Dawkins Fondled As A Boy?I did not know that Richard Dawkins was fondled by a “Latin master” when he was 9, but if this “Latin master” was a religious figure, that explains just about everything about Dawkins’ stance on religion. Does anybody know anything else about this?
—Religion’s Real Child Abuse, Free Inquiry, Fall 2002, Vol. 22, No. 4., p. 9.
Oh, Yeah, Big Difference!So I’ve been checking out the nice links y’all left in the Gnu Survey. In response to Charlotte Allen’s poignant article, Atheists: No God, No Reason, Just Whining, a self-proclaimed “angry atheist” named Landon Ross writes,
[Allen] is blind to her own argument as she spews vitriol throughout. The quotes she cites are either taken out of context, with some clever editing, or false altogether. Sam Harris is quoted as saying “that it ‘may be ethical to kill people’ on the basis of their beliefs.” This is a blatant misrepresentation. Harris, in fact, makes plain that only if one believes that the canon they subscribe to is the divine word of god, does it become ethical, or seem reasonable, to kill someone for their religious belief.
LOLOLOLOLOL! And the haters say *I* nitpick and split hairs! Friends, this is pure comedy. Nah, Harris didn’t say it “may be ethical to kill people” on the basis of their beliefs, not at all. After all, we atheists are moral! Respectable! We’d never spout a line of tribalistic paleolithic nonsense because by golly, we’re atheists, we’re modern, and we’re more evolved! Harris only said it may be ethical to kill people “if they believe the canon they subscribe to is the divine word of God.”
In other words, Harris said it may be ethical to kill people on the basis of their beliefs. In other words, Allen’s reporting was spotless, and Landon Ross confirms her depiction of your average atheist as a whiny hater spouting anger and vacuity. By the way, since Landon conveniently neglected to cite his atheist pal, what did Harris actually say?
Some beliefs are so dangerous that it may be ethical to kill people for believing them —Sam Harris, The End of Faith, pp.52-53
In other news, I’ve added a Gnu category to TWIM. LOL!
The Official Cult Of Gnu SurveyHowdy all. Hopefully it’s as beautiful in your part of the world as it is in mine. So, here’s the skinny: I’m looking to compile a list of New Atheist-types for an upcoming project. Who do you see as a New Atheist worth exposing? The first people that come to my mind are obviously the obvious ones like Dawkins, PZ, Coyne, Harris, Carrier and the late Hitchens (can anyone explain why Dennett is always lumped in this category? Most of what I’ve seen from him seems rational, or, at least not blatantly irrational unlike the others, but maybe I just haven’t seen enough).
1. What would you list as the defining characteristics of particular New Atheists, and/or the New Atheist movement in general?
2. Who would you list as the most competent and/or entertaining critics of New Atheism, online or elsewhere?
3. What are some of the better New Atheist exposés you’ve read online?
And Your Point?This morning I was a little disappointed by this article (because I thought it would be about something else). Do we really need “objective data” to tell us that the overwhelming majority of scientists accept the contemporary evolutionary narrative? What does establishing this fact prove? How does it advance the debate? Pre-Einstein, things weren’t much different: the overwhelming majority of physicists accepted the then-contemporary narrative for physics. So what? Did that make them correct? There’s always a consensus, and many a consensus is often overturned. It’s happened with the evolutionary narrative several times before (fossil records falsified Darwinian gradualism, shorebirds are not a basal evolutionary group, homology often fails at the embryonic level).
I guess I just get annoyed when consensus is invoked or implied as direct evidence of truth.
Just For You, Greta!So Greta Christina wrote this reaaaaallllly loooonnnng slog which can basically be expressed in the following sentence: in the marketplace of ideas, why should religion be immune from criticism?
My answer? It shouldn’t. Religion can and should be criticized like any other idea, and in my opinion, the religious should welcome this criticism. After all, I welcome criticism, because through criticism my beliefs are tested. If—like JT Eberhard—I were to shy away from criticism, then I would lose out on the opportunity to test my beliefs. If I lose out on that opportunity, I increase my chance of holding false beliefs. Therefore, criticism of religion is as essential as criticism of any other idea with far-ranging social implications.
So there you go, Greta. Your second straight answer.
A Reminder To The Willfully IgnorantIf you haven’t read it already, I highly suggest Neil Postman’s The End of Education. It isn’t about (a)theism per se—it’s actually about how the transcendent, unifying narratives of previous generations have been replaced by “gods” of consumerism, technology and economic utility—but Postman raises many points with direct import to (a)theist debate. For example,
…the Big Bang theory of modern astronomers is not so far from the story of the Beginning as found Genesis. The thought that a group of camel-riding Bedouins huddling around a fire in the desert night four thousand years ago might ponder the question of how the universe began and come up with a narrative that is similar to one accepted by MIT professors in the late twentieth century speaks of a continuity of human imagination that cannot fail to inspire. (p.112-113)
But of course, as most of the enlightened, rational atheists already know, there is no evidence for God. They may as well discard Postman’s candor entirely.
A Message To The Uber-RationalistI’ve noticed this thing where uber-rational people judge others as “irrational” based exclusively on whether or not the belief in question has **unassailable scientific evidence. When the uber-rationalist makes that move, they misapply a legitimate but isolated truth-criterion without consideration for the full context in which the “irrational” person holds their belief. I say “misapply” because I generally disfavor a myopic approach to reality and I believe truth is best demonstrated through multiple criteria.
Isn’t Richard Carrier Putting The Cart Before The Horse?So you might have heard that the Loftus put out a new book pompously titled, The End of Christianity, which includes a chapter from self-proclaimed infidel Richard Carrier, titled, Moral Facts Naturally Exist (and Science Could Find Them). Can we agree that this is an empirical claim? If so, can you imagine the consternation that might ensue if a reputable physics journal published a paper titled: The Higgs Boson Exists, And Science Could Find It?
Physicalism Is MeaninglessIn a recent discussion over at SoulSprawl, I encountered the following remark:
…solipsism is meaningless, not false, because there is no difference that we can know of, even in principle, that would tell apart a solipsist from a non-solipsist world.
The same goes for the doctrine of physicalism. To date, all definitions of physicalism I’ve seen lead to meaningless philosophical gibberish. There is nothing, even in principle, that could reliably differentiate between a physical and non-physical cause. If you agree, please affirm. If you disagree, state a precise definition of physicalism and we’ll go from there.
Morality: Well Done, Wrongly DoneThis, more or less, is what I tend to believe about morality:
Take, for example, that which we are now doing, drinking, singing and talking—these actions are not in themselves either good or evil, but they turn out in this or that way according to the mode of performing them; and when well done they are good, and when wrongly done they are evil; and in like manner not every love, but only that which has a noble purpose, is noble and worthy of praise.
-From Plato’s Symposium
What sayest thou?