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Two who hopped off the faith train
by Anthony Doerr / The Boston Globe
Thanks to Martin Rule for the link!
Reposted from:
www.boston.com
The God Delusion
By Richard Dawkins
Houghton Mifflin, 416 pp., $27
The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God
By Carl Sagan
Edited by Ann Druyan
Penguin, 304 pp., illustrated, $27.95
"The God of the Old Testament," claims Richard Dawkins in his latest book, "The God Delusion," "is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully."
Yikes. But what about the New Testament? Don't things get warmer and fuzzier once Jesus arrives?
Barely, says Dawkins. He identifies the central doctrine of the New Testament as atonement for original sin and characterizes this tenet as "vicious, sado-masochistic and repellent."
"What kind of ethical philosophy is it," he wonders, "that condemns every child, even before it is born, to inherit the sin of a remote ancestor?"
In case you don't know, Dawkins is a widely respected evolutionary biologist. He holds a chair in the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University; his first book, "The Selfish Gene," originally published in 1976, is considered a landmark in science writing. In recent years Dawkins has poured lots of indignant energy into fending off proponents of intelligent design. But "The God Delusion" is much more than a polemic against creationists: It is a broadside against the whole of religion.
Christians, Jews, and Muslims aren't the only ones in his sights. "I am attacking God," Dawkins writes, "all gods, anything and everything supernatural, wherever and whenever they have been or will be invented."
In the past several months, it seems, eminent scientists of every stripe have published books about faith. Francis Collins, former head of the Human Genome Project, recounts his conversion to evangelical Christianity in "The Language of God." E. O. Wilson, the Harvard entomologist, proposes an alliance between religion and science to foster biological conservation in "The Creation." Another Harvard scientist, astronomer Owen Gingerich, argues in "God's Universe" that a supernatural "Creator" lives both within and beyond the cosmos.
And this month, 10 years after his death , Penguin Press will publish a new book by Carl Sagan, "The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God." It contains nine lectures on natural theology given by Sagan 21 years ago at the University of Glasgow. Along the spectrum of religious belief, from theism to full-throated atheism, Sagan lands more toward the center than Dawkins. But he's not nearly as far from Dawkins as you might think.
"The alleged natural theological arguments for the existence of God," he says, " simply are not very compelling." Beneath his innate diplomacy, Sagan manages to transmit a conviction that, in a cosmos containing trillions of suns and almost certainly trillions of planets, any belief in a God deeply concerned with the second-by-second monitoring of our infinitesimally small human lives is perilously bound to outdated traditions.
But as could be expected from the man who reached 600 million viewers with his television series, "Cosmos," Sagan approaches the question of God with plenty of tact.
"I do not mean in any way," Sagan says at one point, "to object to or deride religious experiences." Later, he concedes to a questioner that "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." His biggest objection seems to be to any notion that our understanding of the human enterprise is complete. "I think if we ever reach the point where we think we thoroughly understand who we are and where we came from," he says, "we will have failed."
Dawkins writes something similar: "To suggest that the first cause, the great unknown which is responsible for something existing rather than nothing, is a being capable of designing the universe and of talking to a million people simultaneously, is a total abdication of the responsibility to find an explanation."
Both men are concerned with evidence; both argue that the burden of proof should fall on the person making a contention. But "The God Delusion" fails its reader in exactly the way "The Varieties of Scientific Experience" succeeds.
Except in his half-hearted, final chapter, Dawkins fails to reach for a reader's sense of amazement and wonder. Unlike "The Selfish Gene" and several of Dawkins's other books, "The God Delusion" is much more about deflating a hypothesis than crystallizing an enthralling viewpoint. It's not a paean to atheism; it's a diatribe against religion.
Ultimately, a reader can get worn out by 400-odd pages of indignation. I want to feel my sense of awe sparked, want to be captivated, want to be reminded of the breathtaking fortune of living in such an interesting universe. Early in "The God Delusion," Dawkins quotes Sagan's book " Pale Blue Dot" and concludes: "All Sagan's books touch the nerve-endings of transcendent wonder that religion monopolized in past centuries. My own books have the same aspiration."
Unfortunately, in "The God Delusion," he doesn't succeed. Dawkins is probably right that fundamentalist religion "actively debauches the scientific enterprise," but I'll take Sagan's more reverent skepticism any day.
The universe brims over with worlds. In the end, Sagan puts it best: "By far the best way I know to engage the religious sensibility, the sense of awe, is to look up on a clear night." Whatever you believe, it's hard to argue with that.
Anthony Doerr is the author of "The Shell Collector" and "About Grace."
Reposted from:
www.boston.com
The God Delusion
By Richard Dawkins
Houghton Mifflin, 416 pp., $27
The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God
By Carl Sagan
Edited by Ann Druyan
Penguin, 304 pp., illustrated, $27.95
"The God of the Old Testament," claims Richard Dawkins in his latest book, "The God Delusion," "is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully."
Yikes. But what about the New Testament? Don't things get warmer and fuzzier once Jesus arrives?
Barely, says Dawkins. He identifies the central doctrine of the New Testament as atonement for original sin and characterizes this tenet as "vicious, sado-masochistic and repellent."
"What kind of ethical philosophy is it," he wonders, "that condemns every child, even before it is born, to inherit the sin of a remote ancestor?"
In case you don't know, Dawkins is a widely respected evolutionary biologist. He holds a chair in the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University; his first book, "The Selfish Gene," originally published in 1976, is considered a landmark in science writing. In recent years Dawkins has poured lots of indignant energy into fending off proponents of intelligent design. But "The God Delusion" is much more than a polemic against creationists: It is a broadside against the whole of religion.
Christians, Jews, and Muslims aren't the only ones in his sights. "I am attacking God," Dawkins writes, "all gods, anything and everything supernatural, wherever and whenever they have been or will be invented."
In the past several months, it seems, eminent scientists of every stripe have published books about faith. Francis Collins, former head of the Human Genome Project, recounts his conversion to evangelical Christianity in "The Language of God." E. O. Wilson, the Harvard entomologist, proposes an alliance between religion and science to foster biological conservation in "The Creation." Another Harvard scientist, astronomer Owen Gingerich, argues in "God's Universe" that a supernatural "Creator" lives both within and beyond the cosmos.
And this month, 10 years after his death , Penguin Press will publish a new book by Carl Sagan, "The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God." It contains nine lectures on natural theology given by Sagan 21 years ago at the University of Glasgow. Along the spectrum of religious belief, from theism to full-throated atheism, Sagan lands more toward the center than Dawkins. But he's not nearly as far from Dawkins as you might think.
"The alleged natural theological arguments for the existence of God," he says, " simply are not very compelling." Beneath his innate diplomacy, Sagan manages to transmit a conviction that, in a cosmos containing trillions of suns and almost certainly trillions of planets, any belief in a God deeply concerned with the second-by-second monitoring of our infinitesimally small human lives is perilously bound to outdated traditions.
But as could be expected from the man who reached 600 million viewers with his television series, "Cosmos," Sagan approaches the question of God with plenty of tact.
"I do not mean in any way," Sagan says at one point, "to object to or deride religious experiences." Later, he concedes to a questioner that "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." His biggest objection seems to be to any notion that our understanding of the human enterprise is complete. "I think if we ever reach the point where we think we thoroughly understand who we are and where we came from," he says, "we will have failed."
Dawkins writes something similar: "To suggest that the first cause, the great unknown which is responsible for something existing rather than nothing, is a being capable of designing the universe and of talking to a million people simultaneously, is a total abdication of the responsibility to find an explanation."
Both men are concerned with evidence; both argue that the burden of proof should fall on the person making a contention. But "The God Delusion" fails its reader in exactly the way "The Varieties of Scientific Experience" succeeds.
Except in his half-hearted, final chapter, Dawkins fails to reach for a reader's sense of amazement and wonder. Unlike "The Selfish Gene" and several of Dawkins's other books, "The God Delusion" is much more about deflating a hypothesis than crystallizing an enthralling viewpoint. It's not a paean to atheism; it's a diatribe against religion.
Ultimately, a reader can get worn out by 400-odd pages of indignation. I want to feel my sense of awe sparked, want to be captivated, want to be reminded of the breathtaking fortune of living in such an interesting universe. Early in "The God Delusion," Dawkins quotes Sagan's book " Pale Blue Dot" and concludes: "All Sagan's books touch the nerve-endings of transcendent wonder that religion monopolized in past centuries. My own books have the same aspiration."
Unfortunately, in "The God Delusion," he doesn't succeed. Dawkins is probably right that fundamentalist religion "actively debauches the scientific enterprise," but I'll take Sagan's more reverent skepticism any day.
The universe brims over with worlds. In the end, Sagan puts it best: "By far the best way I know to engage the religious sensibility, the sense of awe, is to look up on a clear night." Whatever you believe, it's hard to argue with that.
Anthony Doerr is the author of "The Shell Collector" and "About Grace."
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Posted: Thursday, November 23, 2006 | PermalinkComments 1 - 17 of 17 |
Reload Comments | Back to Top | Page Numbers3. Comment #9258 by maryhelena on November 24, 2006 at 9:20 am
"The God Delusion" is much more about deflating a hypothesis than crystallizing an enthralling viewpoint. It's not a paean to atheism; it's a diatribe against religion".And that's the problem - TGD, despite Dawkins' attempt to separate Einsteinian religion from supernatural religion - is being viewed, by most reviewers, as a broadside against religion, as a diatribe against religion. Why? Are the people writing these negative reviews unable to make the distinction that Dawkins advocates. Or are they simply unwilling to make this distinction. Unwilling to make it not because of some deeply held conviction towards theism - but because they find the whole question of religion a very different question to the one that Dawkins maintains it is?
Dawkins' position, in TGD, is that there are two types of religion. Einsteinian religion and supernatural religion: "As I continue to clarify the distinction between supernatural religion on the one hand and Einsteinian religion on the other, bear in mind that I am calling only supernatural gods delusional".
By separating Einsteinian religion from supernaturalist religion, Dawkins has conceded the point that 'religion' is a broad term that can include two very different viewpoints. However, this is where Dawkins starts to lose the plot. For then he maintains that to continue to call Einsteinian religion 'religion' at all - is "misleading", "destructively misleading" - "because for the vast majority of people, 'religion' implies 'supernatural'. This of course, leads to the premise that there is 'good' religion and there is bad/evil religion. And, for the rest of the book, it is the 'bad' religion, supernaturalist religion, that Dawkins attacks.
Whatever is one's take on Dawkins verse theism and supernaturalist religion, in the full picture of things, its neither here nor there. The problem with TGD is that it falls into a trap, of it's own making, of doing an injustice, by being disrespectful, to those who don't go along with Dawkins' attempt to separate religion into good and bad religion, Einsteinian and supernaturalist religion. Religion is too big a phenomenon to be pigeonholed in the manner that Dawkins seeks to do.
And of course, Dawkins goes further. Charges of "intellectual high treason" to anyone seeking to retain the concept of 'god' in any manner whatsoever. To which the only logical retort, Dawkins' negative intent nothwithstanding, is - thanks for the compliment! The fundamental nature of the mind, it's inherent nature, is its ability to engage in 'treason', to engage in heresy. Without intellectual 'treason', intellectual heresy, the mind becomes stagnant - and that situation, intellectual abdication, would put a full stop to intellectual evolution. Charging those who do not agree with one's point of view with 'treason' is ridiculous.
It is becoming more and more clear to me, from reading the many negative reviews of TGD, that the book is nothing less than a diatribe against religion. My very first comments to this site (in relation to the Cambridge book reading – my copy not having arrived from amazon) related to Dawkins' view narrow view religion. Now, having read the book, and considered Dawkins' four consciousness reasons for writing the book - the raising of consciousness in that being an atheists is a realistic possibility; that there is power in natural selection; that children should not be saddled with a religious label; and atheist pride - it seems, to me, that a book on these issues could well have been written without indulging in a diatribe against religion. One does not have to blacken the 'opposition' in order to demonstrate how shinny white ones own position is. One does not support ones own 'truth' by ridiculing the opposition.
The book's title, The God Delusion, is unfortunate. It might be good as a marketing ploy - but to infer that millions of people are delusional is somehow to cross some line or other. Mistaken they may be - but a charge of delusional takes one into psychological territory - and leads to the whole thrust of TGD becoming a personal slight on millions of sincere religious people. That Dawkins can do all of this - even quoting the Microsoft Word dictionary definition of delusion, "a symptom of psychiatric disorder" - is to take a position that is the height of insensitivity. Religion is a delusion and those who hold this delusion are suffering from a psychiatric disorder - this sort of in-your-face 'argumentation' exposes not simply a desire for consciousness raising - but, seemingly, a deeply felt personal phobia about religion that is being exorcised by writing a diatribe against religion.
At the root of all the criticism of TGD is the notion, the sense, the feeling, that some line has been crossed. Nobody is going to take Dawkins to task for speaking his mind on ideas. Religion, however, is not just about ideas. It deals with: " a believing view of life, approach to life, way of life, and therefore a fundamental pattern embracing the individual and society, man and the world, through which a person …sees and experiences, thinks and feels, acts and suffers, everything. It is a transcendentally grounded and immanently operative system of coordinates, by which man orients himself intellectually, emotionally, and existentially". (Hans Kung: Christianity and the World Religions). There is nothing delusional about such a definition of religion - it seeks to accommodate all aspects of the human experience of life.
The line that has been crossed, in TGD, is one of dignity. Its failure is that it has not deemed it necessary, to accord the millions of non-atheists in the world, not even the slightest smidgen of human dignity. It's only a very small step from looking upon religious people as suffering some sort of psychiatric disorder - to labeling them sub-human, not worthy of being accorded human dignity at all. (here I'm thinking of Atlas Shrugged and its diatribe against altruism).
As a flesh and blood issue, apartheid was a disaster. As an exercise in secular humanism, intellectual apartheid - the judging of people by the content of their minds, is, likewise, doomed to failure. There will be those, like Mandela, who will not allow their dignity to be so maligned. Reviewers, after reviewers, are, in one sense or another, telling Richard Dawkins that a line has been crossed with The God Delusion.
6. Comment #9300 by maryhelena on November 24, 2006 at 11:08 am
HughI'm not making any point about whether or not bad/evil religion is such because of what it "feeds us" or that it "promotes awful deeds". I'm making a comparison between 'good' Einsteinian religion and 'bad/evil' supernaturalist religion. An inference which Dawkins makes on page 19 of TGD - i.e. Einsteinian religion is acceptable religion, Dawkins himself saying that in regard to Einsteinian religion that he, himself, is also religious. That's the 'good', the acceptable religion. The 'bad/evil' religion is the religion that holds to the idea of a theistic god, supernaturalist religion. Dawkins, maintaining, in the book's Preface, that "religion is not the root of all evil" - i.e. that some 'evil' stems from religion.
Hugh, I'm not buying into the idea that everyone that does not agree with one is delusional. Once you buy into that idea - then roll on the '1984' with its 'thoughtcrime' and Thought Police….To even think that most of the world's population are suffering from a psychiatric disorder - and that you, yourself, are somehow exempt - where does that lead one? Delusions of grandeur methinks!!
I do have sympathy for Richard Dawkins. I can feel his frustration with religion. Actually, he puts me in mind of some else, someone who also thought they 'saw' what was wrong with the world - and it must have driven her to despair that she could not instill this insight, this passion, this urgency, to the world at large. I'm thinking of Ayn Rand (whose book I mentioned in my earlier post). For such people, life must at times be like living in a nightmare - everything just out of reach yet the nightmare vivid enough to haunt their waking moments. That's possibly always been the situation with those who can 'see' while other's are in the dark. However, it's no reason to think, as history clearly demonstrates, that the 'light' that such people hold is able to reach every nook and cranny. Rand, sadly, throw the baby out with the bathwater - and, likewise, Dawkins, with his narrow view on religion, seems intent on doing likewise.
7. Comment #9310 by maryhelena on November 24, 2006 at 11:39 am
asdf"This issue cannot be confused with racism and aparheid at all. People cannot change the colour of their skin but that can change their dangerous beliefs."
And how should that be done i.e. getting people to change their 'dangerous beliefs'. A mind, to quote Rand, cannot be forced. And, when you have used all the argumentation in your intellectual armory - and the religionist still does not 'see' your atheist world picture - what then? Send for the Thought Police and have them committed to some psychiatric 'homeland' for the mentally unstable? Or you could try Rand's solution in Atlas Shrugged: leave the unwashed to reap the fruits of their sickness - and let the pure of thought hightail it to the seclusion of a secret hideaway - where the 'men of the mind' contemplate the wonders of their intellect...
8. Comment #9324 by Neil Parry on November 24, 2006 at 12:57 pm
Maryhelena,The point is, if you brainwash and indoctrinate a child, they will grow up unable to listen to rational thought, assess the facts and the evidence and come to the logical conclusion that the chance of the existence of god is about a million to one.
No one is suggesting that adults should be forced to be atheists, only that children should be given ALL the information so that they can make up their own minds later in life. I have 'faith' that if this was the case religion would quietly die out in a couple of generations
Unfortunately, children are predisposed to believe what ever an adult tells them is true without question. This is the sole reason that religion continues to be passed from generation to generation.
9. Comment #9385 by Aussie on November 24, 2006 at 4:37 pm
maryhelena,"Reviewers, after reviewers, are, in one sense or another, telling Richard Dawkins that a line has been crossed with The God Delusion."
I for one will be eternally grateful to Dawkins for crossing that line. If this were to be the only achievement of Dawkins' book then I would judge it, on this basis alone, to have been an outstanding success.
10. Comment #9487 by John Phillips on November 24, 2006 at 10:37 pm
Maryhelena: While calling it delusion may seem harsh it is that nonetheless, at least in my opinion and based on the evidence. That it may not be wholely the fault of the individual holding such delusional beliefs, largely due to a combination of childhood indoctrination and peer pressure doesn't change that it is delusion. Often in treating a mental health issue, especially those involving delusion, one of the first steps, if not the very first, is accepting that they are delusions and where this acceptance is not forthcoming treatment invariably fails. The difference between the god delusion and what are accepted by most as genuine mental health problems is that the god delusion is not seen as delusion by those who hold it, i.e. the majority. Thus the first step is to confront the source of the delusion by showing that there is no evidence for the basis of the delusion, i.e. no evidence for god or gods, when that is accepted there is a potential for recovery. With children it is even simpler, don't indoctrinate them at an age when they are still dependent on adults, whether their parents or others, for their worldview. If the delusion was harmless there would be no problem with people holding it. Unfortunately, too many with the delusion attack those with either a different god delusion or those with no delusion and additionally try to use it for societal control. In fact, societal control by imposition of their beliefs appears the main focus of particularly, but not exclusively, the most dangerous fundamentalist believers. If those with the god delusion simply kept it on a personal private level there would be no problem however many held it but unfortunately they insist on imposing it on others. Either through a belief they are saving the non believers or those with the wrong belief or by imposing their moral standards on others, often through governmental influence. Even today we see this worldwide, with literal war between totally different belief systems and even between those of the same basic belief system but with variations thereof and is true of both christianity and islam. Look what is happening in Iraq right now with sunni killing shia and vice versa and all because of a differing interpretations by various of their so called prophets. If RD called for such actions against the delusional I would argue vehemently against him but he is not, all he asks for is for humanity to think rationally and to stop the child abuse. Respect has to be earned and unfortunately, too many believers have proven beyond doubt that respect is the last thing they deserve as few actually practice what they preach, espcially those with influence at government level. Again true of both christian and muslim leaders and their followers. If they actually followed the tenets of their faith perhaps we atheists wouldn't have a problem with them. But when we see the ones with religious power continuously practice a do as I say and not a do as I do policy and use their influence to directly affect the way I choose to live then I will see them as the enemies of all humanity's future.11. Comment #9520 by maryhelena on November 25, 2006 at 2:07 am
John"If those with the god delusion simply kept it on a personal private level there would be no problem however many held it but unfortunately they insist on imposing it on others. Either through a belief they are saving the non believers or those with the wrong belief or by imposing their moral standards on others, often through governmental influence."
The problem is exactly where you pinpoint it - "imposing their moral standard on others, often through governmental influence". That's the problem - fundamentalists with a political/governmental agenda. All the rest, the theistic god and fundamentalists out to save souls - that should not be the main focus of dealing with the present social problem. It is only when fundamentalists seek political influence that it is morally imperative to make a stand against them. For the rest, we need to uphold their freedom of speech - and thought - and emotion.
No, we don't have to respect any idea that we believe to be in error. There is the world of difference, however, in letting our lack of respect for an idea become a lack of respect for the one holding the idea. And no, I don't think respect, in this context, has to be earned - as though there was ever an occasion that one could justify treating a fellow human being disrespectfully. One condemns the deed, never the man. And why should we do that? Because, ultimately, it is to safeguard our own humanity, it is to keep our own concept, our own estimation of human nature, elevated. We see enough of man's inhumanity to man - its only by choosing to acknowledge basic ground 'rules' that we demonstrate that we place the highest value upon our humanity. If we fail in this regard, if we fail to acknowledge the dignity of another human being, a dignity that is his by virtue of his existence - then it is human nature that we disrespect.
(as far as human achievements go - yes, respect is due, is earned, for any great accomplishment a man or woman might achieve - this earned respect relates to accomplishment only. In other areas of life such an individual's actions might not be deserving of respect. Earned respect, while welcome, is a bonus in life - it can never take the place of the respect we all need to have for one another - that respect is a respect for human life itself.)
12. Comment #9521 by maryhelena on November 25, 2006 at 2:09 am
NeilAtheism has been around a long time now. There are children who have been brought up by atheist parents who have turned to religion, in some form or another. I have mentioned, in previous posts, the noted cosmologist George Ellis - both his parents are/were atheists. So, the least one can say is that even if children are not indoctrinated into some specific form of religion - that such children, as adults can, and do, choose some form of religion. The question of religion is just not that simple. People do change their ideas. People do become atheists regardless of childhood indoctrination with some specific theological ideas. Its pretty normal for teenagers to go through a rebellious stage - rejecting all that their parents stand for, lifestyle, politics, religion - that's part of growing up. If the childhood indoctrination was of such a great danger to future intellectual growth, as Dawkins would like us to believe - then we would not see the growing numbers of atheists that exist today. You and I, and Dawkins himself, are evidence that childhood indoctrination with religious or theological ideas does not give a child long-term immunity from rational thought.
13. Comment #9522 by maryhelena on November 25, 2006 at 2:11 am
asdf"If we had a complete understanding of why people turn to religion, we would be able to a huge amount to prevent it by using rational arguments in addition to **empathy and compassion**
"I stress empathy and compassion as I don't believe that rational arguments alone would work because virtually all the reasons why people turn to religion are emotion based, apart from indoctrination as a child."
So now it's emotions that are getting short changed ;-) Rand tried that as well! No place in Rand' world view for 'men of the heart'. Man's emotional mechanism, she wrote, "is like an electronic computer, which his mind has to program….". This is indeed shaky ground - not only are the Thought Police in view - now we have the Heart Police as well!
It truly beats me, in all of this, why it is that we would want to change people to our liking, to our own 'standard' of what being human means. Variety, they say, is the spice of life. Why not celebrate our diversity instead of bemoaning its existence?
14. Comment #10038 by John Phillips on November 26, 2006 at 11:43 pm
Maryhelena: While I accord all respect initially, trying to live by a do unto others philosophy, they lose that respect the minute they declare a certain religious stance. I.e. fundamentalism of any kind, for the fundamentalist has no respect for my non belief, in fact, generally portraying the unbeliever as evil is some way. Or if they are feeling really generous, as at best misguided only needing to see the light, as I have had it put so quaintly directly to my face. Part of the problem is that for many believers, simply asking questions about the source of their belief is considered disrespectful. Yet conversely, it is perfectly OK for them, and not only the fundamentalist among them, to ridicule and denigrate those with differrent or no relgious beliefs.15. Comment #10176 by maryhelena on November 27, 2006 at 10:05 am
JohnMost certainly, when theists engage in negative behavior towards one because one is an atheist - then one must be prepared to give as good as one gets - if not more so.... That said, I don't think going out of ones way to pick a fight with theists - when all they are trying to do is to live a good and moral life - that does not cut it with me. We just can't set ourselves up as some sort of Thought Police...There must be a place for tolerance!
Of course, when theists are endeavoring to enter the political arena - then atheists do need to mount the barricades...and give their tolerance the day off...
16. Comment #10920 by Max on December 1, 2006 at 1:58 pm
Maryhelena,Maybe Sam Harris put it better I don't know, but by using the word delusional you compare it to other such ideas.
To use a Harris example, what if our commander in chief said he was in daily contact with the creator of the universe and that he spoke to God through his hair dryer.
Now take away the hair dryer. There really is no difference in these two stories, yet in one we have a strong inclination to ridicule as insanely delusional and the other we just shrug at. I leave it to your good offices to decide which is which.
In anyevent there is no good evidence for either story or any religious story.
And we delude ourselves when we try to rationalize these propostions.
TGD doesn't fall into any traps, its just unapologetic in its critique of religious ideas. Whether of liberal or fundamentalist theologians his observations cannot be ducked, or dodged by simply saying, "oh that Dawkins, what a dick."
It may seem like simple bigoted thinking. But it really isn't. In science and in most other areas of our discourse we demand that people have good reasons, replicable reasons, verifiable reasons for their beliefs, or their propositions. If a group of doctors are discussing a diagnosis and a Christian Scientist comes up and proooses their theory of disease, they are quickly, dismissively, marginalized from the discussion. This is precisely how it should be.
Judging by the books success the questions it posed, and the arguments it raised were ready to be heard.
17. Comment #11406 by elroySF on December 4, 2006 at 12:40 pm
Re: Evidence of Absense question.An example of this would be String Theory which depends upon - among other things - additional dimensions in which the strings can vibrate. If some scientific experiment were to prove that these extra dimensions do not exist, that would be evidence for the absence of strings.
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1. Comment #9188 by David on November 24, 2006 at 4:58 am
I tend to agree; I wasn't as inspired by TGD as by The Blind Watchmaker or Unweaving the Rainbow, perhaps. However, I think that TGD wasn't aimed to raise a sense of wonder, but rather thrust the idea that religion isn't useful into the media spotlight, which is has achieved. I haven't read the 'new' Sagan book yet.