1. Comment #19290 by LookToWindward on January 26, 2007 at 5:42 am

That is quite the most brilliant and inspiring oratory I've heard in some time.

How wonderful it must be to be so well rounded and well read that one always knows precisely how to say what one means; and where one has borrowed from elsewhere one is able to remember precisely where, and even which passage.

Other Comments by LookToWindward

2. Comment #19308 by Riley on January 26, 2007 at 7:12 am

I definitely appreciate Hitchens' way with words, but I think he is often too willing to sacrifice accuracy for style and/or effect.

Does he really believe that the curse of religion persists in part because humanity is only "partially evolved" ? -- or is he so enraptured by this turn of phrase, that he doesn't care that it's really quite a moronoic thing to say?

Add to that his explicit yearning for another bloody war which he apparently believes is necessary to eradicat religious extremeism in Israel or to teach a proper lesson in othe regions, it becomes difficult at times to differentiate the morality and logic of Hitchens from the morality and logic of the God of Exodus.

--

Other Comments by Riley

3. Comment #19312 by LookToWindward on January 26, 2007 at 7:36 am

I suppose, Riley, that Hitchens is merely of the opinion that war is the only thing that will settle certain of these questions and may, in the very long term, end up being less awful (according to some measure of awfulness that includes death and suffering together) than the alternatives.

I don't agree with him, but I see where he's coming from.

And yes, like all extremely well read intellectuals, both of them regularly sacrifice accuracy and comprehensibility for poetry. Fair enough, sometimes I want to hear poetry.

Other Comments by LookToWindward

4. Comment #19331 by anotherclinton on January 26, 2007 at 8:47 am

When Hitchens uses the phrase "partially evolved", he is referring to the size of human prefrontal lobes and adrenal glands, the first being too small and the latter too big, potentially leading humans toward irrational and overemotional behavior. He's not misspeaking or misunderstanding evolution, but being satirical. The man understands the science, he's merely using the misinterpretation of natural selection as having a goal to make a joke.

Other Comments by anotherclinton

5. Comment #19335 by Riley on January 26, 2007 at 9:03 am

"The man understands the science, he's merely using the misinterpretation of natural selection as having a goal to make a joke."

Glad to hear it. It is a pretty amusing self-effacement of humanity, even though it's sure to further promote a common misunderstanding about the science.

--

Other Comments by Riley

6. Comment #19338 by Riley on January 26, 2007 at 9:20 am

Comment #19312 by LookToWindward "I suppose, Riley, that Hitchens is merely of the opinion that war is the only thing that will settle certain of these questions and may, in the very long term, end up being less awful (according to some measure of awfulness that includes death and suffering together) than the alternatives."

He contradicts his own stated conviction that religion exists as a way of escaping fear of death by promoting the idea that an increase in violent and unpleasant death (certainly the kind of death I'm most afraid of) could lead to a net decrease in religion. If this idea is not contradicted by his own convictions, then it's certainly contradicted by the events of recorded history. This notion that Hitchens is promoting is irrational and destructive and deserves uncomprimised condemnation.

--

Other Comments by Riley

7. Comment #19350 by Sancus on January 26, 2007 at 11:00 am

Since that part of the discussion was in the context of a question about Dawkins, and since Hitchens made a point to emphasize it, here is the transcript starting in the middle of the 68th minute.

Questioner: Would you be as aggressive as someone like Richard Dawkins, in actually challenging religious people, and... taking issue with their beliefs...

Joan Bakewell: Isn't he?

[laughter]

Stephen Fry: Chris is doing a good job.

Joan Bakewell: I think he's making a fair...

Christopher Hitchens: ... I have great respect for Richard Dawkins as well. I don't think I've been less critical of religion in general, but the religious impulse in people. In other words, our quarrel is not with the priests and the rabbis and the mullahs. All who are willing to kill -- don't forget this, if I make one point tonight and it stays in your minds, it'll be enough:

The Wahabi want to kill the Shia. The Shia really hate the Wahabi. Get used to it. Anyone who says, "don't let us offend Muslim opinion," doesn't know what Muslim opinion is, doesn't know what happened in Afghanistan, doesn't know what's happening in Iran or Iraq now. There is no such thing as a unified Muslim opinion, nor with Christianity... we hope, I look forward to a fight between secular and religious Jews in Israel, I hope, in which blood is spilled in order to remove the messianic settlers. I really look forward to it. All the ingredients are there.

Dawkins, I think, translates himself as an attacker of rabbis, mullahs, "inciters," in other words, what the law, this bloody law would call "incitement." I say the fault is within ourselves. We are gullible, we are stupid, we are partially evolved, we're racist implicitly, we're superstitious, we're afraid of the dark, we're afraid of death, we have... our prefrontal lobes are too small, our adrenaline glands are too big, our thumbs hardly any good at all for opposition. We could do a lot better. The problem is with us, not with the people who live on our gullibility and our stupidity.

That's, if I could just make that... religion makes religious people of the same faith want to murder one another, because, if you ban blasphemy once, the next thing you'll ban is heresy, which means you can't even disagree in the Siekh temple, as was shown in Birmingham. You can't disagree in the mosque. And nobody needs to be told what happens, if you're the wrong kind of christian.

So come on get real about it!

[audience applause]

Next questioner: ... Thank you.

Christopher Hitchens: It's the product of our own evil.

Riley wrote:

Comment #19312 by LookToWindward "I suppose, Riley, that Hitchens is merely of the opinion that war is the only thing that will settle certain of these questions and may, in the very long term, end up being less awful (according to some measure of awfulness that includes death and suffering together) than the alternatives."

It's an unavoidable contradiction to his own stated conviction that religion exists as a way of escaping fear of death, to promote the idea that increasing the suffering and death in a community could decrease the amount of religion in it.

Using religion as a way of escaping fear of death does not mean escaping death, which means that it is probably not a very good way of escaping fear of death. Religious people fear death at the hands of other religious people and, indeed, anyone who is not of their religion. This tendency makes people further fear death at the hands of people within their religion, but of a different opinion. Muslims, for example, may all be of the same faith, but not of the same opinion. Banning blasphemy (denouncing the faith) is for religious people functionally inseparable from banning heresy (denouncing opinion).

Religion has altered people's fears of death in such a way as to make them wish the death of those who do not fear death the same way.

Hitchens sees this as an unreasonable position to be in, and believes the only recourse this dynamic will lead to is violence. I am not as cynical as Hitchens to look forward to this violence, but if it is inevitable, which it certainly seems to be, then I hope that it is swift but potent enough to cause more people to wake up to the fact that religions are not helping them.

Last time I checked my history books, the dynamic between suffering and religous belief was directly proportional to one another, not indirectly proportional. I'm amused that the audience let him preach such nonsense without pointing out to him how full of bs he was.

Maybe that apparent relationship exists because religion causes suffering? My history books don't show that it works the other way around. America started its golden age of freethought right after the Civil War, still the bloodiest war in American history. Existentialism and Marxism flourished around the world after the World Wars. Religious fundamentalism prospers in the peaceful 80s and starts to take over conservatism during the very optimistic 90s. Then after 9/11, Sam Harris becomes the star author of The End of Faith, existent religious conservatism makes more conflict, and then Richard Dawkins' publisher says the market is ready for a book on atheism. The God Delusion remains part of the national discussion indefinitely.

I hear this Marxist garbage about religion being the natural effect of suffering all the time, but curiously I never see the evidence. So, if anyone can show that there may be some actual empirical verification to this claim, I'd very much appreciate it.

Other Comments by Sancus

8. Comment #19352 by Laurence Boyce on January 26, 2007 at 11:20 am

Hitchens has an irritating manner of generally hogging the conversation, only pausing briefly to allow the next person to speak, before cutting across them immediately.

Other Comments by Laurence Boyce

9. Comment #19361 by Stafford Gordon on January 26, 2007 at 1:49 pm

Christopher Hitchin's comments about the need for war remind me of the character of Souvarine in Zola's "Germinal". Worth listening to these two chaps, despite it being a bit of a love-in.

Other Comments by Stafford Gordon

10. Comment #19364 by Riley on January 26, 2007 at 2:16 pm

I hope that it is swift but potent enough to cause more people to wake up to the fact that religions are not helping them.

This is the moronic thinking that I find so scary. We need some "potent enough" violence to wake people up to the fact that religion is not helping them. Obviously, if the problem isn't sovled by violence, it's just that we haven't gotten violent enough. The beatings will continue until morale improves! Lunacy! simple-minded numb-headed lunacy.

Why, with all the violence that occurs in the world on a daily basis do you believe that a little more violence this time will do the trick to teach people a lesson? Just the opposite, When has it ever occured that bloody violence didn't further entrench beliefs? It simply extends the period we must wait before the emotionally unscarred can attempt to recover civility.

Maybe that apparent relationship exists because religion causes suffering?

no doubt it does. But the promise of relief (or just emotional comfort) from suffering is the marketing pitch of religions. When there is a lot of suffering, there are a lot more people to sell to. Suffering need not be the modern-day cause of religion, but it's certainly its key marketing opportunity.

My history books don't show that it works the other way around. America started its golden age of freethought right after the Civil War, still the bloodiest war in American history.

Golden age of freethought??? A country defined, and in many ways crippled, for the next one hundred years after the civil war by black-white segregation, the formation of terrorist groups such as the Klu-Klux-Klan, and the domination of politics in the South by the Southern Baptist Convention? The war in no way ended the belief system of the southern gentry class; these people still believed themselves to be a righteously priveleged class and still believed that no "black" should pretend to be equal better in ability than any white.

To the point: Wars don't change beliefs. There's no reason to believe that a war in Isreal will change the belief systems of anyone involed, and every reason to believe that it will further entrench their faith-head beliefs.

Religious fundamentalism prospers in the peaceful 80s and starts to take over conservatism during the very optimistic 90s. Then after 9/11, Sam Harris becomes the star author of The End of Faith, existent religious conservatism makes more conflict, and then Richard Dawkins' publisher says the market is ready for a book on atheism. The God Delusion remains part of the national discussion indefinitely.

There's no arguement from me that religion can flourish without war, but it does tend to do much better with it than without. The march to war after the 9/11 attacks was a powerful political force solidifying the fundementalist religious base in the United States. Had the United States itself sustained continued ongoing attacks and a real serious threat to its soverignty, do you really think the political atnmosphere here would have been receptive (if not outright intolerant) of the clear thinking Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins or any other voice that suggested Christianity and God were not righteous? It's exactly *because* there has not been a great deal of blood spilled here that rational people are able to speak and be heard.

I hear this Marxist garbage about religion being the natural effect of suffering all the time but curiously I never see the evidence. So, if anyone can show that there may be some actual empirical verification to this claim, I'd very much appreciate it.

I don't see why this needs to have anything to do with Marx, except that he along with dozens of other famous thinkers and scholars have noted a connection - including Freud and apparently Hitchens himself. The simple matter of opportunity for religious marketing to take hold is inescapably obvious. Religion provides comfort (or at least the promise of it); the more a person suffers, the more desperate and susceptible a person is to buy into the sort of comfort that religion promises (and apparently delivers).

It's not a cause and effect, suffering simply provides the sales opportunity.


--

Other Comments by Riley

11. Comment #19376 by Sancus on January 26, 2007 at 5:30 pm

This is the moronic thinking that I find so scary. We need some "potent enough" violence to wake people up to the fact that religion is not helping them.

No, I do not think we need violence. Definitely not! Please do not think that. You can't ignore the fact, though, that religious people do hate one another and they do resort to violence. I don't see anything moronic in hoping that the violence that results helps them to, you know, no longer resort to such violence?

Obviously, if the problem isn't sovled by violence, it's just that we haven't gotten violent enough. The beatings will continue until morale improves! Lunacy! simple-minded numb-headed lunacy.

Yes, it is lunacy. Remember, religion is lunacy,

But the promise of relief (or just emotional comfort) from suffering is the marketing pitch of religions. When there is a lot of suffering, there are a lot more people to sell to. Suffering need not be the modern-day cause of religion, but it's certainly its key marketing opportunity.

I don't agree. This is a very hedonistic approach to religion and religions are anything but hedonistic. Or, if not hedonistic, this is a Buddhist approach to religion. "Relief of suffering" and "salvation" are not the same thing, especially in Christianity. Suffering is practically glorified.

Golden age of freethought??? A country defined, and in many ways crippled, for the next one hundred years after the civil war by black-white segregation, the formation of terrorist groups such as the Klu-Klux-Klan, and the domination of politics in the South by the Southern Baptist Convention? The war in no way ended the belief system of the southern gentry class; these people still believed themselves to be a righteously priveleged class and still believed that no "black" should pretend to be equal better in ability than any white.

Well, I'm sorry our modest freethought movement did not impress you, but there is more to America than the south, and we got a great deal accomplished during that period.

You are thinking in terms of false dichotomies, winning everything or losing everything, and I should not have to remind you that that's neither healthy nor sound.

To the point: Wars don't change beliefs. There's no reason to believe that a war in Isreal will change the belief systems of anyone involed, and every reason to believe that it will further entrench their faith-head beliefs.

Wars change. They're chaotic, stochastic, uncertain, etc. Sometimes they change everything, so, yes, they do change beliefs. Just not in any masterfully directed manner and not always in a positive one.

I do not know the socio-political dynamics of Israel so I could not even defend Hitchens' specific point here even if I wanted to. And I do not want to. It appears to me that Israel has already been in a state of perpetual war since its creation and that it relies a great deal on religion. All I can do is hope the religion part loses out.

There's no arguement from me that religion can flourish without war, but it does tend to do much better with it than without. The march to war after the 9/11 attacks was a powerful political force solidifying the fundementalist religious base in the United States. Had the United States itself sustained continued ongoing attacks and a real serious threat to its soverignty, do you really think the political atnmosphere here would have been receptive (if not outright intolerant) of the clear thinking Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins or any other voice that suggested Christianity and God were not righteous? It's exactly *because* there has not been a great deal of blood spilled here that rational people are able to speak and be heard

This is pretty ridiculous. I would bet good money that you are not an American. This paragraph exposes a great deal of ignorance about American culture outside of American politics.

I don't see why this needs to have anything to do with Marx, except that he along with dozens of other famous thinkers and scholars have noted a connection - including Freud and apparently Hitchens himself. The simple matter of opportunity for religious marketing to take hold is inescapably obvious. Religion provides comfort (or at least the promise of it); the more a person suffers, the more desperate and susceptible a person is to buy into the sort of comfort that religion promises (and apparently delivers).

It's not a cause and effect, suffering simply provides the sales opportunity.

You still have not provided any evidence whatsoever to support your position.

Freud said that belief in God was a longing for the father. Hitchens to escape fear of death. None of these are dependent on the notion of suffering.

Any comfort you see in religion is probably a byproduct of the service, it is not actually the service. If comfort was what people wanted, they would go to massage parlors, watch TV, and find other ways to pleasure themselves.

So, if you'd like to have a rational discussion about it, I'd like to see some historical evidence. You edited Comment #19338 after I posted after it and changed your original claim. You no longer refer to your history books, but recorded history. Whatever it is, I'm really interested in actual events that support your religion-as-comfort-from-suffering claim.

I think it is empirically false. Religion does not provide comfort. If it did, then it would not cause suffering, which it does by your own admission.

Other Comments by Sancus

12. Comment #19387 by HappyPrimate on January 26, 2007 at 8:30 pm

As one who is unfamilar with these speakers, I really enjoyed listening to the expression of their thoughts and views. I thought both men and the host were relaxed and discussed the subject matter with great zeal. I will listen to this again tomorrow. Thank you Sancus for the post. Very interesting and enjoyable.

Other Comments by HappyPrimate

13. Comment #19401 by Veronique on January 27, 2007 at 12:04 am

I can also thank you Sancus for the post. The enjoyment I got from the somewhat one-sided exchange (does that mean that Fry isn't assertive enough?) was dampened by the obvious one-upmanship evident in this so-called debate. Yes they are both erudite and each was able to cite his references and his learning.

At the end of it what was said? Precious little. 'Yes, I have been here, there and everywhere and have heard people on-the-ground elucidating their opinions and I have distilled these opinions through my magnificent neo-cortex. I can tell you what is happening and what will happen in the near future'.

Sounds like arm-chair chat to me and the moderator (Joan) was marginalised most of the time. Neither of the combatants really addressed blasphemy which was what the programme touted.

It was amusing and erudite. I will listen to it again and probably make further, more meaningful comments.

At this stage, after listening only once (and enjoying the sort-of exchange) Australia has a saying about people like these - they must have two dicks (and be pulling both).

Regards
V

Other Comments by Veronique

14. Comment #19514 by Old Coppernose on January 27, 2007 at 6:59 pm

Yep interesting. I too will listen again when more awake. I liked Hitchens' point that "religious hatred" actually mean hatred *by* rather than *of* reigious ppl, or hatred resulting from the hater's religion, not that of the hated. In a similar way, the critic of Harris that said Harris condoned "Muslim torture" showed similar sloppy grammar. "Muslim torture" actually means torture *by* rather than *of* Muslims, or torture using some kind of Muslim technique.

Other Comments by Old Coppernose

15. Comment #19552 by Linda on January 28, 2007 at 8:51 am

New York Public Library - LIVE presents
Christopher Hitchens:

God Is Not Great -Monday, May 07, 2007

"Taking on possibly the greatest issue of our time—the malignant force of religion in the world—journalist Christopher Hitchens makes the ultimate case against religion through a close and learned reading of the major religious texts, citing numerous historical instances in which sexual repression and outrageous acts of violence have been committed in the name of God. He argues for a more secular life based on science and reason, in which hell is replaced by the Hubble telescope's awesome view of the universe, and Moses and the burning bush give way to the beauty and symmetry of the double helix."

https://www.smarttix.com/show.aspx?showCode=CHR9

For those who accuse Dawkins of being too critical and intolerant of the religious surely Hitchens will upstage the mild mannered and gentle professor and go for the jugular on this issue. I'm buying a ticket to NYC for this one. Sadly the Galapagos trip w/Dawkins is sold out ah but maybe next time.

Other Comments by Linda

16. Comment #19588 by Riley on January 28, 2007 at 4:41 pm

I don't see anything moronic in hoping that the violence that results helps them to, you know, no longer resort to such violence?

Sancus,

1) I condemn Hitchens because he promoted resorting to violence in the name of ridding Israel of an ideology he finds undesirable, just as I would condemn other religious sorts who promote resorting to violence in the name of God. One could always hope for a positive outcome from such violence (isn't that always the case?), but I suppose someone could just as well hope that God will one day send us a messiah too. It's baseless wishful thinking in both cases.

2) It's great to hear that you do not support the violence, but if instead of Hitchens, it was a religious imam advocated resorting to violence for the purpose of irradicating an undesirable ideology in Israel, would you be defending the Imam in the same manner that you are defending Hitchems now? or would you be using the example to further condemn the practice of religion for invoking violence? I would guess the latter would be the response of most people on this site: that's hypocrisy.

3) After the American civil war, the regions that suffered the most destruction of infrastructure and loss of liberal institutions tended to be the regions where religious-fueled intolerance and institutionalized bigotry most flourished. The relatively free-thinking and prosperous North existed in stark contrast to the relatively depressed, suffering and religious fundementalist South. As such, your example of the American civil war better supports my position than your own.

4) I am applying Max Weber's explaination of religious belief as a means to satisfy soteriological needs. (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociology_of_religion) The judeo-christian-islamic faiths "offer people soteriological answers, or answers that provide opportunities for salvation -- relief from suffering, and reassuring meaning". The fact that the world-view and practice of such religions might also exacerbate or create suffering does not preclude their ability to effectively relieve it (similar to cases of drug addiction and masochism ).

5) I can't prove my point to you any more than I could prove evolution to a creationist: I'm not an expert and can only refer you to an approaching concensus among experts.

I will add this:
- If you accept the data that indicates supernatural belief is indirectly proportional to demonstrated acheivement in science.
- And you accept that it would be detrimental to scientific acheivment if the institutions and infrastructure that facilitate scientific education, scientific research and free speech (exchange of information) were to be destroyed.
- Then it's reasonable to predict that the destruction of such institutions and infrastructure will lead to a net per capita increase in supernatural-based beliefs and ideologies.

--

Other Comments by Riley

17. Comment #430264 by Modeski on November 8, 2009 at 8:29 am

Whoops, wrong thread.

Other Comments by Modeski

18. Comment #430406 by SaintStephen on November 8, 2009 at 9:51 pm

I could listen to Fry and Hitchens all day and never grow weary of it. Their ability to recall and recite, from memory, things they've read and seen just astonishes.

Other Comments by SaintStephen