all too well, that there is none; for example,
our sense of morality cannot simply be explained as a product of our
genetic struggle for evolutionary advantage. More irritatingly, he
doesn't apply to religion - the object of his repeated attacks - a
fraction of the intellectual rigour or curiosity that he has applied to
evolution (to deserved applause). Where is the grasp of the
sociological or anthropological explanations of the centrality of
religion? Sadly, there is no evolution of thought in Dawkins's
position; he has been saying much the same thing about religion for a
long time.
There are three areas in his programmes where the lack of rigour is
most striking. First, Dawkins is featured in Jerusalem; the point is
that religion causes violence and most of the world's conflicts can be
traced back to faith. If only they didn't have segregated schooling in
Israel and Palestine then peace could emerge. Likewise in Northern
Ireland.
Let's leave the political scientists to point out the absurd
simplification of these political struggles over land, rights and
resources, but take a wider point. Human beings develop collective
identities - ethnic, nationalist, religious or political - and find in
them a sense of belonging, of personal identity and solidarity; the
problem is how, at points of competition and threat, those identities
flare up into horrible violence. Pinning all the blame on religion
blindly ignores the evidence; the Rwandan tragedy was about ethnicity,
the Holocaust about a racist political ideology. Crucially it fails to
grasp the modern phenomenon of fundamentalism and how religious
identity is being mobilised in an attempt to carve out positions of
power within a rapidly globalising world; this kind of violent religion
is a political product of rapid social and economic change.
Second, Dawkins mounts a charge of "child abuse" against religious
education; it manipulates childish minds, inculcating in them a terror
of hell and damnation. On this argument, I'm with Dawkins for a while;
he's right that many religions have a horrible habit of using fear to
shore up their authority. But that's only part of the story - religion
can also provide children with a deep sense of confidence from the
teaching that they are each precious in the eyes of God, of reverence
for their gift of life and of ethical bearings.
His conclusion is that no children should be exposed to religion until
they are old enough to make a choice; anything else is indoctrination.
But this is quixotic; how can they ever make any choice without
knowledge and how can they ever have knowledge without running into
Dawkins's allegation of indoctrination? Furthermore, the concept of a
child to be kept a blank slate, free from parental influence, is absurd
- or does it just apply to religion, and if so, why? What about the
many ways in which parents shape children (so constraining many
choices) for both good and ill? Isn't the point that children should be
encouraged to develop thoughtful, inquiring minds and a strong ethical
framework - and that this is possible both with, or without, religious
belief?
Finally, Dawkins returns to the old complaint that religion "cuts off a
source of wonder"; he once famously described the medieval view of the
cosmos as "little" and "pokey". It's a revealing comment because it
exposes a remarkable lack of empathy for how people in other ages or
cultures imagine the world. That seems a terrible poverty of his
imagination. Just think: when most people's radius of experience was a
few miles, the world must have seemed a vast, deeply mysterious entity.
That lack of empathy also lies behind Dawkins's reference to a "process
of non-thinking called faith". For thousands of years, religious belief
has been accompanied by thought and intellectual discovery, whether
Islamic astronomy or the Renaissance. But his contempt is so profound
that he can't be bothered to even find out (in an interview he
dismissed Christian theology in exactly these terms). If this isn't the
"hidebound certainty" of which he accuses believers, I'm not sure what
is.
Let's be clear: it's absolutely right that religion should be subjected
to a vigorous critique, but let's have one that doesn't waste time
knocking down straw men. It's also right for religion to concede ground
to science to explain natural processes; but at the same time, science
has to concede that despite its huge advances it still cannot answer
questions about the nature of the universe - such as whether we are
freak chances of evolution in an indifferent cosmos (Dawkins does
finally acknowledge this point in the programmes).
Dawkins seems to want to magic religion away. It's a silly delusion
comparable to one of another great atheist humanist thinker, JS Mill.
He wanted to magic away another inescapable part of human experience -
sex; using not dissimilar arguments to Dawkins's, he pointed out the
violence and suffering caused by sexual desire, and dreamt of a day
when all human beings would no longer be infantilised by the need for
sexual gratification, and an alternative way would be found to
reproduce the human species. As true of Mill as it is of Dawkins: dream
on.
The Root of All Evil? begins on Channel 4 on Monday at 8pm
----
Should Evolution Be Immune From Critical Analysis?
by David Buckna [December 22, 2004]
http://www.rae.org/critanl.html
[snip]
On December 3/04 evolutionist Richard Dawkins, [the Charles Simonyi Profe=
ssor
of the Public Understanding of Science, Oxford University] was interviewe=
d on
"NOW with Bill Moyers" (PBS)
(http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript349_full.html)
At the conclusion of the interview Dawkins read from his book,"The Devil's
Chaplain"--reading aloud the last paragraph from the letter he originally
wrote to his then 10-year-old daughter [Good and Bad Reasons for Believin=
g]:
"What can we do about all of this? It's not easy for you to do anything
because you are only 10. But you could try this. Next time somebody tells=
you
something that sounds important, think to yourself, 'Is this the kind of =
thing
that people probably know because of evidence or is it the kind of thing =
that
people only believe because of tradition, authority or revelation?' And n=
ext
time somebody tells you that something is true, why not say to them, 'What
kind of evidence is there for that?' And if they can't give you a good an=
swer,
I hope you'll think very carefully before you believe a word they say. Yo=
ur
loving Daddy."
Some questions for Richard Dawkins:
1. In your book,"The Devil's Chaplain", you write to your then 10-year-old
daughter: "And next time somebody tells you that something is true, why n=
ot
say to them, 'What kind of evidence is there for that?'
What is the best evidence you can cite for vertical evolution
(information-enhancing evolution)? How do you know it's true?
2. Regarding University of Massachussetts professor Lynn Margulis, Michael
Behe writes in "Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolutio=
n"
(1996): "At one of her many public talks she asks the molecular biologist=
s in
the audience to name a single, unambiguous example of the formation of a =
new
species by the accumulation of mutations. Her challenge goes unmet." (Beh=
e, p.
26).
In the years since Margulis first asked the question, can biologists _now_
name a single, unambiguous example of the formation of a new species by t=
he
accumulation of mutations? Can you give one example of an evolutionary pr=
ocess
or mechanism which can be seen to create new functional information at the
genetic level? Can you give one reference for any study that has shown th=
at
duplicated genes acquired different functions during an experiment or ser=
ies
of experiments?
3. Are you able to describe the _specific_ evolutionary process that acco=
unted
for the complex arrangement of inanimate matter into a life form that gro=
ws,
metabolizes, reacts to stimuli, and reproduces? (the four criteria for
biological life). If 'yes', what was the process? If 'no', why can't the
process be specifically described?
4. On page one of your book, "The Blind Watchmaker" you write:"Biology
is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having
been designed for a purpose".
a) If living things _look_ designed--if the empirical evidence
suggests purpose--then how do you know they _weren't_ designed?
b) What is your criteria for "apparent" design?
"Well, science is not religion and it doesn't just come down to
faith. Although it has many of religion's virtues, it has none of its
vices. Science is based upon verifiable evidence. Religious faith not
only lacks evidence, its independence from evidence is its pride and
joy, shouted from the rooftops. Why else would Christians wax critical
of doubting Thomas? The other apostles are held up to us as exemplars
of virtue because faith was enough for them. Doubting Thomas, on the
other hand, required evidence. Perhaps he should be the patron saint of
scientists." --Richard Dawkins
"What Richard Dawkins conveniently forgets is that when doubting Thomas
was shown evidence of Christ's Resurrection, he accepted it. By
contrast, evolutionists like Dawkins are adamantly closed-minded to any
evidence for a theistic worldview."--John Woodmorappe
---
http://www.csulb.edu/~jmastrop/prize.html
The Life Science Prize
=A9 Joseph Mastropaolo 2003
Also see Frequently Asked Questions.
$1000 Reward for finding an evolutionist that completes a Life Science
Prize trial.
Debate Dodgers (Default-Judgment) List as of December 2005
A debate (default-judgment) dodger is a creation basher who declines "to =
put
money where the mouth is" and engage in a mini-trial.
14. Dr. Richard Dawkins. Oxford University, Professor of Public Understan=
ding
of Science.
=3D=3D=3D
(http://reformed.org/apologetics/Richard_Dawkins/barlow_science_a_religion.=
html)
A Reformed Response To:
Is Science a Religion?, by Richard Dawkins, The Humanist, Jan./Feb.
1997., pp 26-29 by Jonathan Barlow
.
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| User: "Robibnikoff" |
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| Title: Re: No wonder atheists are angry: they seem ready to believe anything |
09 Jan 2006 10:17:19 AM |
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<dabuckna@direct.ca> wrote in message
PLONK
--
Robyn
Resident Witchypoo
#1557
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| User: "Sanitys little helper" |
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| Title: Re: No wonder atheists are angry: they seem ready to believe anything |
09 Jan 2006 01:44:47 PM |
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On 8 Jan 2006 15:07:12 -0800, wrote:
<snip>
http://www.heathens.org.uk/lb_nospam.mp3
--
D Silverman FLAHN, SMLAHN
AA #2208, HB #6
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