1. Misbegotten sons

Comment #356 by on September 26, 2006 at 5:03 pm

Cheers Louis,

I am sorry if I came across as condescending in my reply to your post. I certainly can easily admit being defensive, mainly because that is what you asked me to do. I wrote the post in some haste and I think that this probably contributed to its somewhat abrupt tone (as well as the many spelling errors). Again, I apologise.

I was somewhat surprised when you stated that you were genuinely curious about my position. You start out by telling me that my characterization of nontheistic Christianity proves the point of atheists, go on to question how this could possibly be a religion, question why I should have the gall to think that I understand Jesus better than other Christians who read the Bible, etc. You end up by arguing that I am ignoring the bad bits and wonder why I would just accept the good and ignore the bad, and then state that Jesus supposed statements are dogma. I should have argued that you were grossly misusing the term rather than interpreting it as directed towards me (it seemed to cast a farily broad net). Please correct me if I have significantly mis-stated you so far. It seemed more like you were challenging these things rather than expressing curiosity about them. I suppose if you had said, "Gee, I've never heard about a nontheistic Christian. It almost seems like an oxymoron. Can you explain yourself?" that I might have responded differently. I should have been more generous and charitable in my reading of your post. For this, please accept my apology.

I will try to give you a non-defensive response to your questions. First of all, I will still quibble with you about your definitions. Being lazy, I looked up religion on Dictionary.com. The Random House English Dictionary gives the following definitions (in addition to the ones which you mentioned): 2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects. 3. the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices. 6. something someone believes in and follows devotedly; a point or matter of ethics or conscience. The American Heritage Dictionary says, 3. a set of beliefs, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader. 4. a cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion. I do not see anything involving supernatural belief in any of these definitions. While many may define religion differently, these are accepted English definitions. And if arguing with the idea of using "commonly accepted" positions, then I would argue that the IRS poition on what constitutes a religion for taxes or what the US Supreme Court accepts as a definition of a religion are quite liberal in these regards. When it comes to money, what could be more practical in a definition? BTW, definitions of Christian are also not bound by a belief in the supernatural. Random House: 4. exhibiting a spirit proper to a follower of Jesus. 5. decent, respectable. 6. human; not brutal; humane. American Heritage: 3. manifesting the qualities or spirit of Jesus. 5. showing a loving concern for others; humane.

The difference between a nontheistic Christian and a theistic Christian involves one's commitment to theism--belief in one God as the creator and ruler of the universe without rejection of revelation. This does not necessarily result in deism, but is distinguished from atheism by a belief in the divine. Probably the best example of this form of Christianity is represented in the writings of John Shelby Spong. He represents a point of view which is remarkable in its naturalism and helpful understanding and study of the Bible. Yet Spong is far from an atheist. He describes his best understanding of God as related to some of the better aspects of Judaism (yes he also picks out the good stuff and neglects the bad, but so do almost all modern-day Jews). I would suspect that how this would lead to a system of morality, belief, and faith is much how we all eventually arrive there. I said that you should look at Dawkins and others for the evolutionary and ethical basis for morality. I did not mean this to be condescending. But you must admit that it is ironic that the "religious" should have to point out to the "atheist" how this comes about. Usually it is the atheist who is trying to explain how morality can still exist without moral law being revealed by God. Is this something that you genuinely are struggling with or was it merely a rhetorical device to try to show me that Jesus can't be the only way to find morality? I hope you can appreciate the irony, although if it realy is an issue for you, I will try to describe it at more length.

As for your second post:

1. No, you didn't call me dogmatic, but you also didn't say that pronouncements about morality without analysis are dogmatic. Rather, you said that Jesus' "pronouncements" sounded dogmatic to you. You did not provide any evidence that Jesus did or didn't analyze them. I suppose that I took it to mean that you felt that my acceptance of such pronouncements was without analysis. This would imply that you would view me as dogmatic. My bad. I will work on trying to be more generous.

2. I'm pleased to see that you agree with my suggestion that emotions play a vital role in belief. You state that we must continuously apply rationality to our belief systems. Or what? I am in full agreement that this is a desirable state if we are to avoid mistaken and false beliefs. But then again, the more we learn about neurology, social psychology, and evolutionary psychology, the more we see that this ideal is impossible. It is highly likely that our brains have been designed by natural selection to have our beliefs and cognitions which are highly influenced by emotion. Damasio's studies on medial frontal lesions shows how cognition and rationality can remain fully intact but that we can become paralyzed and not able to fucntion without appropriate emotional input into our thinking and rationality.

3. I think that you misinterpreted my comment on cognitive psychology. I was in no way meaning to denigrate its use as a therapeutic modality (after all, it was iinvented by a psychoanalyst ;-) I meant that the cognitive revolution in psychology and neuropsychology has recently appreciated that emotions have been neglected (they are much messier and more difficult to understand than perception, for instance).

4. This is a can of worms which I'm sorry that I opened. It is worth at least a book or two. If you are interested in the "minority opinion" which is currently psychoanalysis, you could certainly do worse than reading Ramachandran's book, 'Phantoms in the Brain.' While he is not an advocate of psychoanalysis, he will certainly convince you that your conscious perceptions of yourself and your mind only coincide with reality most of the time (a fortuitous coincidence). I think that the best course of action is to just agree to disagree here on this point. I am not nearly as convinced by your example of the imaginary friend as you are.

5. I have already made my point about definitions. I would only add that to think that science is entirley rational is an idealization of the process. I would submit that it is a tool which helps to increase the likelihood that wishful thinking does not have as much influence and helps to provide a culture in which mistakes can hopefully be rectified. But don't delude yourself into thinking that science is rational while religion is irrational.

6. Sorry that I keep playing the replacement game. My point is that this is inevitable if we are to take the meme-plex theory of religion seriously. Certainly it would be better if we could just get rid of nasty viruses altogether. It would be great if we could develop a drug which would kill all viruses so that they wouldn't bother us anymore. However, most of our successes against viruses come from tweaking the immune system. It would similarly be great if the meme of atheism or science won out over religion. I agree with you that it COULD happen. It just seems to me that it is unlikely to happen. So I propse an alternative means of fighting this meme-plex, taking into account the "immune system" of the meme-hosts. I sincerely hope that you are right here. My fear is that you and Dawkins are wrong.

7. I am pleased that you have a much more optimistic view of folks than I do. My concern that folks are too stupid or lazy to work through their own existential dilemmas makes me a bit of a cynic, doesn't it? I suppose that I am merely perpetuating stereotypes such as the "leftist East Coast intelligentsia." But then why can't more people become enlightened atheists? I just can't seem to figure it out. Maybe we should require 'Existential Philosophers for Dummies' in high school. We can't seem to get many to learn Calculus. I am also pleased that you understand the role of brain chemistry in emotions. Most psychiatrists haven't gotten so far as to consider the inanity of saying that a patient is suffering from a "chemical imbalance." Grief leads to huge neurochemical changes. Do we call this a "chemical imbalance"? Understanding that the mind and brain are two different sides of the same coin puts you on much better footing than most mental health professionals.

8. I'm afraid that I'm a bit dense. i don't see the contradiction between these two posts. I can see why it might appear that way, though. You are right in that I did not spell out any other options. It might be because I have a stake in the meme of nontheistic Christianity (and would like it to be a frontrunner), or it might be that I was merely trying to give an example and was just too damn lazy to give any others. You did give the impression that you were upset by my choice, that you wondered why not "nontheist singerist" or "nontheistic mackieist." I don't have a problem with being a "nontheistic anythingist," as long as you take out the bad bits. You could be a "nontheistic Hitlerist" for all I care, as long as you took out all of the objectionable parts of Naziism. I suppose the only real answer which I could give to you is how popular do you think that the meme of Singer or MacKie or Hitler are with the general public? How well will it sell? Is it easier to spread a virus contained in CocaCola or brussel sprouts? One is much more healthy than the other, and one is much more popular than the other. THIS IS MY MAIN POINT.

I hope that I have been able to explain myself without sounding condescending. However, I cannot help but be defensive. I refute your point that I am "redefining religion in a way that has nothing to do with the supernatural." You claim that by my doing so I am brushing the issue aside, not solving anything. Rather I suggest that Dawkins is ignoring an important aspect of the common definition of religion, and that by doing so that he overlooks potential areas which might help to immunize folks to pathogenic religious memes. How is that not solving anything? You also state that you think that I am using incoherent labels and haven't addressed the question. I would submit that such assertions are easily interpreted as provocative attempts at rhetoric. I am relieved to find that they were merely expressions of curiosity rather than pronouncements of rebuttal or derision. I hope that I have made these incoherent labels more coherent for you.

BTW, I don't find anything wrong with taking your post personally. What is so wrong with making things personal? It seems that the world would be a much better place if we took things more personally. You may also be interested to know that while I criticized Dawkins regarding something which I believe may be a fundamental flaw in his approach, using the example of nontheistic Christianity as an example, I am in no way invested in Christianity. I am not a nontheistic Christian in Spong's sense, in that I am an atheist. I suppose that I am an atheistic Christian, in that I try to live my life commited to loving and humane behaviour. I am committed to arguing for the "proper place" for faith and belief in our lives, recognizing that it does not have to be religious. Getting rid of superstition is wonderful, but we cannot get rid of the need for faith and belief.

2. Reply to a Christian

Comment #314 by on September 25, 2006 at 1:10 pm

Here's my response to this article:
"Before I present some of my reasons for rejecting your faith – which are also my reasons for believing that you, too, should reject it – I want to acknowledge that there are a few things that you and I agree about."

Ok.

"We agree that, if one of us is right, then the other is wrong. The Bible either is the word of God, or it isn't. Either Jesus offers humanity the one, true path to salvation (John 14:6), or he does not. We agree that to be a real Christian is to believe that all other faiths are in error and profoundly so."

Certainly, for, as a consequence of the law of noncontradiction, contradictory claims to truth can't both be true.

"If Christianity is correct, and I persist in my unbelief, I should expect to suffer the torments of hell. Worse still, I have persuaded others, many close to me, to persist in a state of unbelief. They, too, will languish in "everlasting fire" (Matthew 25:41). If the claims of Christianity are true, I will have realized the worst possible outcome of a human life. The fact that my continuous and public rejection of Christianity does not worry me should suggest to you just how unsatisfactory I think your reasons for being a Christian are."

Certainly, nor would I be worried for claims of punishment from other religions, because if Christianity is true, then it follows that contradicting religions would be false.

"You believe that the Bible is the literal (or inspired) word of God and that Jesus is the Son of God-and you believe these propositions because you think they are true, not merely because they make you feel good."

Yes.

"You may wonder how it is possible for a person like myself to find these sorts of assertions ridiculous."

I could certainly conceive it.

"While it is famously difficult for atheists and believers to communicate about these matters, I am confident that I can give you a very clear sense of what it feels like to be an atheist."

Ok.

"Consider: every devout Muslim has the same reasons for being a Muslim that you now have for being a Christian."

In what sense? Perhaps Muslims believe in Islam because they feel that the preponderance of evidence is on their side, but does mean that evidence for Christianity vs. Islam is equal, or that it's even in the same category?

"And yet, you know exactly what it is like not to find these reasons compelling."

If they contradict the claims of Christianity, then from the law of noncontradiction, they're already false, without there being a need to fully investigate them.

"On virtually every page, the Qur'an declares that it is the perfect word of the Creator of the universe. Muslims believe this as fully as you believe the Bible's account of itself. There is a vast literature describing the life of Muhammad that, from the Muslim point of view, proves his unique status as the Prophet of God. While Muhammad did not claim to be divine, he claimed to offer the most perfect revelation of God's will. He also assured his followers that Jesus was not divine (Qur'an 5:71-75; 19:30-38) and that anyone who believed otherwise would spend eternity in hell. Muslims are convinced that Muhammad's pronouncements on these subjects, as on all others, are infallible."

Ok.

"Why don't you find these claims convincing? Why don't you lose any sleep over whether or not you should convert to Islam? Please take a moment to reflect on this."

It's because I believe that Christianity is true, based on the available historical evidence, and that therefore, all other contradictory religions must be false.

"You know exactly what it is like to be an atheist with respect to Islam. Isn't it obvious that Muslims are not being honest in their evaluation of the evidence? Isn't it obvious that anyone who thinks that the Qur'an is the perfect word of the Creator of the universe has not read the book very critically? Isn't it obvious that Muslims have developed a mode of discourse that seeks to preserve dogma, generation after generation, rather than question it? Yes, these things are obvious. Understand that the way you view Islam is precisely the way every Muslim views Christianity. And it is the way I view all religions."

Sure.

"Christians regularly assert that the Bible predicts future historical events. For instance, Deuteronomy 28:64 says, "The Lord will scatter you among the nations from one end of the earth to the other." Jesus says, in Luke 19:43-44, "The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you." We are meant to believe that these utterances predict the subsequent history of the Jews with such uncanny specificity so as to admit of only a supernatural explanation. It is on the basis of such reasoning that 44 percent of the American population now believes that Jesus will return to earth to judge the living and the dead sometime in the next fifty years."

Ok.

"But just imagine how breathtakingly specific a work of prophecy could be if it were actually the product of omniscience. If the Bible were such a book, it would make specific, falsifiable predictions about human events."

The word prophecy simply refers to the speakings of a prophet, predictive prophecy is simply one type of statement that can be made.

"You would expect it to contain a passage like, 'In the latter half of the twentieth century, humankind will develop a globally linked system of computers – the principles of which I set forth in Leviticus – and this system shall be called the Internet.' The Bible contains nothing remotely like this."

Here you make the assertion that if the Bible was the product of omniscience, that it would predict events like those of the invention of the Internet? What evidence or basis do you have for this expectation? How does it follow from the definition of omniscience(let's say "knowledge of all true propositions"), that this would occur?

"Take a moment to imagine how good a book could be if it were written by the Creator of the universe. Such a book could contain a chapter on mathematics that, after two thousand years of continuous use, would still be the richest source of mathematical insight the earth has ever seen."

On what basis do you assume that the purpose of the Bible is to educate in matters of mathematics? Again, how does it follow that if a Creator writes a book, it has to contain a chapter on mathematics?

"Instead, the Bible contains some very obvious mathematical errors. In two places, for instance, the Good Book gives the ratio of a circumference of a circle to its diameter as simply 3 (1 Kings 7: 23-26 and 2 Chronicles 4: 2-5). We now refer to this constant relation with the Greek letter p. While the decimal expansion of p runs to infinity – 3.1415926535 . . . – we can calculate it to any degree of accuracy we like."

It wasn't a matter of the Bible stating that pi is 3, but rather that it rounds the dimensions of the basin to be 30 and 10, and that if both measures are accurate to the nearest cubit, then there'd be considerable overlap in the ranges of circumference. I'll refer to this : http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/52573.html

"Centuries before the oldest books of the Bible were written, both the Egyptians and Babylonians approximated p to a few decimal places."

Sure, but those were in documents such as the Rhind Papyrus, or in the works of Archimedes as you'll mention, specifically concerned with math. Why was the Bible supposed to be, especially in the context that the writers of Kings and Chronicles might not of been or weren't mathematicians?

"And yet the Bible – whether inerrant or divinely inspired – offers us an approximation that is terrible even by the standards of the ancient world. Needless to say, many religious people have found ingenious ways of rationalizing this. And yet, these rationalizations cannot conceal the obvious deficiency of the Bible as a source of mathematical insight."

Is the Bible supposed to be a source of mathematical insight, who asserts it as such, why do you assume that it has to be such for it to be considered divinely inspired?

"It is absolutely true to say that, if Archimedes had written a chapter of the Bible, the text would bear much greater evidence of the author's "omniscience.""

Really? Because if an omniscient God actually intended to write a chapter on mathematics, we'd probably expect more precision than that of Archimedes. Of course, I'm not asserting that the Bible was intended to be a source of mathematical insight, as I'd have to support that assertion.

"Why doesn't the Bible say anything about electricity, about DNA, or about the actual age and size of the universe? What about a cure for cancer? Millions of people are dying horribly from cancer at this very moment, many of them children. When we fully understand the biology of cancer, this understanding will surely be reducible to a few pages of text."

Really? Couldn't we delve even deeper to arbitrary levels of detail that could fill tens, hundreds, to thousands of pages? Why doesn't the Bible just give a full treatment on astrophysics, quantum mechanics, biology, sociology, hydrology, agrophysics, computational chemistry, and Florida statutes? How would you decide between how much is put in and how much isn't?

"Why aren't these pages, or anything remotely like them, found in the Bible? The Bible is a very big book. There was room for God to instruct us on how to keep slaves and sacrifice a wide variety of animals. Please appreciate how this looks to one who stands outside the Christian faith. It is genuinely amazing how ordinary a book can be and still be thought the product of omniscience."

Why should the Bible contain all these things? Was its purpose that of a textbook, or rather a combination of genres encompassing historical narrative, parable, poetry, and wisdom?

"Of course, your reasons for believing in God may be more personal than those I have discussed above. I have no doubt that your acceptance of Christ coincided with some very positive changes in your life. Perhaps you regularly feel rapture or bliss while in prayer. I do not wish to denigrate any of these experiences. I would point out, however, that billions of other human beings, in every time and place, have had similar experiences – but they had them while thinking about Krishna, or Allah, or the Buddha, while making art or music, or while contemplating the sheer beauty of nature. There is no question that it is possible for us to have profoundly transformative experiences. And there is no question that it is possible for us to misinterpret these experiences and to further delude ourselves about the nature of the universe."

Ok.

"If you have read my letter this far, one of two things has happened. Either you have perceived some error that is genuinely fatal to my argument, or you have ceased to be a Christian. Please don't hesitate to contact me with any errors you may have found. You could yet save me the torments of hell."

The problem with your argument is simply that it's completely unsubstantiated. You made unsupported assumptions of how the Bible should be like had it been written by a Creator, and then conclude that it should be rejected. Furthermore, you seem to have some misunderstanding on the nature of the Bible and how books can be written for specific and multiple purposes, at the exclusion of others.

3. Richard Dawkins explains his latest book

Comment #220 by on September 23, 2006 at 12:21 pm

The statistics used at the conclusion of the article are misleading.

Although 30 million people reported they had "No Religion" on the ARIS study, less than 1 million identified themselves specifically as atheists. The majority of those in the No-Religion group (27 million) identified simply under a vague category of "non-religious", which was assumed to mean they did not believe in a god of any sort.

In fact, in the Baylor study conducted in 2005, this assumption was challenged. 10.8% of respondents identified themselves as "non-religious", but further questions revealed that "the majority of Americans not affiliated with a religious tradition (62.9%) believe in God or some higher power".

http://www.gc.cuny.edu/faculty/research_studies/aris.pdf
http://www.baylor.edu/content/services/document.php/33304.pdf
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2006/09/21/midmorning1