101. Did humans wipe out Australia's big beasts?

Comment #20650 by Jonathan Dore on February 5, 2007 at 12:33 pm

Thalesian wrote: "...the extinction of Australia's megafauna at ~40,000 BP and the North-South American extinctions at ~11,000 BP coincide almost exactly with the arrival of humans."

And Russell Blackford wrote: "I can't help feeling, though, that there's an element of political correctness motivating those who oppose the theory that extinctions of prehistoric megafauna were caused by human activity."

Yes indeed. Two even more recent examples: New Zealand, uniquely, evolved an ecosystem in which birds (albeit huge flightless ones) became top predators; but all species of moa known from skeletal finds (mostly washed into caves in underground rivers) became extinct within a few centuries of the arrival of humans in New Zealand, which was probably no more than 1,500 years ago. As far as I know no-one seriously denies this link, as to do so would strain credulity beyond breaking point, but I see no reason to imagine the Australian example is any different.

And even more recently, Aepyornis Maximus, a giant flightless bird (rivalling the largest moas) from Madagascar, became extinct around 1500, a few centuries after the first settlement of that island by the Malagasy.

Since both these examples occurred within relatively recent history (within the range of oral tradition, folklore, and even written evidence) they give us a rare chance to glimpse on a smaller scale the kind of processes that occur when humans enter an ecosystem for the first time, and which must have occurred on a bigger scale in the continental settlements of Australia and the Americas. Whether the human agency was direct (hunting) or indirect (habitat destruction) it's surely childishly squeamish to pretend that "native" peoples are somehow above such activities.

102. No stoning, Canada migrants told

Comment #20300 by Jonathan Dore on February 1, 2007 at 3:49 pm

mdowe wrote: "Clearly, stonings haven't been a big problem for Herouxville. This makes the motivation for the bylaw a bit of a mystery."

I suspect the motivation is a general sense of irritation probably unrelated to anything that has or hasn't happened in Herouxville -- rather like the proliferation of bylaws in the 1980s pronouncing municipalities to be "nuclear-free", even when they had no nuclear activities in the first place. In other words, it's a symbolic stand against something that may have no specific local relevance at all.

103. Ruth Kelly, her hard-line church and a devout PM wrestling with his conscience

Comment #19482 by Jonathan Dore on January 27, 2007 at 2:58 pm

"Instead, the Communities Secretary said, she was acting in the best interests of vulnerable children since the Catholic bishops were threatening to close the seven agencies run by the church rather than comply."

Good. Let's hope they do close. The more secularized the adoption process is, the better.

104. Secular fundamentalists are the new totalitarians

Comment #16370 by Jonathan Dore on January 6, 2007 at 9:42 am

If folks want to go and have a look at this article on the Guardian's own website (www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1983820,00.html#article_continue), they'll see that it's getting the gratifyingly cogent and thorough kicking it deserves from the commenters there. I've just read through the first dozen or so, all very level-headed and taking no prisoners.

105. Let's Hope It's A Lasting Vogue

Comment #16189 by Jonathan Dore on January 5, 2007 at 12:03 pm

Comment 23 by iluv2meditate

"He most certainly is an eloquent writer although his knowledge about theology and the history between religion & science is disappointingly inadequate to say the least."

Dawkins's reply when this was put to him by "Science & Theology News", following an interview with Alister McGrath, summarizes a point he must be weary of reiterating by now: "I have, of course, met this point before. It sounds superficially fair. But it presupposes that that there is something in Christian theology to be ignorant about. The entire thrust of my position is that Christian theology is a non-subject. It is empty. Vacuous. Devoid of coherence or content. I imagine that McGrath would join me in expressing disbelief in fairies, astrology and Thor's hammer. How would he respond if a fairyologist, astrologer or Viking accused him of ignorance of their respective subjects?" He goes on to say (I don't have the exact quote in front of me) that the only theological questions that there is an a priori reason to consider are those concerning the existence or non-existence of a god, or of the supernatural generally. But if these foundational arguments fail to convince, then the whole edifice of theology built upon them -- which simply *assume* god's existence -- is irrelevant and beside the point. These arguments for god's existence (Anselm, Aquinas, Paley etc.) are indeed what Dawkins discusses at some length in "The God Delusion"; if you've read it (and from your remarks I assume you have), please let us know what these flaws in argument and reasoning are that you find there.

106. If they preach the cause of the poor, they're my people

Comment #15892 by Jonathan Dore on January 3, 2007 at 2:36 pm

"So why are some on the left so hostile to faith?"

A very easily answered question: because religion is controlled and perpetuated by institutions that, the historical record shows, have been consistently on the side of the rich and powerful and inimical to the genuine welfare of the poor.

A more puzzling and interesting question is: Why are some who proclaim themselves atheists so unhappy when other atheists criticize religion? I suspect that Neal Lawson's reason, whether recognized or not, is similar to Terry Eagleton's: they regard religious belief as unimportant because they have made their intellectual investment in the idea that a political framework is the most important way to view problems, and political solutions the only important solutions. When someone like Dawkins comes along and presents a view that frames the problem along some different axis (in RD's case, between a naturalistic and supernaturalistic world-view), they see politics being given a back seat. They don't like that.

107. America's Holy Warriors

Comment #15779 by Jonathan Dore on January 2, 2007 at 11:16 pm

This may be a case of the Christian right shoring up its political support base where it can, rather than being part of a concerted plan (except perhaps in the minds of a few demagogues ... who may be no less dangerous for being few in number) -- while the military, for its part, tired of taking crap for Iraq, may likewise simply be seeking the comforting appreciation of support where it thinks it can find it.

As an observer outside the US, what has struck me over the last 25 years or so is not so much the Christianization of the US military as the militarization of the whole of US society. The number of movies featuring the military (and in which they are *always* heroes); the fawning way in which presidents talk to, and about, the military; the way the military are held up, in popular culture, as paragons of all that is noblest in American society (in a comparison that is always at the expense of civil society); the ever-increasing US military budget (remember when people used to talk about the "cold-war dividend" from reduced military spending in the early 90s? Not any more they don't); and the endless fascination with the military aspects of American history. You really have to spend some time in another country to realize, by contrast, the unusual extent to which the military have permeated every aspect of American culture today. Of course, that doesn't make it the Third Reich by any stretch of the imagination -- but it is beginning to bear an uncomfortable resemblance to early Italian fascism of the 1920s -- the same identification of society's goals with military goals, the same adventurist conquests of easy targets, the same casual erosion of domestic liberties, the same casual violence, and at its pinnacle, the same posturing of an absurd buffoon.

108. Beyond Belief 2006 Videos

Comment #15622 by Jonathan Dore on January 1, 2007 at 5:03 pm

Comment 73 by Cassandra.
I saw this session too, but came away with a very different impression of who was scoring the points. Harris made mincemeat of Konner and Woodward, and by the time Dawkins made his outburst at their pessimism I felt it was long overdue: both of them had exhibited the same shoulder-shrugging, let's-just-give-up attitude towards reducing the influence of religion on society, or even challenging that influence, which they had both, in their talks, encapsulated in the sarcastic phrase "Good luck!" -- a phrase I can imagine a mid-18th century bien-pensant quipping towards those fools who had the temerity to argue for the abolition of slavery. Not just that they thought it was a hopeless task; they didn't even seem to think it worth attempting. Totally lacking from either of them was any sense of urgency in engaging with the major problem that religion has become for the modern world.

"If you are going to hypothesize that "Religion is bad and we must get rid of it", then you ought to have some evidence for that."

This statement beggars belief. We're not talking about an obscure phenomenon for which evidence has to be uncovered by painstaking research: evidence for the proposition that "religion is bad" has been a matter of historical record for as long as there have been historical records. Try Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" for starters, or a history of the Thirty Years' War, or of the Crusades, or of the Inquisition. Try thinking of the psychological harm done to generations of people through scaring them witless with stories of hellfire. If none of this counts as evidence in your book, please tell us what would.

As for the relative good done by religion, you seem to be missing the point: if the supernatural does not exist, then any psychological good done by religion could only come about through a placebo effect which, in all likelihood, could be replicated by other, non-supernatural means. If you think providing psychological benefits is a good enough reason to foster faith in a proposition you believe is factually untrue, then presumably that means you don't actually care about truth and are happy for the unwashed masses to believe lies if they get some comfort from it. If that's your position, please say so honestly.

"When we say "A Catholic Child" we mean a child brought up in a Catholic household of Catholic traditions, not that she is familiar with the catechism and transubstantiation and all that nonsense."

Really? Then in that case, as Dawkins pointed out in his talk, a "Monetarist Child" must mean a child brought up by monetarist parents and in monetarist traditions (restricting the supply of pocket money, for instance, or outsourcing babysitting requirements to a local freelance supplier). If you can't see that these are formal and conceptual equivalents, then you aren't paying attention.

Another assumption that is smuggled in with your statement: people who have a vested interest in passing on their religion to their children view children not as free individuals for which they have a responsibility of care, but as their *property*, to be protected from exposure to critical thinking that might undermine their beliefs, and thus their continued membership of the group (the openly expressed competition between religious communities to "out-breed" each other is another aspect of this idea, since it clearly assumes that the children of each community "belong" to that community). Every time you describe a child as a "Catholic child" you are, whether wittingly or not, reinforcing and legitimizing that way of thinking.

Scott Atran spoke very eloquently, but his basic message was: "If you're negotiating with a suicide bomber and you start off by telling him his beliefs are nonsense, you're not going to get anywhere, so it's best if people like Harris and Dawkins shut up so that they don't upset these delicate and nuanced discussions." It all sounds very reasonable, but think a little about the assumptions being made here: that *all* public discussion of religion can be characterized as a "negotiation with suicide bombers", and should be conducted under the rigorously non-confrontational conditions suitable for such a negotiation (no matter how confrontational and irrational religionists are, of course). What this attitude is trying to do is to shut down discussion altogether by claiming that *any* confrontational public pronouncement by atheists, in *any* public context, are "unhelpful" in this "negotiation". In other words, it is allowing the suicide bombers of this world, and their supporters, to dictate the terms on which *any* public discussion can take place -- which is to say, Scott Atran has already ceded to religionists the right to shut down *all* public criticism of religion. Nice going, Scott.

109. Not Yet The Majority But No Longer Silent

Comment #15586 by Jonathan Dore on January 1, 2007 at 12:40 pm

Comment 55 by Rasco Heldall: "Rather than trying to promote an alternative name to atheist (it does the job fine IMO) I can't help feeling it would be a more effective use of our efforts to try to raise consciousness about the disgraceful discrimination that, for example, sees people barred from employment if they admit they don't believe in a made-up super-being."

Yes, this is a very important issue for the United States, often overlooked. I read a very poignant story on the forums here posted by an ex-teacher from Florida, who was instructed by his (public) school board not to mention evolution in his class, and had a member of staff sitting in to check up on him. He taught a whole class on evolution, packed up his things at the end and walked out, knowing he would be fired; he received his notice of dismissal in the mail. It is a scandal of the first order that something like that is allowed to occur.

My understanding (Americans here please correct me if I'm wrong) is that most employment in the U.S. is on an "at will" basis, meaning it can be terminated at any time without an employer having to justify the decision on any particular grounds related to performance of the job, such as incompetence, fraud, breach of regulations etc. Presumably, test cases have resulted in legal decisions effectively outlawing such termination if the grounds can be shown to be race (and perhaps gender?; have any other grounds been legally established?). Perhaps the situation is also different if the workplace is unionized (and is this a matter that varies from state to state?). But if the field is still open to firing someone quite openly because of a difference in religion, then that is a massively important factor in anchoring religion, and social conservatism generally, to American life as a means of social control, and a very significant obstacle to be overcome. Does anyone know if there have been legal cases in the US that have tested the principles involved?

110. A Christmas thunderbolt for the arch-enemy of religion

Comment #15514 by Jonathan Dore on December 31, 2006 at 11:31 pm

Binx Bolling comment 110: "Once I have made the leap that burning down someone's house is desirable, why should I feel obligated to allow the same freedom to others? When the alpha-male chimp threatens, punishes, and dominates the other chimps, we don't (or shouldn't) wring our hands about how he really is undermining the cooperative social contract among the apes. I would not want to live under similar social rules as the chimps. But I have no problem with being the alpha-male."

No one's asking you to "allow the same freedom" to others, since you didn't seek permission from your previous victim; you simply went ahead. In the situation I am positing your neighbours burn down your house whether you want them to or not. Are you happy about it, or do you object? If you object, on what basis? The most fundamental moral basis available to any of us is "I wouldn't do it to you", but you've just deprived yourself of that position by actually burning your neighbour's house.

"I guess you could summarize my whole point by saying that reciprocity is not logically necessary. Any proofs for the logical necessity of reciprocity are like proofs for god's existence, i.e., based on unfalsifiable, mystical, or supernatural premises, and therefore, most probably false."

Not at all, since what I'm suggesting is not the external existence of a *thing*, but of an agreed framework of social exchange that our genetic heritage predisposes us to favour. You seem to think that a sense of "ought", to be valid, must somehow be dependent on some reified force that compels compliance -- and so without God, moral standards fall. That is simply a category mistake: God and morals are not the same kind of thing at all. God is clearly imagined to be personal, self-sufficient, and existing independent of humanity, whereas morals are concepts, not personalities, are malleable over time as human societies change, and exist only as a product of those societies.

So "proofs" for morals (your term, not mine) are completely different from "proofs" for God, since for morals the evidence is there for all to see in human behaviour. You have a fascination with chimps, but why do you imagine that human behaviour must follow theirs? Three or four million years of divergence separate us from a common ancestor with chimps, and the direction of that divergence can be seen, for instance, in the fact that pair bonding has become almost universal in human societies, as opposed to kinship groups based on alpha males (your favourite avatar) and harems. That means that most human males have a chance to breed, unlike most males of most other large mammals. That observation is suggestive that a basic sense of egalitarianism is pretty fundamental to humans, as thus is the value placed on fairness, and thus the felt necessity of reciprocity as a general principle in human relations. No mysticism. No supernaturalism. Just the interactions of human beings moulded by their environment.

As for why chimp behaviour does not attract moral censure, while humans' does, surely the reason is obvious: human consciousness is an emergent property, the product of brains of sufficient complexity to make them capable of rational, abstract thought and an advanced capability for imagination and empathy. That makes us morally responsible for our actions in a way chimps cannot be. The most telling aspect of your repeated references to chimps is not that you regard them as being indistinguishable from humans, but that you think of humans as having no greater capabilities than chimps.

"Any moral philosophy worthy of the name should help me decide how I myself ought to act. Otherwise, what's the point? The existence of a biologically based moral sense says nothing about how I ought to make my own personal choices."

It does to me. Are you unable to perform an action unless it is an order? Then you're a slave. Your biologically based moral sense tells you how, in the general terms of human societies, you should act. To seek some greater authority for the action is not to look deeper into the abyss, but to look in the wrong direction. Our human nature is all we have.

"Nietzsche was a much deeper thinker than RD. He understood the implications of what he wrote, in their full, tragic glory. If anything, RD is the adolescent in this story."

Hmmm. So Nietzsche's reaction to the absence of an authority figure for morality is "I can do whatever I like and no-one can punish me, so I choose to do what I want." Dawkins's reaction is "I can do whatever I like and no-one will punish me, but since I don't want to live in a society in which people act without regard for others I will choose to act towards others in the way I'd like them to act towards me, which seems to be the best bet for getting others to do the same." Which of those two statements strikes you as being more adolescent?

"A nice big fire now and then would suit me well. I am not arguing that all social norms should be abolished, just that they don't apply to me. I don't really care that if everyone thought like this, society would break down because there is no way that everyone will think like this. People are too wedded to their myths. So I am safe."

Please, get some professional help.

111. Not Yet The Majority But No Longer Silent

Comment #15488 by Jonathan Dore on December 31, 2006 at 7:40 pm

My problem with "bright" is not so much that it's condescending as that it's rather self-regarding, suggesting people who take themselves rather seriously -- an impression one could never get from "gay".

In comment #15445 Mr. Mark asks whether the modern usage of "gay" was thought up by someone specifically or whether it just "arose". But surely it isn't a case of either/or. Almost certainly the usage of "gay" was originally thought up by one individual and simply caught on because it was a strong meme. Similarly, if the term "bright" conveys no advantage to its users, there's no need to actively oppose it: it will simply wither away naturally through not being sufficiently used.

112. A Christmas thunderbolt for the arch-enemy of religion

Comment #15092 by Jonathan Dore on December 28, 2006 at 10:17 pm

Comment #15053 by Binx Bolling: "I can think of plenty of good secular reasons not to burn down my neighbor's house. I can also think of plenty of good secular reasons to do it. I weigh them and decide, based on purely personal preference, what I will do. I see no reason to let other people's preferences determine my own actions."

I would have thought the fairly obvious clincher in deciding whether or not to burn down your neighbour's house is that by doing so you automatically cede the basis on which you can object to anyone burning down *your* house. That logically necessary reciprocity seems to me to be a pretty firm basis for the prescriptive injunction that one *ought* not to burn down one's neighbour's house. As a species that has evolved in social groups, our genes are telling us that respecting the norms of social behaviour, in which competition is restricted by cooperative bounds, is essential to maximizing, on average, each individual's chances of survival. Actions that offend the sense of fairness do so because they violate that principle of reciprocity, which is made possible in the first place by a level of consciousness in humans that allows each of us to imagine what it is like to be another person, and thus to understand that not wanting one's home incinerated is a quite compelling enough reason not to do it to someone else (psychopaths, lacking this ability to extrapolate from empathy, are quite rightly recognized as being a danger to others for this reason). It also explains how, as cultures evolve, moral norms have relative rigidity at any one time (since, as a function of social cohesion, they tend to be widely agreed) but plasticity between one generation and the next (since generations now dead are no longer actors in the social drama).

Nietzsche's reaction to the death of an external authority figure for morality has always struck me as being like the reaction of a teenager the first time his parents leave him at home alone for the weekend: the dawning realization that there is no-one to tell him not to do something inevitably leads him to actions he later regrets (the out-of-control high-school party is a familiar trope of teen movies). Thankfully, teenagers usually grow up.

113. A Christmas thunderbolt for the arch-enemy of religion

Comment #15076 by Jonathan Dore on December 28, 2006 at 7:19 pm

Comment #15060 by ryanjevansuk: "Does anyone know anything about the editor and what kind of agenda he might have?"

The editor is John Witherow, about whose opinions very little seems to be publicly known, though according to Wikipedia even Rupert Murdoch feared he might be "too much of a knee-jerk Tory" when he was appointed. I think the fact that the Sunday Times is a Murdoch paper is quite sufficient in itself as an explanation for its attitude. Rupe is apparently some sort of believer (though there's clearly little room in his thinking for regard for any being other than himself, supernatural or otherwise), so perhaps he's sent the word out that this Dawkins fellow must be given no quarter (and if anyone doubts that he does such things, reflect on the fact that not a single one of News Corporation's more than 100 newspapers worldwide came out against the invasion of Iraq in 2003).

114. The Only One in Step

Comment #14431 by Jonathan Dore on December 22, 2006 at 12:03 pm

As a graduate of Bristol University, I "collapse in deepest humiliation" at the thought of my alma mater's association with Professor Stuart Burgess. I'm only a music graduate, and I can understand why the 2nd Law is not a barrier to evolution. You would have thought a professor of mechanical engineering could do a teensy bit better -- or indeed, 460,000 times better.

115. The problem with secularism

Comment #14426 by Jonathan Dore on December 22, 2006 at 11:44 am

"This atheist apprehension is well founded, as the latest developments in biology, physics and philosophy all open the door to a revivified theology and a religious metaphysics."

Gosh, isn't it lucky that a lecturer in religion and philosophy has come along to explain all those new developments in biology and physics to us. And to think that without him, we might have had to resort to listening to some old duffer like Richard Dawkins, who clearly knows next to nothing about science and simply hasn't kept up with these exciting new developments. Phew! That was a close one!

116. The problem with secularism

Comment #14393 by Jonathan Dore on December 22, 2006 at 9:01 am

Scientists are often accused of having little patience with philosophers. One begins to see why ...

117. The Blasphemy Challenge

Comment #14379 by Jonathan Dore on December 22, 2006 at 7:59 am

Comment #14281 by peterg123

"I see very little on this forum to indicate that it is populated by anything other than the usual dhimmis who are quite happy to tear their own culture to shreds while affording Islam a special place.

Rather than encouraging young Christians to denounce their faith, you should be very hopeful they hang onto it, since rising Muslim demographics in Europe mean that very soon, probably in your lifetimes, atheist sites will be under severe and possibly physical pressure from young European Muslims."

peterg floats the favourite trope of the US neo-cons that Europeans are witlessly sinking towards Islamic servitude, presumably because they had the temerity not to join a patently stupid venture in Iraq (well, apart from Tony of course). Such people betray nothing but their ignorance of European culture, society, and politics, not to mention demographics. Not invading Iraq does not equate with lying down and being walked over.

What peterg seems to have a desperate need of is for someone here to acknowledge that Christianity is *better* than Islam. What he fails to see is that, if there is no god, it doesn't ultimately matter much what hat (or veil) your god delusion wears, no matter how self-congratulatory you are about your superior levels of mercy and tolerance. That tolerance only came about, in any case, due to the 18th-century Enlightenment encounter with secular rationalism. Re-wind another century and you're back in the Thirty Years War and the Salem Witch Trials, and there wasn't much mercy or tolerance in evidence there.

The Enlightenment house-trained Christianity by drawing its teeth. Now Christianity wants to be praised for having such a meekly toothless smile, as if extracting the canines were all its own idea.

118. 7 monks injured in clash over monastery

Comment #14221 by Jonathan Dore on December 21, 2006 at 2:11 pm

Comment #14203 by StephenH:
"The serious side of this, i hope the girls kick up a fuss about this. Women are banned?

Good grief, would love to hear their justifications for this."

The reason is that since the whole mountain is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, she would be jealous if any other females encroached on her territory.

Yes, you heard correctly. The queen of heaven gets a bit bitchy if she thinks she has competition. Can anyone think of a feebler post-hoc rationalization for anything than that?

119. I love the commercialisation of Christmas

Comment #14134 by Jonathan Dore on December 21, 2006 at 8:47 am

Comment #14098 by Didaktylos

" Q: What do you call someone who bans Christmas?

A: Oliver Cromwell"

Not so, Didaktylos: it was banned by parliament in a bill passed on 4 January 1645 -- a time when Cromwell was barely a national figure even as a military leader, let alone head of the army or head of state.

120. 7 monks injured in clash over monastery

Comment #14124 by Jonathan Dore on December 21, 2006 at 8:18 am

Yorker wrote: "...the myth of the lonely Scottish shepherd and the real reason we wear kilts (fast access). English people delight in perpetuating this story as a means of denigration."

I'm English and I've never heard of this ... until now. But since you're spreading the meme, I guess I've now been infected too!

By the way, Yorker, great name -- are you inswinging or outswinging? (and no, I've no particular thought on what those might be metaphors for!).

Seriously, I once worked as coordinating editor on an encyclopedia of Greek culture, and this story surprises me not one bit. I don't think I've ever heard of a group of people who take themselves quite so seriously as Orthodox churchmen. Ironic, really, since the ban on women entering Mt Athos has always struck me as being about as mature as a group of eight-year old boys building a tree house and posting a sign outside saying "No Girls Allowed!"

121. The Trouble with Atheism

Comment #13799 by Jonathan Dore on December 19, 2006 at 1:32 pm

Comment #13769 by Steve Mading: "One complaint I have in general about these kinds of arguments against atheism is that they all make the same mistake of assuming that atheism must be a full drop-in replacement for everything they attribute to religion."

Thanks Steve - "drop-in replacement" is an excellent image for conceptualizing this problem.

122. Talk in Class Turns to God, Setting Off Public Debate on Rights

Comment #13623 by Jonathan Dore on December 18, 2006 at 10:12 pm

I'm surprised no-one complained about the straightforward incompetence shown by a teacher using up a succession of so-called History classes wasting time talking about everything except history, apparently. Doesn't this guy have a curriculum to follow? If this is an "excellent teacher" in the principal's opinion, what are the average ones like?

123. Blaming 'The God Delusion'

Comment #12977 by JONATHAN DORE on December 14, 2006 at 6:29 pm

Yorker (#12974):
>>Eagleton does rightfully take Dawkins to task for his political and historical naivety -- he's particularly baffled when Dawkins's suggests that the words "nationalist" and "loyalist" are, in their Northern Irish context, merely euphemisms for "Catholic" and "Protestant," respectively.<<

"I see it Dawkins' way, because that's basically how they're divided."

Yes Yorker, precisely: whenever I hear someone say the difference isn't religious (because their disagreements are chiefly political rather than theological) I want to ask them why the Northern Irish therefore need to continue being educated in religiously segregated schools? If it was a mere political disagreement, what would be the justification for them maintaining two completely separate and parallel public education systems? Is there any other conflict in the world in which a purely political disagreement has led to the creation of two separate, parallel education systems? Yet in Northern Ireland we are told that is precisely what is happening, even though the segregation, strangely, takes place precisely along the lines of (an of course arbitrary and totally irrelevant) religious identity! Yeah. Right.

(PS: apologies for the grandiose capitalization of my name: I must have had Caps Lock on when I registered, but the user-name turns out to be case-sensitive and now I can't seem to change it.)

124. Blaming 'The God Delusion'

Comment #12976 by JONATHAN DORE on December 14, 2006 at 6:13 pm

JesusFirefly #12967 writes: "It's not like Dawkins doesn't know that religion isn't always the (only) problem, it's just that for Eagleton there's only capitalism to blame."

Yes, exactly -- Eagleton is a believer in a totalizing system of explanation, Marxism, that he regards as having thoroughly and adequately dealt with the theistic system of explanation on completely different grounds to Dawkins. He is thus rather miffed that Dawkins can write a whole book putting theism in its place without once having recourse to Eagleton's own, preferred, system. The irony that Eagleton fails to see is that his mode of thought -- and the resulting system of explanation -- is much closer to the theists' than it is to Dawkins. Perhaps at some unconscious level he senses that true scientific rationality is as inimical to Marxist certainties as it is to theist ones, and this accounts for his otherwise ludicrous degree of hostility. Clearly Dawkins doesn't dwell on the social and political factors behind conflicts from a Marxist viewpoint because, to the extent that any Marxist insight might be true, it is ultimately dependent on the same bedrock of human neural physiology -- the origin of religion -- as any other explanation, and is thus, in the final analysis, secondary. Dawkins is dealing with the fundamentals, not the secondary manifestations.

By the way, Marilynne Robinson's review of TGD in Harper's, which Demers mentions here, is now available online (I've alerted Josh but he hasn't put it up yet) at http://solutions.synearth.net/2006/10/20

I'm sorry Demers didn't say more about Robinson's rather mendacious and mis-representing (not to mention spectacularly ill-tempered) "review" (whose main thesis can be summarized as "science is just as bad as religion, so scientists aren't in any position to criticize"), which has become something of a rallying flag for theists in the blogosphere, so it's gratifying to see that a thorough deconstruction of it (by Earl Doherty) has already appeared at http://home.ca.inter.net/~oblio/AORComment17.htm

125. Beyond Belief 2006 Videos

Comment #11684 by JONATHAN DORE on December 6, 2006 at 2:16 pm

RobS Comment #11564
"7. The guy who made a point about Dawkin's title as "Professor of Public Understanding of Science" may be on to something. Could Richard do more to publicly and cleverly illuminate the method, facts, peer review, logic etc. that support the scientific enterprise, in a more educational way, rather than in an attacking atheist way? Not that I don't like the attacking atheist approach, but there might be fertile territory to work in that area."

Actually, I thought this point was unfair on Tyson's part. Careful nurturing of public understanding of science is what Dawkins has been doing his whole career, long before he took up his present chair, and most of his previous books were written with that explicit purpose. It's only TGD that departs from this norm to be more polemical, so it's a bit rich to forget about the last 30 years and act as if his public pronouncements in connection with TGD characterize the whole of his public work.

126. The godless guru

Comment #11138 by Jonathan Dore on December 3, 2006 at 9:30 am

Tom writes: "I wish Richard Dawkins had never played the "Bible is at least well written" card. Its an embarrassing way to try to get past the problem.

The problem is that this book is clearly rubbish and is only a side-effect of one religion. To spend a lot of time talking about it is a waste of time and so Dr Dawkins has rightly tried to push the argument quickly past it.

However, by suggesting that it has any literary value undermines the value of his otherwise excellent opinions."

I think you're slightly missing Dawkins's meaning Tom: it's the 1611 translation into English (the Authorized Version) that Dawkins thinks has literary merit, not the bible as such. That translation was contemporary with Shakespeare (indeed, WS may have been on the team of translators), so the language has some of the same majestic cadences, and for English-speakers some of the same resonance, as the work of the master.

127. Our Teapot, which art in heaven

Comment #10950 by Jonathan Dore on December 1, 2006 at 7:35 pm

Bitterman writes: "A secondary effect of reading the TGD (aside from the main one of further weakening the shaky structure of theism) is the magnificent bringing-into-focus of the self important morons who write for the press. Perhaps I have been naive for much of my life but these emperors seem to be embarassingly short of garments."

Yes indeed -- whenever a piece appears in newspapers about a subject one happens to know something about, it makes one realize how much unsupported, unresearched, unchecked rubbish must be churned out each day to fill the column inches. The scary thing is, for all the subjects one *doesn't* know about, how often that means we must be misled.

128. The God of the Bible is No Delusion!

Comment #9694 by Jonathan Dore on November 25, 2006 at 3:18 pm

Shaunyboy writes: "That changes occur within species is a fact. That natural selection occurs to a limited extent is a fact. The combination of random mutation and natural selection as a mechanism to explain the complexity of life on our planet (let alone the complexity of each life form!) - opinion. As I said in my previous posting - please refer me to the scientific papers that incontravertably describe and demonstrate the mechanism by which the cell organelles, the eye or the brain developed. Please, please!"

Hi Shaunyboy. Start by looking at this month's (November 2006) issue of National Geographic magazine, which has a very straightforward article by Carl Zimmer (on pages 110 to 135) where the principles behind the development of the eye and the brain through natural selection are very clearly explained. You can read it online here: www7.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0611/feature4/ -- but if you read the magazine version you'll also see the illustrations (especially those of the developing eye on pages 126-27).

129. Remember, Remember, the Fifth of November...

Comment #8522 by Jonathan Dore on November 21, 2006 at 2:00 pm

At the moment all we have is a comment from an unnamed man in an unidentified programme. Does anybody know the context of this extract? Was it a clearly labelled religious "thought for the day" type segment, or was it BBC Devon editorial content by an employee? And does anyone know the speaker's identity?

130. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7594 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 9:35 pm

Jesse writes: "I'm pretty certain there's no afterlife, but that doesn't stop me from desperately wishing there was one... nobody wants to just cease cognition forever."

Hi Jesse. That's interesting, because I feel exactly the opposite. To me, the prospect of eternal life (in any sense in which we can conceive of eternity, i.e. an infinite extension of time) is a truly horrifying thought, whatever the circumstances. Just imagine spending an infinite amount of time learning, say, every language in the world (there are about 36,000), for long enough to speak them all fluently; then all the history of the world, until you can recite the dates backward; then getting to know each person who has ever lived personally, as your closest friend; then every aspect of every science; then do that for all the potentially inhabited worlds in the galaxy, and in the universe, travelling at a speed of, say, 1 mile per hour between stars to get to each world in turn. Then when you'd accomplished all that, imagine starting all over again at the beginning, and repeating the whole process. Now imagine going through the whole process a hundred times, or a million, or 14 trillion times. Are you any better off? No, because at the end of the 14 trillionth time, when you are so catatonically bored that you long more than anything to do something new (but of course, there *is* nothing new any more), understand that you are still no nearer the end of eternity than you were at the beginning. It has no end, and you are doomed to repeat everything you have ever done or could ever do for ever, without hope of escape.

Now *that* is a truly terrifying thought, and yet most people unthinkingly look forward to eternity in heaven as if it would just be laughter and champagne. The unconscious assumption they are clearly making is that they would like things to continue, pretty much as they know them, for, say, another life-time's worth, but without having to work -- a lifetime's holiday, if you like. Beyond that, they're just not thinking. I think it's instructive that many very old people, in their 90s say, are already jaded with the weariness of life, and look forward to the repose of the grave.

I'm hoping for a long life, but I'm looking forward to death at the end of it. Once I've had my decades in the sun, and hopefully done something enjoyable and worthwhile with my life, the oblivion of non-existence will be just fine and dandy by me, thanks.

131. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7586 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 9:14 pm

Jeanne Gill writes: " These people who are "atheist" & claim that there is no God--well, I feel sorry for you because one of these days you will be standing before God & His Son Jesus & explaining your "beliefs" to Him. I would guess that many of you are going to have some mighty hot feet when you are escorted to the elevator with the "down" button, IYKWIM!!!"

On the contrary, Jeanne, it is you who will have hot feet for having not believed in Allah and Mohammed... or is it Vishnu and Shiva? ... or Santa and Rupert the Red-nosed Reindeer? If you think those ideas are just silly, and not even worth a moment's serious consideration, you're not alone. But why would you think your version, with "God and His Son Jesus," would seem any less silly, and any more of a serious possibility, to anyone else?

And attempts to frighten people with threats of hellfire hardly show any great evidence of "love" on god's part. Instead, they tend to suggest desperation and moral bankruptcy -- to put it at its most polite -- rather than a compelling argument.

132. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7553 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 7:15 pm

Anonymous (comment 208): Thanks for the laugh, friend. Nice to have some light relief!

133. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7550 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 7:07 pm

Walter Yergan writes: "We have no choice but to live with uncertainty in the world of quantum physics. But uncertainty is not something that we can accept with equanimity when it seems to us that life depends on the truth of our beliefs."

Not sure what you mean by uncertainty here, Walter. Far from being uncertain, quantum physics makes predictions that can be confirmed experimentally -- and have been -- to accuracies of several decimal places. Or are you referring to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle? That's a precise and elegant mathematical formulation of the inverse relationship between the degree of accuracy with which we can measure the position of a subatomic particle and that with which we can measure its direction. I hope you're not committing the common solecism of confusing the Uncertainty Principle with the idea that there is some general, mystical quality of "uncertainty" inherent in quantum physics ...

There may well be grounds for disturbing our equanimity about the non-existence of the supernatural -- but if there are, they have nothing to do with quantum physics.

134. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7496 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 4:17 pm

Think! writes: "As long as you continue to have this unshakable 'faith' in your 'religion' of atheism, pretending to validate it by still-debated theories and posing them as facts, then I'm afraid no amount of discussion will help show you people the amazing peace and harmony that religion will have on your lives."

Evolution is both a fact and a theory. The facts are there both in the fossils (which show unmistakable patterns of morphological development between succeeding species), in the rocks in which they're found (which are databale in absolute terms by radiometric dating), and in the DNA (the extent of the difference between different species indicating the time that has passed since they shared a common ancestor). Those are all *facts*.

The *theory* is the explanation for how those facts came about. Darwin and Wallace hit on the brilliantly simple idea of "natural selection": the idea that individuals which are better adapted to survive in their environment have a better chance of reproducing, and thus of pass on their characteristics to their offspring; those characteristics will then get reinforced in succeeding generations, because they help their carriers to reproduce and thus spread those genes ever wider.

This is a *theory* in the sense that it is suggested by the *facts* (the evidence -- after all, why do you think Darwin and Wallace both came up with the idea, independently, in the first place?), it agrees with the facts (i.e. they don't contradict it), and is testable by the facts (i.e. new evidence that emerges agrees with it). In principle, the theory can also be disproved by the facts (if no new evidence could, even in principle, disprove it, it would not be a valid theory in the scientific sense). After 150 years of intensive study by scientists all over the world, natural selection is the only theory to have emerged that stands up to all these tests. It's the only theory that fits all the facts. Given the huge amount of evidence that's been collected on the subject, that makes it a very strong theory indeed, which is what makes it so very much more likely to be true than any alternative.

So people don't "pose theories as facts", as the liars who taught you have led you to believe. The facts are observed first. The theory comes later.

As for the "amazing peace and harmony" of religion, well ... you don't seem to be exhibiting much of either yourself. You sound more like the kind of belligerent, abusive believer of comforting certainties that I used to be, back when I was a supernaturalist like you. Contrary to your name, you sound like you're afraid to think of new ideas, because of where they might lead you, and you cover up your fear with abuse (apologies if I've misjudged you, and you are simply naturally unpleasant). Hopefully one day you'll have the courage to think a little further.

135. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7485 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 3:40 pm

Maryhelena writes: "If that is so then why the fuss over state sponsored faith schools in the UK? If there is no need, no request, for such schools then why is the UK government wanting to spend money on them? Perhaps it's all about votes - perhaps the 'religious' vote is such a significant factor that the government, or any political party, needs to play along? Looks like political democracy is hoist upon it's own petard..."

Hi Maryhelena, eternal optimist here. I think what's happened in the specific situation in Britain is that a prime minister of unusually enthusiastic religiosity (certainly the most intense believer to occupy that office since Gladstone), which is very unusual in Britain, is using the power of his office, allied with his own personal obsession with education (it's the department he interferes in most) to artificially boost the power of organized religious lobbies by handing them on a plate the power to influence future generations of schoolchildren by giving them control of hundreds of state schools. This is not in response to any groundswell of religious feeling in the population at large; it's the result of hardline religious lobbies (especially Muslims and evangelical Christians), who were excluded from the previous cosy arrangements regarding state-funded Anglican, RC, and Jewish schools, demanding equal access, in combination with a prime minister actively willing to give them whatever they want. Meanwhile, the old-established Anglicans etc. are more than happy to use their power over the educational system to try to compensate for their loss of influence over society as a whole.

So the entire growth of religious schooling in Britain is basically down to political choices that actually indicate nothing about the (generally declining) religiosity of the nation as a whole.

136. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7361 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 11:03 am

Maryhelena writes: "I have read about people brought up atheist who do 'turn' to religion. George Ellis, the famous cosmologist, was brought up by two atheist parents - and yet became a christian. I've just read Jane Fonda's biography - and, again, an atheist childhood but she has became a christian. So I suppose the best one can say is that it takes all sorts…"

I was such a one myself. Becoming a Christian at the age of 18 (it eventually lasted about 6 years) was my form of teenage rebellion against liberal, atheistic parents. These things happen all the time, in all kinds of directions. But the larger point is that statistically, in societies as a whole, the majority of children *tend* to accept (though with incremental generational shifts and variations) the world-view of their parents (as indeed I did myself when I eventually abandoned supernaturalism in my mid-twenties).

Given that fact, I think it's much too early to say that a stable, generally non-religious society, in which a materialist/naturalistic outlook is transmitted from one generation to the next in the same way, will never be able to emerge. The scientific understandings that underpin an intellectually rigorous atheism simply haven't been around long enough for such a massive intellectual sea-change (much more fundamental than acceptance of anti-racist and anti-sexist norms, for instance) to have filtered through yet. There are several societies (particularly in Europe) where I think it's fairly clear the foundations for such a culture are already there, and given the right encouragement (in the form of emphasis on science education) could flourish and become normalized over the next, say, couple of centuries. I'm certainly hopeful that this is so.

137. I'm an atheist, BUT . . .

Comment #7357 by Jonathan Dore on November 18, 2006 at 10:33 am

Commenter 53: I think you're meant to identify *yourself* in the "name" field, not the person you're addressing.

Of course we all know, rationally, that "he" in these contexts encompasses "she" as well, but that's hardly the point. Try this thought experiment: every time you use the word "he" in this sense, substitute "she". Not "he or she" or "s/he", but just "she". Do it every time, deliberately, until it becomes automatic. Now imagine that you have done this all your life, as has everyone around you, and that every time someone has had the temerity to say "he", or "he or she", instead, a chorus of indignation has arisen to the effect that "of course everyone *knows* that 'she' encompasses 'he'; so why do you have to sully the language with these awkward circumlocutions to avoid it?"

Do you still maintain that this would have had absolutely no effect on your psychological assumptions, conscious or otherwise, about your abilities and roles in life as a man? I know I couldn't. And yet this is what you are asking every woman to do.

It's not about semantics; it's about the effect of everyday language on the basic assumptions we hold, and the attitudes that flow from those assumptions. Every time an unconsciously held assumption (in this case, that the actor in a sentence is, on balance, likely to be male) is subjected to conscious scrutiny, the attitudes that flow from it (in this case, that this male assumption is unexceptional and inoffensive) can be challenged and revised as necessary. Changing the language becomes a way of changing the social reality that flows from it, by obliging people to become conscious of their unconsciouly held assumptions. That's why it's called consciousness-raising.

138. Richard Dawkins and the "new atheists" come to America

Comment #7246 by Jonathan Dore on November 17, 2006 at 9:42 pm

Randall writes: "You miss the point that God CANNOT be used to excuse evil by those who belive in Him. We believe that God is all good and without evil; therefore, evil done in God's name doesn't belong to Him."

But who is deciding which actions done in his name are evil and which are not? The 9/11 bombers certainly didn't consider themselves to be doing evil; they thought they were agents of righteousness bringing the scourge of God on the evil people they were killing.

And that's the point about all god-related violence. Any and all actions are justifiable on the basis of some interpretation or other of some religious text or other. And since the big man isn't actually available to call up for public clarification, there's no empirical baseline available from within the religious mindset by which to decide whose interpretation is more valid and whose less. Since the demands made by your god are absolute, all religious-based conflicts are, at least potentially, total wars of attrition in which there is no basis for compromise, since your enemies are god's enemies too, and who are you to compromise with god's enemies? (as I seem to remember god reprimanded Samuel in relation to Agag). Substitute "the dictatorship of the proletariat" or "the purity of the Aryan race" for "god" as an altar on which to sacrifice human lives, and you have the 20th century's insane repackaged equivalent: an absolutist totem against which any opposition unconditionally damns the opposer. Different god image, different totem, but the same mindset.

Randall writes: "Atheism, on the other hand, takes no responsibility. There is nothing to strive for and no motivation to do good to others, and there is nothing or no one to hold people accountable for their deeds. If you seek responsibility, it is not found in atheism."

A strange, looking-glass universe you seem to live in, Randall. Atheists take responsibility for their actions precisely because they know there is no imaginary friend in the sky who can take that responsibility for them -- which is precisely what Christians celebrate Christ for doing. Our own consciences and society as a whole holds us accountable for what we do, and we are all, together, responsible for maintaining and advancing the moral standards of our time. This is what we all, in fact, do (including you, I suspect), irrespective of the moral precepts handed down in ancient texts, which is why we no longer stone people for illicitly working on the Sabbath or disrespecting a parent, and why we no longer tolerate slavery -- all things that the Old Testament, for one, was quite happy to countenance. In fact, religious believers quite often latch onto these moral advances relatively late (anti-racism, for example, or anti-sexism, or toleration of homosexuality, though maybe some of those haven't reached your neck of the woods yet), and then adapt to give the impression they have always advocated them (a good example of the religious meme conforming itself to new conditions). For an atheist, there is *everything* to strive for and *every* motivation to do good for others, because we know that this life is the only one we will ever have, so we'd better make the most of it, and the joy of human relationships that it offers. Compared to all the possible people who could have been born, it is you and I who are actually here. Isn't that marvellous?

Try putting aside your preconceptions about what atheists must, according to your outlook, be like, and try looking at what some of them actually are like (though that may be difficult depending on where you live -- if you're in the United States, chances are you know several atheists, though you may not know it since they probably wouldn't want to risk being publicly identified as such; that is what religion, when pervasive enough, does to a society).

139. E-Petition: Abolish Faith Schools

Comment #7212 by Jonathan Dore on November 17, 2006 at 5:34 pm

Emme: Yes, it does just apply to state schools.

Following up my earlier post on this thread, the .gov.uk site administrator responded very quickly to my request to enable Brits living outside the UK and dependent territories to sign the petition. I've now done so successfully, so if there are any more of you out there moved to do so, sign away!

140. E-Petition: Abolish Faith Schools

Comment #6948 by Jonathan Dore on November 16, 2006 at 9:11 am

Sadly, when I tried to sign, I found I couldn't since, even as a UK citizen, it won't allow you to sign if you don't have a UK or dependent territories address (I'm in Canada). I've emailed the site administrator to point out the anomaly.

141. Is Apple Computer Insulting Islam?

Comment #6755 by Jonathan Dore on November 15, 2006 at 1:47 pm

This story may well be a MEMRI fabrication -- I've no idea -- but even if it is, surely the fact that it's entirely believable is an indication of the level of insanity we have come to regard as normal.

142. Science vs religion

Comment #6728 by Jonathan Dore on November 15, 2006 at 12:54 pm

69

"Based on that how does one assign a probability to the possibility of the existence of God?"

Funnily enough, Richard Dawkins has just written a book on the subject. It's called "The God Delusion". Why not read it and find out?

143. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #6651 by Jonathan Dore on November 15, 2006 at 8:50 am

Nate wrote: "Quit saying this is end timeS! By doing so you LET global warming continue, you LET genocide continue, you LET people starve to death ..." etc.

Quite. This is a point that needs to be made forcefully and clearly, again and again: people with an "endtimes" agenda are a positive menace to life on this planet, and are thus unfit to hold public office. Having such beliefs should disqualify one from positions of public responsibility.

144. Richard Dawkins and the "new atheists" come to America

Comment #6644 by Jonathan Dore on November 15, 2006 at 8:07 am

Stuart (comment 23) writes: "RD does makes mistakes and misrepresent research in his book perhaps in a wish to simplify the complexity of the evidence."

That's interesting, Stuart. Can you give us a more specific idea of what you're referring to here?

145. Losing Our Religion

Comment #6569 by Jonathan Dore on November 15, 2006 at 12:27 am

Hi Joe (comment 35)

"misguided but clever", eh? Somehow I have a feeling the second adjective is meant to be as insulting as the first. A shame.

"There is no doubt that religion in some form preceeded science. From the clap of thunder that was Thors hammer, the bolts of lightening cast by Zues the role of religion "explained" the natural wonders to primitive man."

Precisely -- so from the very beginning "science" (if we are giving that term to any kind of naturalistic understanding of the world) was a project of encroaching on territory that had formerly been the preserve of "religion". From the world of our ancestors, in which virtually every observable process outside the human body (and plenty within it) was potentially subject to a numinous explanation, naturalistic understandings have relentlessly pushed back the frontiers of ignorance. I regard that multi-millennia struggle as being among the noblest of human achievements, and it's sad to see anyone regretting a loss of ignorance, which is what you seem to be doing by saying "These myths you despise so much have been telling us who and what we are for longer than the last 150 years (the time science has expanded nearly incomprehensibly)". Actually, I don't despise the myths; I just think their time of usefulness has come to an end. But I'm more intrigued as to why you think just having been around for a long time is a recommendation. Smallpox had been happily disfiguring people for millennia until some upstart in Gloucestershire decided to try to do something about it a couple of centuries ago. Should I regret the demise of smallpox?

"The Tao of Physics" made some rather weak parallels between certain expressions in eastern religions and certain propositions in quantum mechanics, but without providing a convincing analysis that they are actually talking about the same thing -- or even anything close. Likening the Heart Sutra's pronouncement that "form is emptiness, emptiness is form" to the theory of relativity is about as meaningful as likening it to a Tom and Jerry cartoon, and Capra's scepticism about quarks is, thanks to Fermilab, now badly out of date. Sorry Joe, but you won't get anything except, perhaps, artistic satisfaction from trying to make mysticism relevant to particle physics. For actual, real gains in understanding, I'll take my physics neat, thanks.

146. Richard Dawkins and the "new atheists" come to America

Comment #6552 by Jonathan Dore on November 14, 2006 at 7:48 pm

Robert Briggs writes: "I remember seeing Richard Dawkins and Ken Ham on BBC Newsnight a number of years ago. Dawkins could not handle Ken then and his articles on Answers in Genesis are yet unanswered."

Hello Robert. Your memory seems to be faulty in several respects. First, it wasn't Dawkins that Ken Ham appeared with on Newsnight, but Steve Jones, Colin Blakemore, and Russell Stannard. Second, far from not being able to "handle" Ken, the transcript of the programme segment (I encourage everyone to read it, at www.holysmoke.org/kansas22.htm) shows that all three scientists came across as being considerably more articulate and effective in their points than Ken, whose absurd assertions (e.g. trying to pretend that speciation is somehow qualitatively different from macroevolution) were easily shot down.

Discussion of this Newsnight segment on the internet (particularly on the Answers in Genesis site), and Robert Briggs's attempt to gain mileage from it here, encapsulate a couple of points. One is that a shoddy disregard for the facts (such as confusing Dawkins with Jones, or trying to portray the event as Ham somehow besting his opponents) are an absolutely typical characteristic of fundamentalists, who will tell any lie if they think it can gain them even a temporary advantage. The other is that, as Dawkins has said elsewhere, fundamentalists consider the mere fact of appearing on such programmes in the company of real scientists to be a victory -- that is, a validation that their view is somehow worth debating. It does not matter if their man is shown to be a dolt barely able to string two thoughts together. Once the event has taken place, it simply enters the realm of legend -- in their heavily partial re-telling -- as an occasion on which their viewpoint was (naturally) seen to "triumph". Robert Briggs has given us a classic example of the reason why Dawkins doesn't want to give these people the oxygen of publicity by appearing with them.

Thanks Robert.

147. Losing Our Religion

Comment #6363 by Jonathan Dore on November 13, 2006 at 10:46 pm

Joe Killian writes: "I must (reluctantly) admit that human beings religious belief is the foundation of all of our culture, art, education and even science! It is the evolution of religion along with the human species mind that has brought us all to the here and now." --- I note that no one has disputed this part of my comment!"

Hi Joe
Perhaps people are just getting weary of knowing where to begin with such a sweeping claim, but if no-one else has the energy, I'll step up to the plate and have a go. First off, what is your evidence? Have you evaluated *all* the culture, art, education, and science of the human species and detected the unmistakable imprint of "religion" running through it, or inspiring it? If you think you have, I suspect that you are using "religion" in such an attenuated sense -- standing in, perhaps, for any and all forms of abstract thought, aspiration, moral sense, and aesthetic sensibility -- that the word effectively has no meaning at all. In that sense, getting a mortgage and going on holiday are "religious" activities.

If, on the other hand, you want to use the word in a more useful way, to actually indicate some identifiable attitude or approach to life, then I think your assertion is clearly false. Even in the sense that most people through history who have engaged in cultural, artistic, educational, or scientific pursuits have been, to some extent, "religious" believers, why do you assume that the religious aspect of their lives is the defining characteristic responsible for producing the activity? Many artists in all disciplines, for instance, have worked within conventionally religious forms, but isn't it obvious that if they had emerged in a non-religious society they would simply have worked in other forms? It's a fascination with sound, words, and paint that makes great composers, poets and painters, not a fascination with religion. As for scientists, the idea of free enquiry that arose at the renaissance came about mainly because of the rediscovery of ancient Greek texts that represented a tradition that was hijacked and shut down by the religious (Justinian closed down Plato's Academy in 529), and upon the revival of learning a thousand years later, the same forces were still trying to stifle it -- the Catholic church's suppression of Galileo by threat of torture is an episode that will live in infamy for as long as humans draw breath. Every step of the way since then on the long road of human discovery has been achieved in spite of the organized power of religion. Where religion saw no threat from science, it tolerated it; where it perceived a threat, it opposed it resolutely. Not much evidence of it being the "foundation" of science, except in the sense that a child abuser's actions are the "foundation" of his victims' will to resist him. You might think it a little rich for the abuser to claim credit for the child's resulting strength of character; I know I do.

So is your statement simply another way of saying that most people so far in history have been religious? But this is simply an observation of the same kind as saying that most people in human history have never made a phone call, travelled at 500 miles an hour, or seen a movie. All perfectly true, but so what? The validity and reality of telecommunications, jet engines, and cinematic projection is not thereby compromised one iota. The possibility of a fully conscious, fully acknowledged atheism is something that has only been possible in human societies in the last 150 years -- in other words, since the publication of the Origin of Species gave an explanation of the origin and development of life, thereby removing the last obstacle that had given deists such as Voltaire and Jefferson a default reason to believe in a god (i.e. to explain the origin of life) even when they could think of no other reason.

So, rather than being the "foundation" of culture, art, education and society, I would say it's fairly obvious that religion is simply coeval with them. Not the parent, but the sibling -- and the rather malevolent runt of the litter at that.

148. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #6331 by Jonathan Dore on November 13, 2006 at 4:39 pm

Gordy M

Your post 6321 is a familiar argument, easily answered. Propositions about the honesty, trustworthiness etc. of real, physical flesh-and-blood people are ones to which we bring the evidence of our senses. You judge whether someone saying "I love you" means it by assessing their actions, their attitudes towards you, the way they look at you, their tone of voice in talking to you, and how they respond to *your* tone of voice, looks, attides, actions etc. In other words, you rely on *evidence*. Because these are real, flesh-and-blood people, this evidence is actually available to your senses, and if tested over a long enough time, for someone you spend a lot of time with, it is very hard to get such judgements wrong. For the same reason, the evidence is also available to other people, and their assessments can be a valuable check on your own.

None of this is available when talking about supposed supernatural entities such as god. Different people assign completely different, sometimes mutually contradictory, properties and characteristics to god (e.g. Mr A. thinks he loves sinners, but Mr B thinks he wants them to be painfully put to death), merely on the basis of intuitions that have no basis in the evidence of their senses, but are pure rationalizations based on the supposed authority of some particular bronze-age text. The mutual contradiction is a good hint that the being to which these characteristics are ascribed actually exists only in the heads of the people ascribing them. That is why "faith" in god means belief *without* evidence, which makes it fundamentally different from the faith in another person that you refer to in your examples, which *is* based on evidence. Likewise, the cross-checking of your perceptions against someone else's is not available when talking about "god", since you cannot point to god and say "see how he looked at/talked to me? Isn't that evidence that he loves me?" Your only sensation of god takes place, by definition, entirely within your own head, and nothing that you experience or assess there can be cross-checked by another person. Again, this is a good indication that what we are talking about is confined to our own brains and, unlike the trustworthiness of firemen, say, has no connection to a reality outside them.

For a fuller exploration of the issue, see Dawkins's essay "Good and Bad Reasons for Believing", in his book "A Devil's Chaplain".

149. The Dawkins Delusion (Different Article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #6323 by Jonathan Dore on November 13, 2006 at 4:02 pm

Jack Sparrow wrote: "In fact if you watch the creationist video 'From a Frog to a Prince' Dawkins comes off badly as admitted by a australian secularist who heard the entire audio recording."

If you're interested in what actually happened, you can read about it in Dawkins's essay "The Information Challenge" in the collection "A Devil's Chaplain". Here are the first couple of paragraphs:

"In September 1997, I allowed an Australian film crew into my house in Oxford without realizing that their purpose was creationist propaganda. In the course of a suspiciously amateurish interview, they issued a truculent challenge to me to 'give an example of a genetic mutation or an evolutionary process which can be seen to increase the information in the genome'. It is the kind of question that only a creationist would ask in that way, and it was at this point I tumbled to the fact that I had been duped into granting an interview to creationists -- a thing I normally don't do, for good reasons. In my anger I refused to discuss the question further, and told them to stop the camera. However, I eventually withdrew my peremptory termination of the interview, because they pleaded with me that they had come all the way from Australia specifically in order to interview me. Even if this was a considerable exaggeration, it seemed, on reflection, ungenerous to tear up the legal release form and throw them out. I therefore relented.

"My generosity was rewarded in a fashion that anyone familiar with fundamentalist tactics might have predicted. I found that it had been edited to give the false impression that I was *incapable* of answering the question about information content. [A footnote here reads: See Barry Williams, 'Creationist Deception Exposed', The Skeptic, 18 (1998), 3, pp. 7-10, for an account of how my long pause (trying to decide whether to throw them out) was made to look like hesitant inability to answer the question, followed by an apparently evasive answer to a completely different question.] In fairness, this might not have been as intentionally deceitful as it sounds. You have to understand that these people really *believe* that their question *cannot* be answered! Pathetic as it sounds, their entire journey from Australia seems to have been a quest to film an evolutionist failing to answer it."

He then proceeds, in the rest of the essay, to give an eloquent answer to the "information" question. If you're actually interested in the answer, Jack, I'm sure you'd benefit from reading it.

150. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #6315 by Jonathan Dore on November 13, 2006 at 3:28 pm

OJ wrote: "...My anchestor told this man that he had the [Origin of Species]. "You must never tell it to anyone!" said the other man."

Reminds me of the priceless comment of the Bishop of Worcester's wife on hearing about "The Origin of Species" for the first time (a line that almost sounds scripted by Oscar Wilde, except it actually happened): "Let us hope it is not true -- But if it is, let us pray that it does not become generally known."

Come to think of it, that could stand as an honest precis of most fundamentalist thinking in the US today...