201. Richard Dawkins talks about Darwin and his visit to the Galapagos

Comment #53213 by Donald on June 30, 2007 at 6:13 am

Billy ..sex...
Thanks, Billy. Yes, sex is great. By which I mean, of course, that sex is a great way to try out rearrangements of DNA fragments. Most importantly, as you point out, it is not just rearrangements of the DNA within a single individual, but rearrangements of fragments from anywhere in the whole population, given enough generations. It means the entire population is an entity evolving, not just individuals. This greatly increases the rate of evolution as measured by tracking individuals, as you say. Also, biologists have discovered that DNA is transferred by plasmids and viruses throughout the biosphere. So it is actually the whole of earth's living biomass that is evolving, not just each species separately.

PaulEmecz: I really do think that evolution is not just the result of random mutations.

I agree. So does Dawkins, and every other evolutionary biologist.

Evolution is the result of "natural selection". Let me amplify the meaning of natural selection.

Natural selection means that there is a competitive situation. It means that there are fewer places for something than there are things.

It is not exclusively biological. For example:
The earth has heavy stuff (mainly iron) at the centre and light stuff (water and air) as the outer layers. This is the result of natural selection. Gravity drew tiny grains of dust together. There are fewer places at the centre of a ball than there are places in the whole ball. The heavy particles won the natural selection competition, which involved much violent jostling and collisions between particles to convert the initial random, approximately uniform distribution, into the result we see. There was no need for a celestial entity to carefully sort the particles to achieve this extremely improbable distribution (of nearly all the heavy stuff at the centre).

Obvious, you say. Yes, and so is biological natural selection, once you understand it.

The relevant competitive situations have changed over the eons of evolution. One reasonable speculation is that the earliest competitive situations were competitions for binding sites on mineral surfaces, with simple molecules being the competitors and (at the earth surface in particular) a proportion of them being "killed" (I.e. dislodged from their binding site) twice a day due to tides.

Later, the competitive situation would be location near to an energy source. There are fewer places near to sunlight, and near to hot springs, than there are places throughout the whole oceans. Natural selection would favour molecules that first survived the energy flows, and later exploited the energy flow to maintain position near the energy flow.

Then there is a big gap in our knowledge. There is not yet good understanding of how molecular groupings might arrange themselves into a primitive cell, nor how DNA might have come about. [This gap is the easiest into which to insert a belief in "god". But, be warned, this gap is shrinking fast.]

It is still true today that there is insufficient energy source (food) for all the molecular whirlpools (cells) that exist at any one time. Cells die, and only some survive.

In the last few hundred million years, the competition has between different colonies of cells, rather than individual cells. Each colony (read creature) effectively creates a new competitive situation for the other creatures. Each creature is in competition against other creatures for the food. This creates selection pressure, and the more successful creatures survive and the others die.

The ever-changing arenas of competition have led to a ratchet effect in complexity. To be successful, creatures must be as capable as their competitors, and then have an extra advantage. This increases the complexity of the environment (= competitive situation) for others. The result has been ever increasing complexity.

202. Richard Dawkins talks about Darwin and his visit to the Galapagos

Comment #53132 by Donald on June 29, 2007 at 3:30 pm

A reasonable post from Bizarro.
So here is a reasonable response.

I am surprised that the wildlife on the Galapagos (the finches in particular) is still so revered by evolutionists as evidence for common descent.

I don't think it is revered as strong evidence. It is celebrated because it was a memorable tipping point that triggered a revolution in human scientific thought.

I really have a hard time understanding how such demonstrably limited adaptation can be extrapolated to imply large scale evolutionary development.

Yes, one needs a great deal more evidence to confirm Darwin's speculation. Darwin had more than finches to go on, of course, but he was still going out on a limb. Since Darwin, though, his speculation has been overwhelmingly confirmed by ever-increasing evidence on many fronts, e.g. fossils (some very recent, e.g. tiktaalik - have you read http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/04/tiktaalik_makes_another_gap.php?), by ever-increasing DNA analysis, by evolution of disease microbes and drug resistance, and by better understanding of genetic and molecular processes from computer simulation.

any intellectually honest and scientifically inclined individual understands that the "evolutionary" processes we observe today and what scientists extraneously fabricate from those observations are two very different animals.

True, in the sense that placing a moving a brick onto a garden wall is very different from building a city. Not true, in respect of the principles involved.

We can also bring time into it; massive amounts of time, millions and billions of years. I still don't see how this can solve the problem.

It's only one contribution to solving the problem. Note however, that time alone changes things dramatically. Could you walk 10 miles in a day? I think you could. So you could walk the distance from the west coast to the east coast in a year. You could walk the distance to the sun and back 20 times in a million years. And a billion years is a thousand times longer. Yes, time is definitely part of the solution.

Another part of the solution is that evolution is not linear in time. Complexity grows exponentially, not linearly. Have you seen Kurzweil's talk - http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/38? He is talking about how technology has grown over human history. It takes a mental readjustment to really understand the consequences of exponential growth if one has previously been thinking mainly linearly. Another talk about the human genome project - http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/80 - makes the same point about the effects of exponential growth on accumulation of knowledge about DNA sequences.

Now, Kurzweil and Enriquez were talking about human acquisition of knowledge. However evolutionary biologists understand that the same character of exponential growth applies to biological evolution too. At all stages of DNA evolution, the process includes copying chunks of DNA by accidental duplication and modification. In the beginning the chunks were tiny, and modification could only operate on small pieces or individual bases. Later, the chunks were large, and modification could be about rearranging DNA fragments, rather than about changing bases, one by one. For much of the evolution of living things, it would be more appropriate to think of in terms of a "doubling time" for complexity, rather than a time for "adding each gene".

This switch from linear estimating to exponential estimating makes even MORE difference than the expansion of time scale from thousands to millions to billions.

We don't observe evolutionary processes adding novel genetic code to species populations.

I'll let BillySands deal with that one. But I'll throw in my twopennyworth. First, time. Don't expect too much from observations from one decade compared to millions of years. Second, there is another aspect of DNA evolution to mention. It follows on from my comments about exponential growth rather than linear growth. Most of the evolution today operates on the higher level of rearranging existing chunks rather than painstakingly constructing new genes. Mutations are still occurring, and new genes can still gradually get constructed, but the reason for the spectacular explosion in the Post-Cambrian (Phanerazoic) era is that evolution has been operating on rearranging and adjusting the genes for basic body parts evolved earlier, rather than constructing genes and gene sequences one by one. (In this vein, don't forget that you (and me) get 70% of our genes from plants!!)

There is little if any evidence to imply that it has ever occurred, save for a handful of disputed fossils that most evolutionary paleontologists are constantly arguing over.

Erm... Could I politely suggest that you should rephrase that to "I [bizarro] am not yet aware of the evidence scientists have discovered..."

It is therefore not rational to believe in an elusive process that has never been observed, nor can be clearly inferred from the evidence.

Agreed. But you are grossly underestimating the scale and weight of the evidence that scientists have accumulated for the evolution of modern life from simple prokaryotes. It enables today's well-informed scientists indeed to "clearly infer evolution from the evidence".

203. God Hates the World

Comment #52954 by Donald on June 28, 2007 at 5:32 pm

More errors, non-sequitors, straw men, misrepresention, digressions and speculations etc.

Flea wrote:

Comment #52668 by Donald
Why do you find it so easy to accept what Phelps says as the truth? Because you want it to be.

The mere fact of using bible quotes means nothing. It is the context in which they are used and the reason they are used that should be thought about. But you won't do that. Why? Because you want to be able to blame the Phelps on religion.

Anyone who cares to look back at comment #52668
http://richarddawkins.net/articleComments,1326,God-Hates-the-World,Westboro-Baptist-Church,page4#52668
will see that David avoids answering the central issue of that comment, just as he avoided answering the previous comments in that sequence.

Instead, David has offered more straw men, and digressions.
David: "Why do you find it so easy to accept what Phelps says as the truth?"

This is a "when did you stop beating your wife" question. I don't easily accept what Phelps says. I checked his claims of what is written in the bible (by looking in the bible), and found those claims to be true.

David goes on to imply he can read my mind: "Because you want it to be."

Not so. You are not a very good mind reader. When I checked Phelps claims about what was written in the bible, I had no interest either way. I simply wanted to know whether the claims were true or not. I found those claims were true.

David goes on to say: "The mere fact of using bible quotes means nothing."

Perhaps it suits you at this point to say that. I think it means that someone has read the bible carefully enough to quote it correctly.

David goes on: "It is the context in which they are used and the reason they are used that should be thought about."

It is true that context is important, but this an attempt to switch the discussion from whether Phelps gets his message from the bible to why Phelps is doing it. Does Phelps get his message from the bible? You have tried to evade that question.

David:: "But you won't do that."

Not so. I already did.

David:: "Why? Because you want to be able to blame the Phelps on religion."

More inaccurate mind reading. I don't want to blame Phelps on religion. I want to observe and draw any conclusions that seem to be justified by facts. Fact - Phelps quotes the bible. Fact - Phelps is quoting the bible accurately. Fact - Phelps claims to be speaking for god. Fact - there seems to be a link with religion here.

Since you base some of what you say on speculation about what is in my mind, let me help here:
I am not specially interested in the gays versus homophobics issue. I prefer to discuss belief in god. I am deeply interested in the question of what beliefs people have about "god" and why they have them. The bible seems to be an important source of beliefs about "god", especially about what "god" wants people to do. That was the reason I made a comment about Phelps.

As I see it, you have avoided responding to my point directly, instead you have scattered chaff from several posts, despite my attempt to focus in one point at a time.

Since you have treated several other people here in the same manner, you find yourself dealing with a flurry of antagonistic posts. How does this help you? Is it what you wanted?

204. Giuliani To Regent University: 'The Amount Of Influence You Have Is Really, Really Terrific'

Comment #52844 by Donald on June 28, 2007 at 7:38 am

Yes, he may have deliberately chosen the word "terrific" because of its double meaning.

If he is a closet atheist, or merely anti-Robertson, that would be a way for him to preserve a vestige of self-respect while pandering to his audience.

I am reminded of a hostage crisis some years ago, when the captives issued a statement under command of their captors. They referred to wishing to "paean" their captors. Thery were betting that the captors would have to look up the dictionary definition, and would not pay attention to the spoken ambiguity. It worked. They effectively spoke past the hostage-takers, and the western media did the necessary translation and explanation for their audience.

So, is Giuliani god-appeasing, or expert in double speak? Not a great choice.

205. I believe that there is no God.

Comment #52799 by Donald on June 28, 2007 at 5:29 am

Excellent article by Penn Jillette.
It is worth keeping for reference. It is rare to see positive aspects of atheism presented so well. (I think Penn Jillette took religious pious propaganda as a template, and carefully replaced reliance on god with benefits from tackling the real world directly. The result is brilliant.)

[ Josh - I think think this deserves to be a "featured article", not merely in the "news list". ]

I too particularly liked the thought singled out by BT Murtagh:

Believing there's no God means I can't really be forgiven except by kindness and faulty memories. That's good; it makes me want to be more thoughtful. I have to try to treat people right the first time around.

Incidentally, it would be a perfect item for BBC's "thought for the day" if only they would give up their insistence that only religious believers are permitted in that slot.

206. Giuliani To Regent University: 'The Amount Of Influence You Have Is Really, Really Terrific'

Comment #52673 by Donald on June 27, 2007 at 5:27 pm

I hope this is just a misprint. Surely he said ".. really, really terrifying". Didn't he? Oh.
Disgusting.

207. God Hates the World

Comment #52668 by Donald on June 27, 2007 at 5:07 pm

I think it is unhelpful to be insulting to David Robertson. I think there are only two good options - ignore him, or reply patiently, stating what we see as errors, non-sequitors or misrepresentations.

With that in mind, I give below a couple of comments on the following sequence of extracts:

Donald: this video points to an underlying problem with people who believe the bible relays messages from "god".

DAR: Donald is yet another one who thinks that Phelps gets his message from the Bible. Yet Phelp's message is directly contrary to the Bible. But does that stop Donald and others lumping them altogether. And you encourage this kind of ignorance?

scottishgeologist, Donald et al post the exact biblical quotes Phelps uses, which show Phelps is quoting the bible, which has very clear homophobic statements.

Donald: David, you accuse me and others of ignorance. Are you sure it is me that is ignorant about where Phelps gets his message? You say "Phelps message is directly contrary to the bible". Yet Phelps quotes the bible as the source of his message.

DAR ignores Donald, and replies to scottishgeologist: What I find extraordinary here is your simplistic naivete. Do you really think that just because people quote the Bible that that somehow makes them a Christian?

Ok, lets look at some aspects of this.

(1) David seeks to avoid answering the original issue about people believing what is written in the bible. He avoided it by simply saying, without justification, that Donald and others are IGNORANT.
(2) When SG, Donald et al, produce evidence that Phelps is really using bible quotes (and accurately too), David does not attempt to provide alternative explanations. He rounds on scottishgeologist and claims he is SIMPLISTIC AND NAIVE.
(3) He also tries to switch the argument from whether Phelps gets his views from the bible, to whether Phelps is a Christian. We weren't talking about whether Phelps is Christian. That is a separate question.

One might wonder why David doesn't offer some reason interpreting the Phelps quotes as meaning something else, and doesn't suggest that these particular bible quotes are out of date or inappropriate today.

I think the answers are: (a) Those particular quotes are perfectly clear, so they don't mean anything else. (b) David is in a dead end, logically speaking. He has previously said the bible is inerrant. So he can't really be credible if he now says those quotes are inapplicable.

So, poor chap, boxed in and nowhere to go, he says YOU'RE IGNORANT, SIMPLISTIC AND NAIVE. I think he is capable of better.

It's a pity. If only David could do a Jonathan Edwards.

208. The Stupidity of Fox News is Truly Beyond Belief

Comment #52304 by Donald on June 26, 2007 at 5:02 pm

I thought this item was great.

For several seconds it showed nothing but a picture of the God Delusion book (long enough for fox news viewers to read the title).

Then "Father Jonathan" says people like him buy the book.

Then he goes on to make controversial statements while fox news shows a video of muslims praying alongside.

Random House couldn't do better if they were paying for it.

209. Journey Into Islam

Comment #52298 by Donald on June 26, 2007 at 4:41 pm

Clear support for what Sam Harris has been saying.

How can we get western politicans to read some of this stuff? Perhaps it would have been slightly better to send "End of Faith" to the UK MPs rather than TGD.

I'd love to think that western leaders privately understand this, and prefer not to say it out loud. But everything we know about our politicians suggests they are really are blind to the reality of Islam.

210. His word: Attacking religion can seem like breaking a butterfly on a wheel

Comment #52291 by Donald on June 26, 2007 at 4:20 pm

I didn't know that. Most religions, or some? Sincerely, if you revisit this thread can you please list a few so I can check that out?

The big example is the jewish religion, as described in the OT(aka torah). It is all about things that happen in life, and how god wants humans to behave. There is no mention of afterlife, at least not until the Pharisees started a belief in resurrection, a little ahead of Xianity starting. In turn, this suggests that the numerous cultures and tribes that came and went in Mespotamia for a couple of thousand years prior to Xianity, probably did not have religions that were based on an afterlife.

The (contemporary) Egyptian culture did have a belief in afterlife, but, successful though it was, it was only one of many cultures of the time.

Europe had numerous Celtic religions during that time. There seem to be no written records of the beliefs, but according to myths and folklore, they believed in spirits, and a spirit world, but one of fairies, gods and other supernatural beings, not dead humans. (To be fair, one historian does include a version of the greek hades, but he was a greek, writing about celts 500 years after Xianity, according to wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other_World)

Perhaps I should have said, I was thinking of an afterlife belief where human consciousness continues, and thus the dead human in hell/heaven is aware of his fate and what caused it. I was not thinking of reincarnation beliefs where a spirit continues, but with a fresh start.

So I would class Buddhists, and most Hindus, as not having a belief in an afterlife (at least not in the sense of Xianity/Islam).
http://www.religionfacts.com/buddhism/beliefs/afterlife.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu

Also, it seems to me that most of the gods in most religions are primarily about influencing things in the here and now, such as gods of rain, sunshine, crops, fertility, travel, etc, etc. http://pantheon.org provides one online index.

YMMV of course. I don't claim any special expertise in ancient religions.


Despite what it says on the wikipedia page you quoted, I do not see religions as primarily driven by fear of death.
(1) For most of human evolution, life has been about getting enough food and avoiding disasters. Religion had first to support that. Life after death would be secondary. Rituals to charm the gods would be primary.
(2) Children do not have a well-developed sense of death. Children are instinctively concerned about being provided with food, care and avoiding punishment. A concept of death can be taught, but I disagree that it is primal.
(3) Yes, it is possible to introduce fear of death into children, although it has to be done by describing it as eternal punishment, rather than merely a statement that they will not exist for ever. The big religions have evolved to use this trick widely, I agree.
(4) It is well known that young people (say, people in the first half of their lives) mostly live their lives "as if they were going to live for ever". To me this means "without thinking about death because it's a distant prospect, irrelevant for now", not "with a belief in an afterlife".
(5) Religion is entwined with getting people to obey the dictates of a religious ruler. Punishment in the here and now, via peer pressure, cruelty by example, and rewards for submitting, expulsion for resisting, etc, are more effective than threats/promises about what happens after death.

The afterlife beliefs seem to me to have been a useful add-on, not primary. The add-on has gradually become more influential as life has become more secure, and people were able to spend less of their time on basic survival and more on socialising. Afterlife beliefs would appear disproportionately large in pre-history because tombs, etc have left physical traces, whereas rituals, oral traditions, and other religious practices, etc have not. However, this is all IMO. Again YMMV.

211. God Hates the World

Comment #52051 by Donald on June 26, 2007 at 3:33 am

Flea wrote:

55. Donald is yet another one who thinks that Phelps gets his message from the Bible. Yet Phelp's message is directly contrary to the Bible. But does that stop Donald and others lumping them altogether. And you encourage this kind of ignorance?

Here are extracts from Phelps message, copied, unedited, from his website:

"If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them." Leviticus 20:13.

"The foolish shall not stand in thy sight, thou hatest all workers of iniquity." Psalm 5:5.

In summary, sodomites are wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly (Gen. 13:13), are violent and doom nations (Gen. 19:1-25; Jgs. 19), are abominable to God (Lev. 18:22), are worthy of death for their vile, depraved, unnatural sex practices (Lev. 20:13; Rom. 1:32).....

David, you accuse me and others of ignorance. Are you sure it is me that is ignorant about where Phelps gets his message?
You say "Phelps message is directly contrary to the bible".
Yet Phelps quotes the bible as the source of his message.

Does your copy of the bible not have those quotes?

212. God Hates the World

Comment #51944 by Donald on June 25, 2007 at 3:38 pm

Flea wrote:

I am really angry and disgusted with you for doing this. It is the worst thing you have done on this website yet and deserves an immediate apology and retraction.
David Robertson

scottishgeologist wrote (good post):

Phelps knows his bible well and that is exactly where the problem lies. Every one of his hateful assertions is backed up from "scripture" Check out his home page where he gives proof after proof for his anti gay ideas.
"Sinners in the hands of an Angry God" is absolutely chock full of Phelps-isms - and all quoted from Scripture!
The problem isnt Phelps - its the disgusting holy book of hate that he reads and quotes from. He is actually being quite honest. The hypocrites are those conservative Christians who conveniently ignore the "difficult" bits and try to present a lovey-dovey God.
Hate is actually a biblical value. Try Romans 9:13 - "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated" Those who are "saved" are loved, the rest, ie most of mankind, well, hated.
Prof Dawkins is right in his statement about "God" : 'the most unpleasant character in all fiction ... a misogynist, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully'

David - are you embarrassed by some of your fellow bible readers? Not surprising in this extreme case. But geologist is right - this video points to an underlying problem with people who believe the bible relays messages from "god".

David - didn't you post that the bible is inerrant? More than once?

We can all agree that Phelps is an unpleasant fringe character.

Who just happens to believe what he reads in the bible.

213. His word: Attacking religion can seem like breaking a butterfly on a wheel

Comment #51835 by Donald on June 25, 2007 at 8:33 am

Donald wrote:

I'm not convinced that awareness of death has a large part to play either. Most people live most of their lives without thinking about their death. It may be handy to provide religions with a few death-bed conversions, and it may provide opportunities for religions to indoctrinate while the bereaved are sad and vulnerable, but it's only one element in a complex phenomenon.

Thor wrote:

"Most people live most of their lives without thinking about their death"
But I think religion plays a huge part in enabling some people to do this! I dont think living past death is at the forefront of every religious person's mind every day. However, i do think that the belief in an afterlife allows some people to not worry about the issue again. Once they buy in to religion then their fear of death disappears and they try not to let it come back.

Well, religions before Xianity and Islam, mostly did not have any notion of afterlife. People assumed that when you died you returned to the state you were in before being born, i.e. not existing. That is my belief today. I don't find the thought of being dead at all worrying or frightening. (I dislike the process of ageing, and dislike the prospect of being crippled, in pain, or helpless just prior to death, but that's a somewhat different matter.) Afterlife has not been essential as an element of successful religions.

However, I agree that it has become an important element of the main religions today. I was a bit careless in expressing doubt that awareness of death "has a large part to play". I should perhaps have said it wasn't an essential part, being a relatively recent invention at the time of creating the Jesus myths, and not part of the OT.

I also differ slightly from your perspective above. You wrote that the belief in an afterlife allows (some) people not to worry about the issue again. Ok, but this rather implies that the natural state of people is to worry about death. I don't think that. I think the fear of death is deliberately implanted into people by Xianity and Islam, reinforced by terrible threats of hell and eternal hateful damnation by god, so that they can dangle the carrot of eternal bliss in heaven as an alternative, if only people obey the dictates of that particular brand of Xianity/Islam.

214. His word: Attacking religion can seem like breaking a butterfly on a wheel

Comment #51821 by Donald on June 25, 2007 at 6:17 am

Baddiel wrote, and attracted comments from Benway & Charlou:

The problem for ultra-Darwinians is that they have to assume that all things – including ideas, or memes as Dawkins calls them – progress via the animal narrative of natural selection (so religion, or rather the need for it, must serve some basic "positive" survival-enhancing purpose)

Well, if we view religion according to a theory of memes, religion has to increase "fitness". Usually "fitness" is equated with survival, because harsh environments are the norm. However, in benign environments, so benign that population explosions occur, "fitness" can mean reproductive success, rather than fitness to survive against the vicissitudes of the environment.

The most "successful" of the major religions (Roman Catholics and Islam) contain doctrines designed to maximise the production of indoctrinated offspring.

As regards the other reasons for the "reproductive success" of religions, it helps humans self-assemble into communities which have sufficient central control propagated downwards via a hierarchy of obedience to act coherently as a single "organism". This coherence improves the community's survival against harsh environments and competing communities. Religion is not the only possible meme-package that can achieve communal coherence and obedience, but it is the most successful in the evolutionary sense of the most widespread.

I think the Dawkins "by-product" argument is only scratching the surface of the phenomenon of religions as a meme package. Religions are not about to fade away because a tiny minority of intelligent people point out that "god" is a human invention and does not actually exist (at least not in the form of conventional religion). There have been people pointing that out for thousands of years, long before Darwin, Telescopes and DNA sequencing strengthened the argument.

I'm not convinced that awareness of death has a large part to play either. Most people live most of their lives without thinking about their death. It may be handy to provide religions with a few death-bed conversions, and it may provide opportunities for religions to indoctrinate while the bereaved are sad and vulnerable, but it's only one element in a complex phenomenon.

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

Comment #51724 by Donald on June 24, 2007 at 10:51 am

Thanks for your calm and polite reply, Frank.

You write:

"For the most part atheists do not seek to impose their beliefs on others."- Donald.

That is very untrue. Communism/Marxism is inherently atheistic, and one of their main goals is to quash religion and spirituality by imposing their ideology on others, using unethical methods. Did you know that Communism is seen by their followers as a political science? Where do you think political correctness derives from? It is Marxist propaganda designed to distort truths by deconstructing historical texts, and inserting their own meaning. I do not wish to drag you into a political debate, so I will briefly mention that our state elite (that are majority secular and atheist) are extremely hostile to the principles and practices of Christianity. They are introducing legislation that prevents Christians the freedom to practice their beliefs. How is that not imposing upon religion?

I agree that a few ruthless and despotic regimes have imposed atheism and tried to prevent theism by force. But I don't see this as typical of atheists. Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Kim Jong Ill, are usually paraded at this point. But throughout history there have been even more ruthless dictators and despotic regimes who imposed belief in god and ruled in the name of god, Popes from the inappropriately-named Innocent III onwards, Kings e.g. Henry XIII, Emperor Hirohito of WWII, etc, etc, and I haven't even mentioned the current middle east! I think ruthless and despotic dictators will use whatever belief systems are around at the time for their own ends, although I suspect it helps them if they can become personally deluded that god is on their side!

I don't regard the current crop of atheists as trying to impose beliefs. I regard it as a verbal battle for the best possible concepts (memes Dawkins might call them) that make sense of our world and guide humanity towards a better future.

Rather, the boot is on the other foot. For centuries, it has been religions that have had the upper hand, and imposed beliefs via blasphemy laws, death or excommunication for speaking out against religion, etc, etc. Now that atheists are speaking out against the theists instead of being silent, it feels to religious believers that the atheists are imposing, simply because the past imposition of religious beliefs has held sway for so long.

That said, beliefs and rights do conflict of course. If one group believe they have the right to go everywhere banging a large drum, and the rest believe they have a right to peace and quiet, then there will be a quarrel which will not end until one side wins.

So, if the "principles and practices of Christianity" you referred to, are impinging on others (e.g. preventing medical research, preventing medical treatment, removing civil rights from minorities, seeking privilege, seeking disproportionate representation in government, etc, etc) then you can expect a quarrel.

You say "They [atheists] are introducing legislation that prevents Christians the freedom to practice their beliefs." What specific legislation did you have in mind?

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

Comment #51694 by Donald on June 24, 2007 at 6:14 am

Frank Hodson wrote

Prayers are not meant to perform miracles.

Excuse me? Is this a new strand in religious thinking? The traditional reason for prayer is to ask "god" to intervene and cause something in the world to be different from what it otherwise would be. Given what we now know about physics and the rest of our scientific understanding of the universe, that means that every traditional prayer is asking for a miracle, be it big or small.

However, I do not see the harm in prayer,

Agreed, if it is personal prayer and does not displace practical, real-world, actions that might help to bring about the desired result.

In fact there is one kind of prayer that we might agree is beneficial. That is prayer to "god" to help the praying person overcome unwanted feelings. This might be prayer to get through difficult times, prayer to overcome feelings of hate that are damaging the person praying, prayer to become a better person within, or prayer to help the person praying to reach out to other people in love, friendship and mutual support.

That kind of prayer works whether or not the praying person believes in god or not, or which version of god is believed. It is akin to meditation, mantras and self-hypnosis into desirable behaviour patterns. It is perfectly possible to interpret that kind of prayer without belief in a supernatural creator, invisible sky father, or what-have-you. That kind of prayer can be highly beneficial and not harmful at all.

But it is dangerously close to apparently similar prayer that affirms that the praying person is superior to other people, because the praying person believes in the "true god" and others don't, and apparently similar prayers that assert the right of the praying person to oppose the interests of others because the praying person has access to "what god wants people to do" and the others don't.

As long as religion stays personal, no big problem. Unfortunately most religions come entwined with power hierarchies that seek to impose their beliefs and way of life on others. That leads to conflict and possibly to disaster for human civilisation.

For the most part atheists do not seek to impose their beliefs on others. They try to educate people about what science has really discovered (which is far more than most people actually understand), and try to point out the contradictions and absurdities in the ancient myths handed down from a time when most people did not know that the earth was round, that the earth went round the sun, before people understood that diseases were caused by viruses and bacteria instead of evil spirits, and before people understood the real causes of thunderstorms, earthquakes, floods, etc, instead of believing that they were caused by evil spirits or a wrathful "god".

The need has become urgent due to an appalling resurgence of the use of religious belief by western politicians and the even more appalling and deeply rooted religious domination of political power in Islamic countries.

217. Evolution IS a Blind Watchmaker

Comment #51684 by Donald on June 24, 2007 at 5:01 am

Donald wrote:

do you have any well-thought-out suggestion for a simulation scenario that is:
(a) simple enough for a present-day desktop PC to run
(b) does not require external selection towards a predetermined goal
(c) has scope for ever increasing complexity
(d) will develop some complex function that humans will recognise as analogous to something in real evolution.

Steve quickly suggested:

Evolution lab: http://biologyinmotion.com/evol/
Evolution Simulator: http://www.truthtree.com/evolve.shtml

I have looked at both. I don't think either meet my criterion (c) above. Evolution lab also fails the "complex function" of my criterion (d). The swimming motions of Evolution Simulator qualify on (d), but I don't see scope for ever-increasing complexity.

[ Incidentally, Evolution Lab also fails badly on user interface. The control functions are harder to learn and understand than the very simple educational point it is trying to make! ]

Also, they lack qualities that will draw people to them (I thought the watchmaker video was more engaging).

Worthy, but no cigar. Good scenario still sought.

218. Evolution IS a Blind Watchmaker

Comment #51675 by Donald on June 24, 2007 at 3:44 am

Steve99 wrote: "I don't think a video like this is going to change any minds unless it presents a far more realistic simulation, where functionality just appears by itself, with selection coming from within the model, and not from the programmer/user."

It might be possible to find a better simulation demonstration. But someone has to come up with a better scenario.

Steve, do you have any well-thought-out suggestion for a simulation scenario that is:
(a) simple enough for a present-day desktop PC to run
(b) does not require external selection towards a predetermined goal
(c) has scope for ever increasing complexity
(d) will develop some complex function that humans will recognise as analogous to something in real evolution.

It might be possible. Can you find such a scenario?

219. Evolution IS a Blind Watchmaker

Comment #51667 by Donald on June 24, 2007 at 3:12 am

I like the evolving-clock video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcAq9bmCeR0. It only addresses one part of the evolution versus god argument, but one can only do so much in a short video. I wonder if someone could make that program into an entertaining downloadable program that kids could run on their PC and see visual representations of representative clocks during the evolution in some visual way?



Also, I notice that the watchmaker video http://www.kids4truth.com/watchmaker/watch.html shows considerable progress compared with a century ago.

It describes living cells as complex machines. Great. No vital force. No continual intervention by a spirit.

The watchmaker video is much closer to Deism than Theism. (Of course, the creators of of that video don't see it that way. They see it as the best defensive position they can hold to claim the existence of their version of "God". But I see it as an intermediate form between Theism and Deism. And Deism is a major major improvement over the Abrahamic nonsense.)

So, scientific knowledge is gradually winning the battle over ancient myths.

But the progress does not look fast enough to avert global disasters for human civilisation. I see the problem as not so much the billions of people who believe nonsense. Most of them would change their "beliefs" if fed the right information diet. The problem is that religions are not merely personal belief systems. They are all, to some degree, political systems. By that I mean that they provide a hierarchy of power and control for the individuals who climb within, and aspire to control as large a slice of humanity as possible. I am appalled at the extent religions have gained control of western politicians, and particularly appalled at the depths of religious domination in the Islamic world. (Islam is an overtly political system, and the main forms explicitly desire world domination.)

I hope every clear-thinking reader, especially those recovered from delusional propaganda, can find some way, whether small or large, to spread enlightenment and counter religious propaganda.

220. An Inquisition in science's name

Comment #51081 by Donald on June 21, 2007 at 11:40 am

Cardinal Robert Bellarmine (aka Preston Manning): "Unfortunately, in pursuing this course of action, my colleagues and I made a grievous mistake - a mistake that, in the end, seriously discredited ourselves, our conception of reality and the organizations through which we advanced and defended it."

Yep, and you are still doing it.

"I am writing this letter in the sincere hope of dissuading you, the author of The God Delusion, and your colleagues - scientists and atheists, as I believe you describe yourselves - from repeating our mistake.."

Don't worry, old chap, we haven't and we won't. But thanks for acknowledging that RD isn't making your mistake.


And since you are a politician, perhaps this would be a good moment to point out that our dispute with religions and the religious is not only about beliefs. Anyone can believe about in fairies, spirits of rocks and trees, or whatever, if they must. It's about power and who has the right to dictate what is taught to children. You want to implant into children a belief that there is a god, plus a belief that you know what "god" wants us to do, which in turn, gives you and your ilk a power base from which to control and dictate important social and political decisions.

You misunderstand science profoundly if you think that is another belief system on a par with religion. Science is based on enquiry, continually accumulating evidence, and is a living, growing, body of knowledge in a way that "god did it" can never be.

We want to implant into young children a fair-minded summary of what science has established beyond reasonable doubt (earth goes round sun, evolution, etc) and as they get older, encourage a spirit of enquiry that will enable them to adapt to the discoveries and circumstance of the future, instead of shackling them to beliefs and dogma that belong in the graveyard.

221. Debate between Sam Harris and Chris Hedges

Comment #50677 by Donald on June 19, 2007 at 11:51 am

Following on from 50653, I took another small dose of Hedges. The next sentence from Hedges opening speech was:
"...This individualism is the central doctrine and most important contribution of monotheism - we are enjoined after all to love our neighbour, not our tribe."

The manoeuvre becomes clear. He is attempting to blame the hostility between social groups on "tribalism" , and thus free religions from blame. He intends to completely the ignore the enormous contribution religion makes to define people into separate groups in the first place, and then ignore the doctrines in religions that create hostility between religious groups.

Some of those doctrines are:
Sect A says sect B has got the story wrong, and therefore do not believe in the real god.
Only believers in the real god go to heaven, all others go to hell. (belief throughout xianity and islam)
Allah hates unbelievers. (repeated many time in Koran)
Unbelievers will go to hell, whereas believers will go to heaven. (sentiment repeated many times in Koran)
Allah says "don't take unbelievers as friends". (explicit in the Koran, e.g. 60:13)
If you take unbelievers as friends allah will punish you. (explicit in Koran, e.g. 58:14-15)
Allah wants the whole world to submit to Islam.
And the worst of all: in the Koran, careful reading, in context, shows that all the injunctions to be kind and help neighbours, to not kill etc, are intended as rules for muslims to follow in regard to fellow muslims. Non-muslims (i.e. unbelievers) are hated by god, are not to be taken as friends, and are to be fought (and killed) if they oppose Islam. That's what it says.

Now, if you believe there is a supreme being rewards you for following him, and sends you to hell if you don't, and you also believe that the supreme being hates the "others" enough to send them to everlasting hell, then doesn't that create a divide deeper and more destructive than tribal rivalry? The evidence from history is that religious divisions are indeed worse than tribal rivalry.

And this guy spent many years in the middle east? He didn't read the Koran to see what it actually says???

Hedges goes on:
"This empowerment of individual consciousness is the starting point of the great ethical systems of our civilisation. The prophets ... helped institutionalise dissent and criticism."

That's enough for me. I can't bear to listen to Hedges in more than very very small doses (about 60 seconds at a time). Judging from the other comments here, I think I would do serious damage to my blood pressure if I listened to all of Hedges nonsense.

My admiration for Sam's ability to remain patient and produce calm responses is enormous.

[edit: correction to length of time Hedges spent in middle east]

222. Debate between Sam Harris and Chris Hedges

Comment #50653 by Donald on June 19, 2007 at 8:20 am

Sam is very impressive as usual. Great opening speech.

I found Hedges hard to listen to. Hedges started with:
"...[Sam] fails to grasp the supreme importance of the monothestic traditions in creating the concept of the individual. This individualism, the belief that we can exist as distinct beings from the tribe or the crowd, and that we are called on as individuals to make moral decisions that at times defy the clamour of the tribe or the nation, is a gift of the Abrahamic faiths."

My jaw dropped. So individuals before Abraham did not think they were distinct beings? They did not make moral decisions? All moral decisions were collective decisions of the tribe or nation? The claims of the religites seem to grow ever stronger and more bizarre.

I have never heard this claim before, and it is out of line with what I believed about Greek civilisation, Roman civilisation, the early history of religions, and human nature.

However, in case Hedges is quoting a mainstream view that I had not heard before, where should I look for the historical or philosophical underpinnings for this opinion from Hedges? Or is Hedges talking nonsense that he made up himself?

223. In the know

Comment #50252 by Donald on June 16, 2007 at 3:39 am

Vernon's profile in the Guardian says he left the Church of England after becoming an atheist. Probably he figured out that religions peddle a load of fictions, claiming they are truth. Good.

Now Vernon says he is an agnostic, which makes him sound a bit wimpish.

In fact the evidence that the god of the bible is a human invention and does not exist is overwhelming - about as strong as the evidence that the earth orbits the sun.

I think he should stop wallowing in uncertainty and keep it simple. The earth orbits the sun. God is a human invention and does not exist.

[It is fine to keep the uncertainty about how the universe came to exist - no one knows - but a personal god that cares about us, answers prayers, and scoops us up into an afterlife can be placed alongside a flat earth, astrology and alchemy.]

This is not militant, not undue certainty, just an honest assessment of the evidence. Once evidence becomes overwhelming, it is inappropriate to use the language of uncertainty.

224. We of little faith

Comment #48881 by Donald on June 9, 2007 at 10:21 am

Blair: "religious faith is not inconsistent with reason, or progress, or the celebration of diversity."

Blackmore: "But religious faith is inconsistent with reason (and much more that we value as well)."

This is a good article from Sue Blackmore. But I would have liked to see it longer, and tackle the other two of Blair's three assertions:

Blair: "religious faith is consistent with progress"

Not if it's based on ancient scripts that are claimed to be the unchallengeable, unchanging, right for all time, word of god, it isn't. Especially Islam.

Blair: "religious faith is consistent with the celebration of diversity"

Not if divides humans into two camps: believers who will go to heaven, and unbelievers whom god hates and will go to hell, it isn't. Especially Islam.

Blair entered politics as a naive orator who found a neat way to advance the labour party. He leaves it as a deeply deluded and corrupted politician.

225. Can we really learn to love people who aren't like us?

Comment #48783 by Donald on June 9, 2007 at 3:37 am

Remarkably good article for a top religious leader.

And I liked Sacks' remarks about the cohesion within and divisions between that religion excels in creating.

However, I don't agree that cohesion is always at the expense of creating divisions. They are actually independent. Religions go to great trouble to explicitly create the divisiveness. (Nonbelievers are more sinful, Allah hates unbelievers so don't take them as friends, etc, etc.)

Science is an example of a group movement that produces cohesion, but does not promote hatred of the outgroup. (Yes, I know scientists argue, but the common cause of science is a cohesive movement. And it is basically neutral towards non-scientists.)

Religion is primarily about creating social cohesion via a dominance hierarchy. It is easily corrupted because it encourages obedience to individuals above you, with the pope/other-top-leader professing to obey the top leader of all - god, and the individuals get to accumulate wealth and power along the way. It uses fear of an outgroup to help keep people obedient.

Western-style democracies are better because they have limited the time an individual can spend in power (during their time in power they almost always become corrupted), and western-style democracies limit the power given to individuals. Being ruled by inefficient, but elected, committees is better in the long run than being ruled by "efficient" dictators. History proves this.

So, the key struggle is about who controls us, not as Sacks implies, about whether we can join hands for peace.

If a burglar breaks into your home, you will be hostile to him, and try to eject him, violently if necessary.

The religious are trying to break into our jointly owned house of secular democracy which generations of ancestors have laboured and sacrificed to build. That is what why we must fight religion. It is not about peace or war. It is about defending our house from attack.

Go, Musketeers!

226. What use is Religion? Part 2

Comment #48391 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 5:20 pm

Your theory attempts to explain the advantages of religion from a sociological and perhaps economical point of view.

No, it is focused on survival. Early farmers would be much more subject to the vagaries of climate and crop failures than today. Some groups would starve, some would survive, some would thrive and increase their population. Evolution by selective survival would be in action.

227. What use is Religion? Part 2

Comment #48385 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 4:54 pm

Actually some kind of nascent religion existed much earlier. We know that by looking at cave painting and burial rites of early humans. Religion defintely predated agriculture.

It all gets very fuzzy that far back. I'm not sure cave paintings and burial habits can be equated with religion as we understand it today.

228. What use is Religion? Part 2

Comment #48383 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 4:36 pm

Oh, an article posted a year ago, and only now, someone comments, and I notice it!!

Nice article, though, so I'll post a comment as well.

Yes, propagation of religious beliefs as parasites on useful advice seems more than likely.

However, I think there is a bit more to it than that. Here is some speculation.

In the early days of humanity, when human societies were hunter-gatherers, human tribes were in natural competition for most of the time. The supply of food was fixed, and the tribe which could get a larger share would prosper at the expense of other tribes. Small groups, prepared to fight each other whenever food was in dispute, would be the norm.

The situation changed gradually but fundamentally, as humans became farmers. Now human groups that could cooperate would have the advantage. And the larger the group the better. I suspect religions had their origins during that transitional era. Religious tribes would benefit from the additional force a belief in gods could bring to social cohesion. Believing that one had to obey the elder, because the elder could receive omens, or even instructions, from the gods of plant growth, or the sun, or the rain, would help in ensuring that the tribe planted the seeds even if they didn't feel like it at the time, didn't eat or steal the seeds during the year, and were available when required for chores that might not show their benefit for a whole year.

The transition from completely hunter-gatherers to completely farmers probably took many tens of thousands of years - perhaps long enough for evolution to select for certain types of brain. Obedience, longer lasting and more rigid than required for hunting/gathering, would be an advantage. Amalgamating with adjacent groups by one group converting to the ways of the other would be an advantage. Trying new things might lead to starvation.

Over the past few millennia, human society has changed again, most dramatically in last 500 years. This time too fast for significant evolution by selective survival. Brains vary, perhaps more than attributes such as height and athletic ability. But brains will still have the atributes selected by the most recent burst of selection-by-survival. Belief in, and obedience to, the tribal authority may be tendencies built into current brains, and may partly account for the success of present-day religions.

There is even a prediction of sorts that would result from my speculation. It would predict that there should be at least a few cases of people who were not brought up religious, but became religious later in life, and, more commonly people who, even if convinced their original childhood indoctrination was wrong, merely switch their version of god, instead of abandoning god altogether.

This speculation is a little different from the pure parasitic theory, although they share the suggestion that most religious beliefs would be propagated in childhood. And it does offer an answer to the question "what use is religion?".

On the other hand I recognise that occam's razor ir hovering nearby. Is the pure parasitic theory enough?

229. Wanted: Moral Education for Secular Children

Comment #48355 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 2:54 pm

Excellent article!

230. The 'Is God...Great?' Debate

Comment #48347 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 2:29 pm

Comment #48323 by darwin2

Thank you for giving clear answers to the questions I posed. I appreciate the fact that you are trying to be consistent and logical.

Your answers exclude the god of the bible and koran, since to believe those versions of god, it is necessary to believe that those holy books are the word of god, and that the holy books contain the instructions for us. You obviously don't want to go back to gods as far past their use-by date as Thor and Wotan.

So that puts you amongst people who think that none of the current religions contain an accurate description of god, but that nevertheless there is a god.

I don't suppose you would like this description, but isn't it the case that you are inventing your own version of god? You aren't parotting any of the standard religions, so where does your version of god come from?

Oh, wait a minute. Oh dear. I do recognise a "religion" disturbingly similar to your description that was invented (yes invented) by a certain notorious science fiction writer. I hardly dare ask, but could I ask your opinion of the material on the website: http://www.xenu.net ?

231. Religion and Child Abuse

Comment #48202 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 3:20 am

Comment #48113 by Bizarro Dawkins
C'mon, without me this would be the most boring forum on the internet. At least I'm not a jerk, right (well, most of the time)?

When I was an undergraduate, the students union invited a "UFO believer" to give a talk. He presented crudely drawn crayon sketches of alien spaceships, talked about abductions, explained that the spaceships used "anti-gravity" drive, and demonstrated an antigravity device in front of our eyes. It was a magnet. He said magnetic force could counteract gravity. True, his magnet lifted a piece of metal against the best efforts of the entire earth to pull it down.

After the talk, when people were laughing at him, he puffed himself up and told us that he had been invited to numerous universities to talk about UFOs (implying that he was being taken seriously). It was true. He had been invited to numerous universities - word had got around.
I felt sorry for him at that point, and no longer felt comfortable laughing.

(1) That talk was the best attended, and least boring, that year.
(2) I learned something about human psychology.

232. The 'Is God...Great?' Debate

Comment #48194 by Donald on June 7, 2007 at 2:33 am

Comment #48087 by darwin2
However I believe Hitchens is totally wrong about the existence of God and I think his obsession with the brutal evils of organized religions has crippled his mind into denying the possible and highly probable existence of God.

OK. I'll ask. Would you tell us which god you think (probably) exists?

Thor, Zeus, Apollo?
The god of the OT?
Jesus?
The holy spirit?
ALLAH?
Wotan?

Or, another version you think is the real one, that the writers of the above religions didn't manage to describe accurately? If the latter, please tell us for your god:

Did he create the earth, or did it coalesce from star debris?
Did he create humans, or did they evolve from simpler life forms?
Does he have any instructions for us, and what are they?
Does he intervene in the world? If so, does intercessary prayer work?
Has he created an afterlife for us?

If you find those questions difficult to answer, I invite you to consider the possibility that "god" might simply be a human invention.

233. The 'Is God...Great?' Debate

Comment #48061 by Donald on June 6, 2007 at 1:00 pm

Islam planned to take over the world. But there was a Hitch....

234. Pell plans fidelity oath for principals

Comment #47818 by Donald on June 5, 2007 at 3:33 pm

THE Catholic archdiocese of Sydney wants its 167 school principals, its deputy principals and religious education co-ordinators to publically commit to ... an oath that demands "religious submission of intellect and will" on questions of faith and morals...

Yep, he understands the most effective way to propagate the faith, which so many "moderate" religious leaders have wandered away from.

Scary.

The pope will be pleased though. Perhaps Cardinal Pell might even fancy his chances to be the next pope?

235. Should Science Speak to Faith? A dialog between Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins

Comment #47813 by Donald on June 5, 2007 at 3:17 pm

Comment #47741 by Bonzai

Donald:
Dawkins is referring to the OT...Although those religions have other aspects, one aspect is that they attempt to explain how things have happened in this world (creation, fall, flood, ark, divine retributions, etc, etc, etc), and what will happen if we do, or don't do, certain things. This is the portion of religion that Dawkins calls bad science.
Bonzai:
This would be a valid point only if it is only possible to interpret the OT literally.

I don't agree that my point depends on literal interpretation. Old Earth creationists believe genesis is not literal, but still claim support from the bible for their belief that God created the world. Bible believers select some passages to believe and some to reject. They still claim that God intervened in the world to change things, and they still make claims about the efficacy of prayer, and that bad things happen if one doesn't follow god's instructions. These are claims about the real world, and how it works. That is the bad science bit.

Your Nun's order was doing well to openly acknowledge that many of the bible stories were ripoffs from earlier myths. Of course, she could have gone further and recognised Jesus as Mithras, but perhaps that would be expecting too much.

Yes, I agree that some strands of religious belief are more honest than others, but none of them can give up ALL the myths and mysticism. Each sect clings onto some belief about the real world and how it works which is demonstrably not true, so they all have some element of bad science.

I take Dawkins to be aiming mainly at mainstream USA religion which definitely derives some bad science from the bible.

Yes, sufis are not a problem. If that were the only flavour of Islam, Islam would not be a problem. Unfortunately, Sufis are a very tiny minority, and regarded as not true muslims by mainstream muslim sects. All flavours of Islam have at least the "bad science" that praying can change what happens in the world (or after we die).

So, we agree that religions vary enormously. But I don't think that affects the point about religions having an element of "bad science".


Bonzai 1:
Dawkins errs in assuming most people are like him and his oxford colleagues in having an systematic and intellectually consistent worldview.
Donald:
...I think he understands that most people have neither the time nor the inclination to pursue intellectual matters very far, I also think he regards most people as being able to follow simple logical arguments...
Bonzai 2:
I didn't say most people are incapable of following logic and arguments.

I didn't say you did! I just gave a different perspective on Dawkins, and wondered how you could be so sure what was in Dawkins mind.

Bonzai 2:
Pointing out what I perceive to be a flaw in his argument is not an attack.

We could call it an attack, or not, depending on our mood, our use of language, the context, etc, etc, etc.


Comment #47691 by Bonzai
But in any case if the beef is about false scientific claims and bad cosmology why not just attack them instead of making categorical argument against this amorphous thing called "religion"?

Dawkins has answered this in TGD and elsewhere. To summarise/paraphrase, he has observed that religion is a mindset that discourages independent thinking, is based on ancient myths that make false claims about the world, has dogma that is damaging to present-day civilisation, and spawns fundamentalists who take ancient scripts literally as the word of god with disastrous consequences.

If you only attack the symptoms, the disease remains.

What I want to say is that humans do have emotional needs, we seek satisfactions to those needs in different ways, whether through science, religion, romance, sex or drug abuse.

No disagreement there.

It is simplistic to reduce religion to simply "bad science" without understanding its emotional appeal to the believers as if it can be eliminated through logic and empirical observations.

I don't think Dawkins says that religion can be reduced to "bad science". I am sure that Dawkins understands, as I think just about all of us do, that religion is an emotional pull, and the "science" it contains is ancillary. But Dawkins believes that the extent of modern science undercuts religious beliefs so much that anyone who has a fair understanding of relevant science (and some history) will perceive religion as myth and fairy tales. So he has decided to set out some of the reasons why modern science conflicts with religions. Good for him.

You are pointing out that emotional reasons (and I would single out fear of community ejection as a major one) are powerful reasons for people to stay religious. Quite right, but at least the science "attack" is non-violent, and allows peaceful disinfection for those individuals who can be persuaded to pay attention to it.

We'll just have to agree to disagree on some points.


Getting back to the article, I prefer Dawkins side of that argument, but I agree that tackling entrenched false beliefs requires careful handling of the emotional side. And let's not forget money and power - they are even bigger forces driving the propagation of religious belief than anything discussed here so far.

236. Should Science Speak to Faith? A dialog between Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins

Comment #47688 by Donald on June 5, 2007 at 9:40 am

Dawkins says:
The fact that I think religion is bad science..
Bonzai says:
This sums up succinctly the central flaw of Dawkins' understanding.

Central flaw?! No flaw at all, as I see it.

His sentence, in context, is a reaction to what Krauss said immediately before, about the interaction of science and religion.

Dawkins is referring to the OT, and the origins of the religions we know today as Judaism, Xianity & Islam.
Although those religions have other aspects, one aspect is that they attempt to explain how things have happened in this world (creation, fall, flood, ark, divine retributions, etc, etc, etc), and what will happen if we do, or don't do, certain things. This is the portion of religion that Dawkins calls bad science. Perhaps you are interpreting Dawkins as saying "religion consists only of bad science". If so, I think you are grossly misinterpreting.


Your points about the emotional aspects of religions are good. But then you go on to say:

Dawkins errs in assuming most people are like him and his oxford colleagues in having an systematic and intellectually consistent worldview.

I am surprised that you feel able to be so certain about what Dawkins thinks of most people. From reading and listening to Dawkins, I think he understands that most people have neither the time nor the inclination to pursue intellectual matters very far, but I also think he regards most people as being able to follow simple logical arguments, and distinguish good reasoning from bad reasoning if it is pointed out to them. Dawkins has decided to point out the good reasoning and bad reasoning deployed around reliigon. Good for him. Why are you attacking him?

237. 6 Billion Bits of Data About Me, Me, Me!

Comment #47675 by Donald on June 5, 2007 at 8:57 am

At the risk of sounding even more pedantic, 6 billion characters of a 4-base code, is 6 billion characters in base 4 (this pun of 4-bases in base 4 has really only just occurred to me) which is 12 billion bits (as in binary digits), not 6 billion, as each base 4 digit needs to be replaced by 2 binary digits.

The human genone has about 3 billion "characters in base 4", not 6 billion, so the "6 billion bits" in the title is ok.

238. Religion and Child Abuse

Comment #47601 by Donald on June 5, 2007 at 3:48 am

What a splendid article. It's good to see the efforts of the sane to counterbalance the insanity that gets reported here.


I see Bizarro is still here. But living up to his name, sadly.
Biz mispresents the article, then attacks the misrepresentation. Straw man again!

I'll only tackle the first misrepresentation, which occurs in the first sentence. Biz says "At the heart of this monstrous idea lies the incredible misunderstanding that children can be taught to not believe anything."

I assume that "monstrous idea" means the idea that the religions indoctrinate children, and that this indoctrination is child abuse which should be stopped.
Fine, so far so good, Biz's opinion is that the idea is monstrous. We could usefully discuss the reasons for and against this idea.

But then comes the sleight of hand and the misrepresentation. "...the incredible misunderstanding that children can be taught to not believe anything."

Whoa! NOT so fast, please. The article does NOT say that children can be taught to "not believe things".

To paraphrase the article, it says "children should not be taught damaging false beliefs". Quite different. I assume you CAN see the difference Biz?

Or are you practising to write misleading religious propaganda, and are using this site to explore how far you can go with intelligent readers?

239. What I Think About Evolution

Comment #46544 by Donald on May 31, 2007 at 3:34 pm

I thought it was a well written defence - grammatical and smoothly coherent through the blatantly circular and subversive reasoning.

I wonder who wrote it for him.

240. Observer Diary 27th May 2007

Comment #45493 by Donald on May 28, 2007 at 2:49 am

The posters criticising RD[bbhn] for this and that seem to have overlooked the most serious matter in his diary.
"I could kill at least three birds with one stone."

This from a biologist! And before he even got to the Galapagos!!!

How he gets away with it I don't know.

241. Observer Diary 27th May 2007

Comment #45350 by Donald on May 27, 2007 at 9:40 am

Our impressive Ecuadorian guides told us that Boobies eventually go blind, the consequence of years of repeated high-velocity impacts of their eyes on the water.

Can Richard point us to scientific literature that supports this claim?

[edited] question has been rephrased

242. Christian sports workers degree ridiculed

Comment #44941 by Donald on May 25, 2007 at 3:58 pm

Some translations:

connect with = slip religions indoctrination into

applied theology = evangelism

specialist mission training = how to convert the gullible

sports ministry = slip religious indoctrination into sports

Oh my. I note that the course is supported by sponsorship, both for the course itself, and for funding the jobs that the graduates will be training for.

243. Fears for Democracy in India

Comment #44930 by Donald on May 25, 2007 at 3:41 pm

What an excellent, insightful, article.

I saw the key insight as being the use of "obedience and the abnegation of critical faculties" in the service of groups seeking dominion.

It's not just religions that do it, but nations, ethnic groups, political movements, and even commercial organisations. But the worst offenders by far are religions.

And Nussbaum observes it originates in human nature. Bullseye.

America, and all western nations, should indeed look inside themselves for their own versions of this vice, and seek counter measures as she advises.

There is only one long-term viable solution. The public sphere has to be secular, to allow a reasonable range of diverse opinions and groups to coexist. BUT, the groups within (under) that secular umbrella have to conform to one crucial rule. They must not include dogma or even an implication that their group should seek dominion. Islam and fundamentalist Xianity fail that test.

And ultimately there are decisions to be made. When two groups confront each other, and neither will give way, everyone is forced to join one side or the other. Secularism has to fight dominionism in all its varieties. Its a power struggle. Most of such fights in history have been coupled to territorial disputes. This one is mainly about belief systems, but will no doubt get coupled to land, resources, etc, on a local basis around the world. Can it be a war of words only? Only if both sides see that as to their advantage. So it seems unlikely.

Religious disputes are not mainly about belief systems in the sense of understanding. Religions are about belief systems as tools of power and domination. They are rooted in emotions and power hierarchies, rather than evidence and rationality. This site focuses on evidence and rationality. Fine, but it is a secondary aspect. The real struggle is a power struggle and operates mainly through emotional manipulation.

244. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42466 by Donald on May 18, 2007 at 9:04 am

Hello again Bizarro, I think it is to your credit that you came back to this site to try to defend your beliefs.

It's a pity that your beliefs include that Falwell was a good guy who merely made a few mispronouncements.
It is good to build education for the young, but a crime against humanity to build an educational institution based on misinformation and bigotry.


Regarding the debate on the origins of the universe, it is really a side issue, because neither religion nor science can prove their speculations.

The key question is "does the god of the bible+koran really exist?"

If that god really exists, it is the most important thing we could know.

So most of us here on this site look at all the evidence, WITHOUT any prior assumption that any book, no matter how ancient, was written by a few special humans with privileged access to god.

The result is overwhelming evidence that god was invented, and continually adapted and modified by people, to provide:
(a) comforting explanations in the absence of specific knowledge
(b) rituals to act out in the hope that they affect the future, in the absence of understanding how the universe actually works
(c) power hierarchies (priest claims to be obeying god's will, you in turn must obey what he says are god's instructions for you), which used to be a very important way to get communities to act as a team, and thus survive, and defeat enemy communities in warfare

A small fraction of this evidence is:
The wide variety of different and contradictory versions of the god story (there are currently hundreds, and have been thousands in recorded history)
The blatent contradictions within the story of any one religion
The clear explanations from modern science for some previously inexplicable things, such as the complexity of life
The strange focus of Xianity's god on worshipping him (4 out of 10 commandments) above all else, and the promise of eternal hell if we don't, yet he loves us?!

There is just a chance you may be able to escape your religious indoctrination. (I know you think you have not been indoctrinated - it is often so subtly incorporated into our culture that we don't identify it.)

Giving up belief in a mythical "god" does NOT mean giving up morality, the good ways of living that some religions teach, or being part of a community. All those can be justified equally well without bronze age myths, and derive from our natural instincts and our brains, assuming we can be well educated enough to understand our self-interest in all its deep senses.

You believe that something must have created the universe. Ok, if you must. In that case you can be Deist, not a Theist, and you can believe in Spinoza's god. But I hope you may at least open your eyes to the plethora of different religions, all claiming to be the only true one, and all having equally incredible stories at their core. When you understand the detail of why you reject Thor,Yahweh, Mohammed, the galactic lord Xenu, and hundreds of others, you will understand why we here reject Jesus as well.

245. The Creation Museum: Prepare to believe

Comment #41033 by Donald on May 15, 2007 at 11:29 am

"Jerry Falwell just died."

If there is no god: he won't be able to come back and tell us he was wrong.

If there is a god: I predict he won't come back and tell us he was right.

Why doesn't god allow the dead to communicate with the living? Why not Bizarro/Ryan? The holy books are bit quiet on this question. Religites make up lots of answers though: here is one - god has chosen to supply us with convincing evidence that we evolved over billions of years in the hope that we will instead believe the word of a few writers of "holy books" who were ignorant of modern science, and thus prove we are obedient rather than intelligent.

What is your favorite answer?

246. BBC man says 'I was wrong to lose it. But these scientologists are truly scary'

Comment #40442 by Donald on May 14, 2007 at 9:50 am

"maybe i dont know enough about Scientology... but i cant help but feel that it isn't that much more ridiculous than much of the stuff Christians or Muslims believe... am i wrong?"

You could look at: http://www.xenu.net/

Last year I recall seeing more anti-scientology sites when google searching than now. I guess some of them have been taken off the internet for some reason.

247. True faith is greater than the ranters

Comment #40371 by Donald on May 14, 2007 at 7:31 am

Oh dear.

Rees-Mogg employs a standard polemical trick. Distorting what the opponent says and then attacking the distortion.

Rees-Mogg says:

He [Dawkins] makes an assertion, that is contrary to common experience, that the vast majority of religious believers are closer to the beliefs of American evangelists or of bloodthirsty Islamic terrorists than to quiet and rational religion.

This is a distortion. Dawkins simply does not assert that. Dawkins says that the moderates and fundamentalists both believe in something that does not exist, and that they share a common delusion. It is a different point. Dawkins then says that the moderates give protection for the more extreme beliefs. This is also a different point.

The rest of what Rees-Mogg writes is built upon his distortion and is worthless as a result.

Like all religious apologists who try to operate at a serious intellectual level, Rees-Mogg is forced into polemical tricks because the case for the truth of religious beliefs is so embarrasingly weak, athough the word "weak" does not do it justice. "Zero worthwhile evidence for, and an abundance of strong evidence against" is a better description.

248. Fortune-telling no longer in the cards in Philly

Comment #39271 by Donald on May 10, 2007 at 8:45 am

For readers unacquainted with shakespeare: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falstaff

Well, Sir John, let me begin by humbly thanking you for gracing this forum.

It is a fine thing when a man of your great stature can spare a few moments apart from Prince Hal to advise us common folk.

You are of course quite right to remind us that these fortune tellers, or "gypsies" as you say some refer to them, may be jobless after years of comfortable work, and maybe without anything to fall back on. And that their service is legitimately legal, although not being as distinguished a lawyer as your eminent self, I am a little unsure of the exact meaning of "legitimately legal".

You are also quite right when you say "It is quite arbitrary to decide who is allowed to con people out of their money or not, because everybody does it."

Yes, it is indeed unfair that the laws of the land are uneven in their effect and allow so many cons and scams to thrive, whilst arbitrarily picking on some to penalise. I know we can rely on you to identify the most deserving of crimes, and look forward to your future advices.

Yours most humbly,
Etc, etc.

249. Fortune-telling no longer in the cards in Philly

Comment #39141 by Donald on May 10, 2007 at 4:48 am

Russell Blackford:
This is not good at all: at best, it's offensive paternalism; at worst, it's an attack on "unchristian practices" (as Reg put it above),and thus a little bit of theocracy in action.


You generally make very good posts, but I have to respectfully disagree here.

I see the issue as preventing one particular form of unscrupulous exploitation of the gullible.

Reg's cynicism might have some truth in it, but this is one of those issues (like laws against theft) where religites and atheists can agree. Indeed I think many forms of organised religion are uncomfortably (for them) close to being hit by this law.

Also this is widespread law. I happen to know similar laws apply in the UK and Italy, and I guess probably many other states and countries. That does not make the law right, but it shows there is a widespread problem that lawmakers have felt it necessary to tackle.

250. Londonistan Calling

Comment #38988 by Donald on May 9, 2007 at 5:24 pm

Hitchens is right, right, right about the schools issue and the behind closed doors issue.

As far as schools go, if there is any UK reader who has not signed the "faith schools" petition, http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/faithschools/, please do so.