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Morality without a God
by David Roffey
"… consolatory nonsense seems to me a fair definition of myth, anyway … Myth deals in false universals, to dull the pain of particular circumstances." Angela Carter
The Preface to Richard Dawkins' new book, The God Delusion, says: "If this book works as I intend, religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down." On the face of it, a deeply unlikely ambition, and not one that is borne out by the quality of the writing. Along the way, however, it does raise some important questions about the nature of morality, and the relationship of morality to religion.
Let's start with Dawkins' tome …
The God Delusion
Since time immemorial, people have been ascribing what they don't understand to gods and magical beings. This is still the essential argument of many deists, most notably the Intelligent Design / Creationists: "it's too complicated to be explained, therefore a God must have done it". Richard Dawkins, it seems, has had enough of writing popular science texts that attack this idea by explaining the complicated, and has moved on to attack the basic premise.
Dawkins is careful to define the God he is attacking: "a superhuman, supernatural intelligence who deliberately designed and created the universe and everything in it, including us." (p.31) and: "in addition to his main work of creating the universe in the first place, is still around to oversee and influence the subsequent fate of his initial creation." (p.18). Examples: Yahweh, Christ, Allah, but not Buddha or Confucious.
So, we are not here discussing an Einsteinian or Spinozan amorphous belief in (eg) a god or force who designed the universe but has taken no actions in it for several billion years once it was set up or sneezed out of the Great Green Arkleseizure * (busy with some other project?). "To adapt Alice's comment on her sister's book before she fell into Wonderland, what is the use of a God who does no miracles and answers no prayers. Remember Ambrose Bierce's witty definition of the verb 'to pray': 'to ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner, confessedly unworthy'." (p.60)
Failure to understand this distinction as it is intended renders, for example, the New Scientist review of the book meaningless, as well as many other criticisms of it from those who say they do not recognise the God they believe in as the one under attack – simultaneously not recognising that the God they believe in is not the same one that their church, temple or mosque believes in, either.
Second definition: Delusion: "a persistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence" (MS Word dictionary). Dawkins notes with interest that the illustrative quotation for "delusion" in the Penguin English Dictionary is "Darwinism is the story of humanity's liberation from the delusion that its destiny is controlled by a power higher than itself" (Phillip E Johnson).
Now, clearly any follower of any religion believes that theirs is the only true and valid view. However, there is a wide range of views about what to do about the infidels who don't believe (or, worse, believe in something else). I have a vivid memory of a service led by the saintly Rev Dr Ann Wansbrough which began with a welcome that included the words: "My God loves you whether you believe in him or not." Like everyone else, I also have many vivid memories of news of incidents perpetrated by those who think in more violent terms on how you treat unbelievers. Dawkins' motivation for attacking religion, rather than just ignoring it, is essentially because of the growing prevalence of the fundamentalist and intolerant view amongst followers of many religions (but most particularly in the three Abrahamic faiths). Anyone who has seen Andrew Denton's low-key masterpiece God on my side has seen some good examples. (NB, keep watching to the end of the credits for the best question of the whole film.)
Dawkins has the traditional fun with the myriad contradictions and inconsistencies of the Bible story, and the unlikelihood that anyone could live their life following God's word as set out in it without being banged up for life:
"The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a mysogynist, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully." (p.31)
Knockabout stuff, but not really up to the task of persuading the deluded that Dawkins has set himself. A confirmed deist who took on the penance of reading the whole thing will have no difficulty brushing off the rational (after all, faith in the irrational is how they got where they are to start with). They might give up on page 253, just after St Paul is described by Dawkins (with every justification, admittedly) as "barking mad, as well as viciously unpleasant".
Which would be a shame, because they'd miss some of the more important questions on the next few pages, as Dawkins raises questions of just what exactly is the morality we can get from religious teachings, and where they can lead us. A few recent debates elsewhere on Webdiary might be illuminated by the discussion of Israeli schoolchildren's reactions to and learnings from the story of Joshua and the battle of Jericho (pp.255-7) [NB – worth reading the whole paper by John Hartung from which Dawkins' discussion is drawn.]
Choosing which of God's Rules to follow
The key point raised is this: clearly, good Christians don't get all of their moral teaching from the Bible, or, more accurately, don't get their moral teaching from all of the Bible – they pick and choose amongst God's word for the principles they feel comfortable with, and discard the ones they don't. Faced with the injunction to " utterly destroy all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword" (and keep the gold for the Treasury), most of us have second thoughts, and those that don't tend to end up on trial, as do those Muslims who follow up on the equally lurid odd passages of the Koran.
We all interpret and choose amongst the moralities set out around us, and the evidence is that the choices that atheists and religious people make when faced with moral dilemmas are very similar (pp.222-6). So, Dostoevsky's Ivan Karamazov was almost certainly wrong, and without god, not everything is permitted, and not only because "conscience is that inner voice that warns us that someone may be looking" (HL Mencken).
As one of Dawkins' chapter titles asks: why are we good? He provides a good summary of the evolutionary reasons why individuals might be altruistic, generous or 'moral' towards each other: kinship, reciprocation, reputation-building, and advertising ourselves as good breeding mates. Once we started banging the rocks together with a purpose, thoughtful humans have selected towards these characteristics (though not completely – see Capitalism's Moral Bastards). People who care are just more likely to successfully pass on their genes. We don't need that 'someone who may be looking' to be some omniscient and personified surveillance system with a penchant for smiting or torturing for eternity those who transgress.
On the other side, as we've already aired here, those who do want to do almightily awful things to their fellow human beings (and the rest of the denizens of the planet), can find plenty of justification in the weirder outreaches of their holy books.
As Dawkins sees it (and I agree), the big problem with religion is not so much in the detail of the Jericho's and the '72 virgins', but in the absolutism of the handing down of knowledge, and the aversion to discovery (not to mention the whole Armageddon movement and its view of all the fire, flood and disaster as being preliminaries to final days – and thus not only unavoidable / unpreventable, but to be welcomed).
The question is, now that we're applying intelligence as well as instinct and evolution to our morality, just how do we choose the rules we follow from among those set out by our peers, our parents, or our favourite prophet?
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Morality without a God
As it happens, while I was reading The God Delusion, I was also reading another book covering this ground from a very different direction: Values, Ethics and Society: Exton Land [an alter ego of writer LE Modesitt Jr (LE = Leland Exton)] **
"What is ‘ethical’ or moral? A general definition is that actions that conform to a ‘right set of principles’ are ethical. Such a definition begs the question: Whose principles? On what are those principles based? Do those principles arise from reasoned development by rational scholars? Or from ‘divine’ inspiration? Does it matter, so long as they inspire moral and ethical behaviour? ... In practice, with or without a deity, every action is permitted unless human social structures preclude it. Yet, on what principles are those social structures based? Ethics and morality?
Theocracies and other societies using religious motives, or pretexts, have undertaken genocide, torture, and war. Ideologues without the backing of formal religious doctrine or established theocratic organizations have done the same. The obvious conclusion is that ‘moral’ values must be ethical in and of themselves, and not through religious or secular authority or rationalized logic. This leads to the critical questions: How can one define what is ethical without resorting to authority, religious doctrine, or societal expediency? And whom will any society trust to make such a judgment, particularly one not based on authority, doctrine, or expediency?"
Setting out some principles
On the face of it, the definition of ethical looks pretty straightforward. It is relatively easy to set out a "new ten commandments" that fit most people's ideas of ethics and morality – Dawkins references some of these – and they will have a substantial overlap with the principles in the Sermon on the Mount – which is one of only three incidents in the story of Jesus that are agreed upon by all the Gospel writers (the others being the baptism and the passion week story). The problem is that atheists are no more likely to actually act on those principles in their day-to-day life than Christians are. If you think I'm being harsh, try looking for the frequency of application of a few examples, say (not at all at random): "Agree with thine adversary quickly" or "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you" or "Judge not, that ye be not judged".
The Golden Rule ("do as you would be done by") would tend to come first, followed by "(strive to) do no harm". Of the original Ten (though actually there is not agreement amongst the sects on what the original Ten are), we can fairly easily accept the injunctions against murder, theft and perjury, while wondering how it came that coveting your neighbours' stuff got to be more worth mentioning than, say, rape or child abuse, and not getting too distracted by the thought that at least some sects have used "honour thy father and mother" as justification for forms of the latter.
"To insist that people not annex their neighbor's cattle or wife 'or anything that is his' might be reasonable, even if it does place the wife in the same category as the cattle, and presumably to that extent diminishes the offense of adultery. But to demand 'don't even think about it' is absurd and totalitarian, and furthermore inhibiting to the Protestant spirit of entrepreneurship and competition.": (Christopher Hitchens, in Slate)
Dawkins, with a modern sensibility, argues for "do not discriminate or oppress on the basis of race, sex or (as far as possible) species", "do not indoctrinate your children" and "view the future on timescale longer than your own". (pp.263-5)
However, this only takes us so far along the route. The principles may be clear, but how do we actually operationalise them in our individual lives and police them in society's rules – and how much do we respect other society's/people's different rules.
"Traditionally, one of the fundamental questions behind every considered attempt to define ethical behaviour has been whether there is an absolute standard of morality or whether ethics can be defined only in terms of an individual and the culture in which that individual lives.
Both universal absolutism and cultural relativism are in themselves unethical. Not only is the application of universal absolutism impractical, but it can be unethical, because the universe is so complex that there are bound to be conflicts between standards in actual application, unless, of course, the standards are so vague that they convey only general sentiments.
‘Be kind to one another’ is good general guidance, but it does not qualify as an ethical standard because the range of interpretation of the meaning of ‘kind’ is so broad as to allow individuals incredible discretion. That does not even take into account the problems when society must deal with unethical or violent individuals.": 'Exton Land'
Interpreting the rules
It isn't only the definition of 'kind' that has been a problem. The other big problem in "be kind to one another" has traditionally been the circumscription of 'one another' to a severely reduced subset of humanity. Dawkins points out that the original Ten Commandments' "thou shalt not kill" only applied to other Jews – killing non-Jews didn't count (and in the case of Jericho and numerous other examples was at God's command). For most of history, 'one another' also didn't include any females, or at least not to the same extent – recall that Lot proved his status as the only man worth saving in Sodom by offering his daughters up for gang rape in place of the angels he was sheltering.
The modern response to these dilemmas sometimes seems to be ever more detailed definition of exactly what is or isn't forbidden / punishable / suable for, with piles of precedent and litigation to hone the edges of liability and guilt. Almost makes you want to hark back to the false certainties of doing what the AllFather tells you…
"The Judeo-Christian concept of ‘original sin’ as defined in basic Christian theology was and remains an extremely useful tool for social indoctrination, because (1) it provides a reason for evil while also allowing people to accept that evil is not the fault of the given individual; (2) supplies a rationale for why people need to be taught ethics and manners; and (3) still requires that people adhere to an acceptable moral code.
Only a small minority of human beings have a strong predilection toward either ‘morality’ or ‘immorality’. This has historically posed a problem for any civil society based on purely secular rule because (1) society in the end is based on some form of self-restraint; and (2) the impetus to require self-discipline and to learn greater awareness of what is evil and unacceptable lacks the religious underpinnings present in a theocracy or a society with a strong theocratic presence. Likewise, history has also demonstrated most clearly that the majority of individuals are uncomfortable in accepting a moral code that is not based on the ‘revelation’ of a divine being, because in matters of personal ethics, each believes his or her ethics are superior to any not of ‘divine’ origin.
As transparently fallacious as this widely accepted personal belief may be, equally transparent and fallacious – and even more widely accepted – are the ethical and moral systems accepted as created by divinities – and merely revealed to the prophets of each deity for dissemination to the ‘faithful’. Throughout history, this has been a useful but transparent fiction because the ‘divine’ origin of moral codes obviates the need for deciding between various human codes. Humans being humans, however, the conflict then escalates into a struggle over whose god or whose interpretation of god is superior, rather than focussing on the values of the codes themselves.": 'Exton Land'
Focusing on our values
It really is becoming very important that we try to focus on the values of the codes (and our society) themselves. We have let our society drift for the last fifty years or so along a path where the values of the individual and the market have been allowed progressively to dominate: where the central dogma is that there is no dogma – there is always another way of looking at things - that all voices deserve a hearing, that all points of view have something of value to offer.
"There is indeed an ethical absolute for any situation in which an individual may find himself or herself, but each of these absolutes exists only for that individual and that time and situation. This individual ‘absolutism’ is not the same thing as cultural relativism, because cultures can be, and often have been, totally unethical and immoral, even by their own professed standards. That a practice or standard is culturally accepted does not make it ethical. There have been cultures that thought themselves moral that practiced slavery, undertook genocide, committed infanticide, and enforced unequal rights based on gender or sexual orientation.
The principle practical problems with individual absolutism are that, first, one cannot implement a workable societal moral code on that basis, and, second, that any individual can claim unethical behaviours to be moral in a particular situation, which, given human nature, would soon result in endless self-justification for the most unethical and immoral acts. That said, the practical problems do not invalidate absolute individual morality, only its societal application …
In practice, what is necessary for a society is a secular legal structure that affirms basic ethical principles (eg, one should not kill, or injure others; one should not steal or deceive, etc), and that also provides a structured forum, such as courts, in which an accused has an unbiased opportunity to show that, under the circumstances, his behaviour was as moral as the situation allowed. Such a societal structure works, however, as demonstrated by history, only when the majority of individuals in the society are willing to sacrifice potential self-interest for the value of justice, and such societies have seldom existed for long, because most individuals eventually place immediate personal gain above long-term societal preservation.
The faster and more widely this ‘gospel of greed’ is adopted, the more quickly a society loses any ethical foundation – and the more rapidly it sows the seeds of its own destruction.": 'Exton Land'
The reaction to blatant wrongdoing that contravenes our basic values can be reduced to "well, that's the only way you can do business over there". If the only values we all submit to are the values of the market, then 'a fair go' doesn't get a market value, nor do the rest of the 'Australian Values' the Commonwealth is about to spend a small fortune on in our schools. (Hands up who can name them? - to save you, they are: Fair Go; Care and Compassion; Understanding, Tolerance and Inclusion; Integrity; Doing Your Best; Freedom; Respect; Responsibility - and doesn't our Federal Government stand up for all of these every day as an example to our kids.)
Letting market value determine the rules
"What happens to ethics and morality when economics reigns unchecked – when the negative externalities of not following an ethical course are not included in the marketplace? Laissez-faire economic systems simply assume that everything has a price, and that, if left alone, supply and demand will balance at an optimum price. As a general rule, it works fairly well. Or it does so long as there is an independent moral system underlying it.
Assume everything has a price. Does that mean that ethical behaviour also has a price? And that, if it is scarce, it becomes harder and harder for the average citizen to purchase?
Look at history, How many societies were there where ethical behaviour in trade and government were not the norm, but where bribery was necessary merely to ensure that both merchants and functionaries did their jobs? Then, in the worst cases, whether or not the job was done depended not on ethics, but on market power, on who could pay the highest price. In some societies, that was obvious. In others, that aspect of the market economy is far from obvious. They have an elected government, and everyone can vote. And they have a seemingly open legal system. But that system is based on the assumption that an adversarial system will provide the truth and justice. At times, it does, but only when both advocates are of close to equal ability and when the issues are relatively simple. Most times, the court ends up deciding for the party with the most resources, unless the case happens to be one that is truly egregious. The same thing happens with legislative bodies, because once large nation-states developed and modern communications emerged, the number of citizens represented by each legislator grew so large that only those candidates with the resources to purchase those communications services could reach the citizens. So, in the end, both the laws and their interpretation become commodities purchased by the highest bidders.": 'Exton Land'
How far are we down the road to a society where market power overrules democracy always and everywhere? I'm fascinated by how the Right are divided over this question: while some will protest that all is best in this best of all possible worlds, and our version of democracy is so strong and pure that it must be exported to the rest of the world (at gunpoint, if necessary), there is another faction that may have gotten quieter about the 'greed is good' philosophy since Wall Street, but basically believes it still.
The latter view is often mixed up with some simplistic interpretation of Adam Smith's 'invisible hand', and views such as this:
"The rich ... divide with the poor the produce of all their improvements. They are led by an invisible hand to make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life which would have been made, had the earth been divided into equal proportions among all its inhabitants." Adam Smith (1759), The Theory of Moral Sentiments. London: A. Millar, 1790. Part IV. Of the Effect of Utility upon the Sentiment of Approbation in paragraph IV.I.10
This earlier 'invisible hand', which predates the more famous one in the later Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776), exposes the habitual misapplication of the term, because The Theory of Moral Sentiments is imbued throughout by the unstated assumption that the aforementioned rich operate in a society with a shared set of values ('moral sentiments') based on pervasive agreements on ethics and morality that our society has largely left behind (or reserved for a small and compartmentalised segment of life).
A 'crisis of faith'?
There is some (mostly anecdotal) evidence that the general run of our society is becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the direction we are taking. Whether this unease or malaise is going to translate into action is far from clear.
"A societal crisis of faith occurs when the values that produced a particular incarnation of a society no longer correspond to the values held by the individuals and organisations holding economic, political, and social power in that society. Paradoxically, these value changes seem to occur first on a social level. In reality the changes are already far advanced by the time they appear, because in most societies social standing and mobility lag behind economic and political power. Those with economic power seldom wish to flaunt values at variance with social norms, and those in the political arena prefer a protective coloration that in fact straddles the perceived range of values, while ostensibly preferring the most popular of values …
Although all stable societies rest firmly on a consensus of values, invariably the individuals in those societies prefer not to discuss those values, except in glittering generalities, not because they are unimportant, but because they are so important that to discuss them seriously might open them to question and interpretation. Thus, the very protections of a society’s values preclude any wide-scale and public re-evaluation of those values and any recognition of a potential crisis of values.": 'Exton Land'
The need for a new consensus
We are coming to a period where the challenges to society are going to require actions that need a radical change to the fundamental ethics we hold so deeply that we haven't hardly questioned them at all. Only a short while ago, our Prime Minister got away almost unquestioned with the theory that we couldn't possibly consider doing anything about the future of the planet if it was going to potentially cost Australian jobs: even now the rhetoric is still (qua the Stern review) that saving the planet is only on the agenda because it might not cost any jobs after all.
We need a new consensus on morality and ethics. Coming full circle to where we started, I don't think we can look to religion to get us there, because although there are many wonderful and moral people in all major religions, large factions of the religious hold to various versions of either "let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth", or "these are the latter days, fire and flood, and there is nothing we can do to stop it" – this last being a direct quote from conversation with a famous Australian of evangelical bent.
Where are we going to get our consensus? Everywhere, I guess. David Curry's boy gets his worldview at least in part from The Lion King. Probably a better place to start than The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which in the film version at least was so heavily into the Church Militant and smiting that I ended up cheering for the Witch. I, in my turn, have taken much of my text from the sidebars of a novel.
However we get there, the process must be at least as moral and ethical as the result.
"From the beginning of human history, there has always been a debate over the ethics of ends and the ethics of means. Can a good and ethical solution result from the use of unethical or immoral means? Does the end justify the means? Virtually all ethicists would agree that, of course, it does not, because, first, actions should be ethical in and of themselves, and, second, because corrupt means almost invariably result in corrupting the ends."
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Notes
* "The Jatravartid People of Viltvodle Six firmly believe that the entire universe was sneezed out of the nose of a being called The Great Green Arkleseizure. They live in perpetual fear of the time they call The Coming Of The Great White Handkerchief." The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy: Dawkins' book is dedicated to Douglas Adams.
** 'Exton Land's writings are scattered through the section and chapter headings of Modesitt's books: all of the quotes above come from The Ethos Effect. As David Brin noted in the speech cited in the text, science fiction is one of the places where human creativity can explore the big questions without getting bogged down in the specifics of history and particular hard cases.
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Over the limit
I think the question of whether the religions can produce better systems of ethics, or more moral people, is too broad. If we could accept that the overarching problem to humanity is the existence of evil, then there may be a discussion that Dawkins (and Harris) could get into on equal terms with religionists. I don't know if either would use the term (evil), but I reckon they would much like to see the end of actions that are deliberately intended to harm others. That's a narrow definition of evil, but it is certain that the organised religions have failed to make much headway. It's also a good place to see whether scientific endeavour can help find a solution to that particular problem. The answer may be a very simple one, a silver bullet akin to the discovery of the actions of penicillin by Fleming and Florey, or something like the smallpox vaccine. That is, the problem could be related to a single factor like infection with toxoplasma or even something counter-intuitive like an excess of a vitamin in the diet.
If Dawkins and colleagues are searching earnestly for the cause, they will be using rational principles, scientific method and looking for evidence that can be tested. They will not be, and there is no need to be, hoping for a special intervention from God. They will, justifiably, ignore the many who come forward with the claim that moshiach is found over here, or there, or in a specific person. However, Dawkins is stuck with fact that his search is only a hope, there is no evidence evil will ever be eliminated, and that his passion is therefore grounded in faith. But he can be confident he is on a better track than the prevailing powers that so evidently proceed in the belief that peace can only come through destruction.
Sam Harris, the neuroscientist:
From the Sam Harris website, Response to Controversy:
A cross-posting of Harris is at RichardDawkins.net - The Official Richard Dawkins Website.
More at NPR - Science Explores Meditation's Effect on the Brain.
In this approach from neuroscience, Harris (and Dawkins?) perhaps hope to see into undiscovered reservoirs of knowledge, or pathways to them, in the unconscious. There's nothing new about that. There are strong clues discoveries are to be made and confirmed, but I will be watching for two broad themes in their work. First, no human endeavour is disconnected from the arts, literature and music. Scientists who are not informed by these essential characteristics of true humanity are dangerous.
In the BBC series Spitfire Ace (now being re-run on ABC TV) one of the ex-pilots (The Few) lamented on the meaning of young men of the twentieth century up in the skies in the finest machines shooting each other down in flames. The next bit of backing music to the documentary was an excerpt from Allegri's Miserere. There is a kind of rescue, from ever present tragedies, in the sublimity of human expression, and that may be all we can hope for in our present state of knowledge. My pessimism wouldn't stop Dawkins et al in their passion for scientific advance, but they must respect the other avenues as much as their own fields. The musicality of Boys Wanna Be Her is as much part of our heritage as McRae's In Flanders Fields.
The neuroscience of meditation may unlock pathways to brand new kinds of knowledge. But, right now, children are being denied the most basic elements of education. We are not all capable of seeing things the same way, and educational structures should not promote some perceptions and learnings at the expense of others. The facts support the case that humanity is benefited greatly when there is a multiplicity of means of acquiring, digesting and expressing knowledge and understanding.
So to the second signpost. Progressive education takes account of different kinds of learning, and All Kinds of Minds is one example. If Dawkins and Harris are right, then more investment in learning and education will get us closer to solving the predominant paradox of our age. The approach should recognise perception is not restricted to the conscious. One day, a guru may emerge from a cave after 40 days of meditation, with a brilliant new moral code or scientific hypothesis that promises to eliminate evil. Whether or not this came from God will not matter. But if there is a multi-focal eruption of the same idea, or solution, in many minds all over the globe, we may have to re-think the Dawkins hypothesis.
Well said Geoff
Hi Geoff, glad to see you still here. Our conversation didn't finish but I haven't passed away, just yet anyway. Still interested mate?
Enough 2 Party barracking.
Said What?
Glad to see you're still around Ross. I was getting a little worried for a while there.
Still interested? Sure. God willing.
An invisible friend ...
... says "Kill 'em, kill 'em all"
One Redeemer
Will Howard, I am constantly irritated by this sort of nonsense, fuzzy thinking, or call it what you will. Sadly it is the currency of a certain type of scietific propoganda:
While some might regard the quibble as no more than semantic, it is not. Science is not about theory; it is about hypotheses. A "theory" is merely an undisconfirmed hypothesis (a good example of a disconfirmed hypothesis is the "ether"). As such, theory has no absolute permanance. That is the problem with "god": the concept is supposed to be absolute and enduring.
You perceive no difficulty with the essential difference between science and belief: the true believer takes on faith the permanance of his "god' while the true scientist (or empiricist) takes on faith that any proposition can be disproved but, until it is, it remains a valid working hypothesis. Your perception is fundamentally flawed.
Re: One Redeemer
Malcolm, perhaps I should have made more clear what I mean by "theory." I use the word in the (New Oxford American) dictionary sense of: "a supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something, esp. one based on general principles independent of the thing to be explained. e.g. Darwin's theory of evolution.
That same dictionary defines the related term "hypothesis" as: "a supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation."
Both "theory" and "hypothesis" share one vital quality which distinguishes science from religious belief: they are amenable to disproof. You are correct that no theory or hypothesis has absolute permanence, and is only standing because it hasn't yet been knocked down.
Perhaps my use of the term "article of faith" for the underpinning of the scientific enterprise was a poor choice of words. Maybe "premise" or "postulate" would be a better word.
Te Absolvo
To the extent that was an apology (and correctly so) Will Howard, I accept. Pax vobiscum.
Sam Harris on Radio National
This morning I caught the second half of a very interesting interview with an American scientist called Sam Harris on Radio National that I thought would be very pertinent to this debate. He's apparently another 'evangelical athiest' - he mentioned Dawkins in fact - and the transcript should be available on the ABC website soon. I have to run (I'm heading down the coast for my short annual pilgrimage) but if somebody else can track it down and provide a link that would be great. Must have been 'the religion report', I think.
Re: Sam Harris on Radio National
Maybe dogmatism is really the problem
In that Radio National interview with Sam Harris, RN's Stephen Crittenden makes the same criticism that I would make of "evangelical atheism":
Harris replies:
Crittenden interrupts:
The flaw in Harris' reasoning, IMO, is that this criticism of religion only applies if you take the scriptural stories literally and your faith depends on a literal interpretation of the scriptures. E.g. God made the Earth in six days; Jesus walked on water, etc. So millions of Christians and Jews, for example, are perfectly comfortable with evolution by natural selection on a 4.5-billion-year-old Earth and the Big Bang without their traditions being unravelled.
Harris asserts that (in the case of the Judeo-Christian traditions) the Scriptures:
But the Bible says nothing about condoms or AIDS. It is the Pope's interpretation of Catholic traditions stemming from the texts that informs his opposition of condom use. Other branches of Judeo-Christianity do not prohibit condom use (just as one example). My point is that Harris (and Dawkins to some extent) has just as literal, deterministic, and mechanistic an interpretation as the fundamentalists he criticises. Harris implies that if you accept the Bible as the central text of your religious tradition you must "subvert... reason in favour of religious dogmatism." I don't think this is true. Harris ignores the fact that there are "open-ended and non-dogmatic" discussions going on as we speak within many religious communities. About the role of women in religious institutions, about homosexuality, abortion, embryonic stem-cell research, and other
issues of human interest.
I agree with Harris that religion can and often does lend itself to dogmatism. Dogmatic interpretation of the Bible has done a lot of damage in the world; but so have the dogmas stemming from The Communist Manifesto and Mao's Little Red Book. Any belief system is vulnerable to dogmatism, and it is this dogmatism that Dawkins and Harris seem to take greatest issue with.
So why not just criticise dogmatism?
Sam Harris
I heard that broadcast, and it is a repeat of the one picked up by Will. Good stuff.
Harris and Andrew Sullivan are having a blogalogue about faith and reason.
Sullivan vs. Harris
In that "blogalogue" (thanks for the link Trevor) Andrew Sullivan makes a very cogent comment: "Science cannot disprove true faith; because true faith rests on the truth; and science cannot be in ultimate conflict with the truth. So I am perfectly happy to believe in evolution, for example, as the most powerful theory yet devised explaining human history and pre-history. I have no fear of what science will tell us about the universe - since God is definitionally the Creator of such a universe; and the meaning of the universe cannot be in conflict with its Creator. I do not, in other words, see reason as somehow in conflict with faith - since both are reconciled by a Truth that may yet be beyond our understanding."
In a sense, both science and religious belief have their own articles of "faith." In the case of science, it is that there are rational, natural, rule-based, empirically-testable theories which can explain our universe; i.e. "the (scientific) truth is out there." No ad hoc "fairy tales" or "magical" explanations are allowed in science. As in "God stopped the sun in the sky, Joshua blew down the walls of Jericho, then everything went back to normal."
Science cannot rule out the intervention of a deity, but must not require it. However, for all we know we scientists could be the butt of a cosmic joke and God is having a good laugh at our expense.
Nuclear winter
Time For A Song ...
OK guys.
I'm happy to concede that the evidence for an interventionist God is problematic. To say the least. Indeed both for and against.
But I can say one thing for certain. I believe in love.
Into my arms.
Od's bodkins
Geoff - if I didn't make it clear, I'll try again. Dawkins spends a long time making it clear in detail that he isn't attacking those of all or any "modern religion" as described by you and Will. (He has famously appeared in a "Scientists for Jesus" t-shirt.) He specifically identifies that he is attacking those of any and every religion who believe that God has told them explicitly what to do (at least through a long-dead prophet) as a guide to how they work in the world. What that White House aide helpfully described as faith-based decision making.
While he spends a little time on those in Islam and Judaism, he rightly (in my view) spends most of his time on the most dangerous of these sects, the Christians, whose literalist legions in the Southern Baptist Conference etc really do believe in the kind of god that you and Will (and I) don't, and that Dawkins attacks ... They and the martyrs for Islam and the Greater Israelists live in the same meme space, and deserve the attention and the attack.
An Unproveable Proposition
Dawkins said in an interview recently "I'm actually asking people to open their eyes to the evidence and think critically, and I think if you do open your eyes to the evidence and you do think critically then you will come to your own conclusion and become an atheist." Dawkins makes it quite clear he's seeking to convert believers to atheism, and expresses his pride that author Douglas Adams is one of his first converts.
There's no more "evidence" that there is no God than that there is one. What "evidence" does Dawkins have for his atheism? There is no empirical evidence proving there's no God. Science, which Dawkins invokes as authoritative, cannot rule out God, though it must not require Her. In that same interview Dawkins asserts of his atheism: "it's not a rival religion because it's not based upon authority, it's not based upon revelation, it's not based upon tradition, it's based upon evidence, and nothing in religion is based upon evidence."
But what is this "evidence?" I don't see it. If there is none then all he's pushing is another rival religion. There's nothing wrong with that; I respect his beliefs and all the precepts of Dawkinism. But I see no basis for according Dawkins' atheism any more intellectual authority than any other faith-based belief system.
David: you could try reading the book instead of inventing what he might have said and attacking that: I think Chapter 4 would be the one - the title of the Chapter being "Why there almost certainly is no God". I have to say that I'm deeply disinterested in whether there is a God or not, as long as he or she stays out of my life, which fortunately seems to be the standard position. What does interest / appal me is how many other people want to use their belief in their God to interfere in my life and morality.
Let's leave God out of it
David Roffey: "[Dawkins] specifically identifies that he is attacking those of any and every religion who believe that God has told them explicitly what to do."
I understand that. The point still stands - how can he, or you, prove they're wrong?
And David, I'm not "inventing" anything. Dawkins has made it clear, in numerous articles and interviews, that he believes there's no God, and has titled a chapter of his book accordingly, as you note: "Why there almost certainly is no God." He may be right, but he cannot prove it, any more than believers can "prove" God exists, let alone has told them what to do.
Dawkins has made it clear he doesn't even like agnosticism, telling Salon Magazine: "It's said that the only rational stance is agnosticism because you can neither prove nor disprove the existence of the supernatural creator. I find that a weak position."
What I'm criticising is what I view as Dawkins' intrusion of science into an area it has no business going. He says "the presence or absence of a creative super-intelligence is unequivocally a scientific question.” No, it isn't. Jim Holt, reviewing The God Delusion for the New York Times, notes:
I'm not "attacking" Dawkins' assertion that there's no God. I'm pointing out it's beyond empirical proof. That is, empiricism can't touch it (cue the MC Hammer music).
You note you are appalled by how other people use their belief in God to interfere with your life. Fair enough point, and I agree completely. So let's talk about that and leave God's existence or non-existence out of it. Like you, I'm not that interested in whether there is a God or not.
"Disproof"
Will, can you disprove the assertion that a malevolent green-skinned witch lives deep inside Uranus? No. Is that assertion plausible simply because it cannot be disproved? No. Is there any rational reason to believe it? No. Should we all respect such beliefs because they cannot be disproved? No. The same goes for the concept of a super-person or persons who created and/or control the universe. That is Dawkins' point. The anthropomorphic deity of Christianity and Islam, and its "bad god" counterpart Satan, are patently absurd, child-like constructs that deserve no respect whatsoever. The more ridicule the rest of us can throw at them, the better.
Disproof and Dylan Moran
Mike, to me it's not a question of "respecting" or disrespecting deistic beliefs, however they may manifest themselves. The plausibility of the green-skinned witch in Uranus is beside the point. From the viewpoint of rationality and empiricism the idea of a God or gods is indeed absurd and ridiculous.
You and Dawkins are fully entitled to ridicule away. Dawkins is not entitled to call it a "scientific" issue.
I saw Dylan Moran's stand-up routine last night. Very funny. I'm already a big fan of "Black Books." His comedy "persona" is quite similar to Bernard!
scientifically speaking,
Will, scientifically speaking, if you are going to offer some outrageous theory, you'd better have some evidence to back it up. If not, you will not be taken seriously in the scientific arena.
There is no evidence for a God in the sense that Dawkins is criticising. Nor is there evidence that a green skinned witch lives deep within Uranus. Or that a teapot orbits Pluto (Dawkins' example), etc. Thus the stance of science on the issue of the existence of such a God is that there is no evidence for such a being. The null hypothesis of "there is no God" must therefore be retained.
Implausibility is not an argument
Mike, I would add that plausibility or implausibility is not an argument for or against anything, either.
Many scientific ideas we now accept were considered "implausible" when first proposed. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, the basis of Dawkins' career, for one. Continental drift for another.
Has Dawkins Said Anything New?
And so on and so on. Now let me be absolutely clear about this. At the first mention of Mishnah, Gemara, Sanhedrin 79a, my eyes glaze over as quickly as the next man's.
But I can also spot a logical fallacy as quickly as the next bloke and there is a humdinger in Hartung's essay. When the Jews copped the love law, or at least the don't murder other humans law, they were isolated in the desert with only other Jews around so therefore the prohibition against murder did not apply to killing non-Jews. Oh really? So Hartung takes Exodus literally? The law arrived one day inscribed on two tablets on the shoulders of Charlton Heston who was in a relatively good mood and so the punters sold off the golden calves to a passing tribe of heathens on its way to a FA Cup final. Or something. How quaint. Almost sweet.
There's a well known literary feature that applies to the Pentateuch and Talmud as much as any other set of books ever written. This is that the books are written after, perhaps well after the events the books purport to describe and that therefore the context and times of when the books were written is at least as important as the context and times of when the described events ocurred, when interpreting the meaning of the books. Unless you believe the Pentateuch is the literal word of God handed down from Mt Sinai, as Hartung appears to, in which case what is his problem? Judaism? Or God?
As for the other stuff? Now I remember where I have seen it before. As I've said I'm no expert on Torah or Talmud and I leave that sort of thing to those who are. But I've seen all kinds of funny strands of bigotry before, and the misrepresentation of the religious or cultural beliefs of groups, to cast them in the worst possible light, is a tried and true classic that seems to be coming back into fashion in a big way. It appears in the most unlikely of places. Perhaps even in pop-cult paperbacks about God, morality and atheism.
Here's what another expert has had to say about some of these issues. I don't know who is right or wrong. But there is something that smells pretty funny around here.
And so on. By all means read all the examples . But I do suggest you stay out of the hate sites where the claims were originally made.
Dawkins and Islam
Geoff, Dawkins certainly does not shy away from ridiculing Islam. And he is a brave man indeed for doing so these days.
Read his book and you will probably have a different impression to your "silly little man" one (although I have no idea about his physical stature, his book is definitely not silly).
Challenge Accepted.
OK, Mike. I'll read the book.
My hostility to Dawkins and his book is based on my assumption that he is attacking things that most Christians and religious Jews do not believe and perhaps never did believe. I also have a grave suspicion that he is using sources, or sources that have sources, that may have a very unpleasant provenance.
Moreover I suspect hypocrisy and semantic fraud. He defines "God" as "a superhuman, supernatural intelligence who deliberately designed and created the universe and everything in it, including us." (p.31) and: "in addition to his main work of creating the universe in the first place, is still around to oversee and influence the subsequent fate of his initial creation." [per David Roffey's article]. As he does not believe in this "God", he defines himself as an "atheist".
By those definitions I know a few observant Christians and religious Jews who would qualify as "atheists".
He excludes Buddha. Why? Would you regard an observant follower of the teachings of Buddha an atheist? Certainly I wouldn't. I wish I could muster as much faith as they seem to do without any effort at all.
I suspect Dawkins is just another God-botherer, arguing the toss with other believers of his own definition, about the unknowable. He calls himself an atheist? It's amazing what you can do with words and definitions.
Geoff -
Geoff, at the very least I think you will find the book an enjoyable read. You are right that Dawkins does not say anything particularly new, but in this case it is the collection of diverse arguments that makes an impact, not their originality.
Dawkins directly addresses your concern that "his book......is attacking things that most Christians and religious Jews do not believe and perhaps never did believe." He also explains why he excludes Buddhism, a religion that does not emphasise a deity. You are right that there are Jews and Christians who do not believe what Dawkins is in the main attacking (though in the case of Christians I doubt they are the majority), but the most vocal and troublesome Christians and Muslims certainly do.
Atheism
I'm not sure reading the book will help, Geoff, if you take in as little as you have of the article. As set out, Dawkins is an atheist (me too) because he doesn't believe that there is a God out there who actively intervenes in human affairs. On that basis, so are almost all Buddhists, though some of the Tibetan branches veer in that direction. On that basis, it is true, a hell of a lot of people who profess religiosity are atheists too, since they don't actually believe or follow what their professed church, temple or mosque says. Spirituality, pantheism and deism are not theism - and I guess from what you and Will have said, you probably aren't theists, either. The primary evidence that there is no God that intervenes is the fact that he or she doesn't intervene.
To deal with another point: Dawkins is at pains to stress that he has no "faith" in his atheism - "faith" implies that you hold onto your belief whatever the evidence, and Dawkins is a scientist: present him with evidence and he'll change his mind (after duly checking whether the "evidence" is what it claims to be). I guess the previously expressed deep unlikelihood of his book converting anyone is the obvious fact that "faith-based" is the opposite of "reality-based", and evidence or lack of it won't dent the faith of the faithful.
Non-intervention: How can you tell?
David, you note: "The primary evidence that there is no God that intervenes is the fact that he or she doesn't intervene."
How do you know? Some people claim everything that happens, or doesn't, is divine intervention. What "evidence" proves them wrong?
My own beliefs are hard for me to describe. I'd have to call myself a semi-observant agnostic. I think there is spiritual, philosophical, moral and even intellectual richness in religious traditions that would be there with or without a deity. Many religious observances and traditions provide a sense of "connectedness" to a larger community of people beyond onesself, In addition, they provide a temporal connection to a larger sweep of time past and future than we might otherwise be conscious of. So to me there is virtue in being part of a faith community quite independent of theism.
The dark side of all this is the tribal xenophobia and bigotry often directed towards non-believers of one's own formulation of faith. But in my view if it were not for religious differences, people would find or invent differences by which to justify their hostilities. Note that some of the most vicious hatreds are within streams of faith rather than between them, e.g. Catholics vs. Protestants, Sunnis vs. Shiites (cue the Tom Lehrer music).
God exists, in the minds of those ready to make that impossible
Hi David, long article ... sorry couldn't read it all as yet, too early in the morning.
Hopefully I got the essence and must add just a small comment, Margo may be interested too.
Saw a documentary recently about Jesus's tomb. It's claimed to be in Kashmir where he is reported to have learnt his teachings directly from Buddhism. Imprints of feet with the nails and all.
Wikipedia covers it here, as does "The tomb of Jesus" here.
Proof? Of Jesus real life, no succesful crucifixion, just a return to Kashmir until death. Being the Son of Man, not God as written mostly today.
Oh, God does live today. Sporting reference coming, duck all. Freddy Fittler on the bench as the Roosters future coach. Oh, my God.
Recently spent 11 days in hospital and had some discussions with believers, gently. Towards the end of my stay I asked a few of those who believe in the messiah returning how they would know. A shrug, possibly a return to room for a dash of Gideon.
A further conversation was had in which I posed the question to them :
"What would your religion do today if Jesus or such did actually reappear?" No answer. Pushed the limits and asked "How do you know you're not talking to him?" Raised eyebrows. No, I don't have a God complex, but the question hopefully questions their beliefs.
National Values
Back in Aus. So fatigued and full of emotion I don't know what to do. Need to reconsider my plans for the year, including my policy towards Webdiary and ancillary ventures. By all objective indicators I am at the tail end of an almost, if I can have the courage to use the word, spiritual journey, though it appears to be far from over - business still left to attend to in Melbourne, for which going to Europe and having a romance was a necessary prerequisite of ever returning, as esoteric and/or inexplicable as that may sound. I have organised a couch to sleep on in Bleak City, covered in cats, like the graves of the Cimiterie de Montmartre. Melbourne has as yet not had the courage to try and join the European Union and so I had to cash in all my few, remaining Euros if I am to ever get there at all.
I have take comfort in the slogan of the French revolution: Liberté, égalité, fraternité, ou la mort! having somewhat abandoned my attachment to (prima facie) liberty I can argue that I am strengthening my resolve on the other two, forgotten values. Islam still featuring heavily on my mind. I have never seen Muslim women begging in the streets as I did in France, except of course in Indonesia, where Islam fits more naturally in to the environment and is not an oddity or an exposition histoire. With such an issue gnawing on my mind (whilst I did not go to France for such a preposterous reason as to explore the issue, for there were so many other reasons for this particular country, too many to list, it was nevertheless in the forefront of my consciousness) I find it hard to stay with my renunciation of all things Webdiary/media, who seems to be both the cause and the cure of my particular malady.
Jet-lagged and reading too much of Proust, who encourages my weaknesses of sentimentality, confessionalism, unrestraint, melancholy and romanticism. Looking forward to the year which, if it continues in such a glorious fashion as I have planned it will, will have my name written all over it. I have spent the past year quietly as a Christian, attending church and bible study and even singing along. I am considering just as quietly extricating myself from this world, not for any lack of faith (which has forever remained as faithfuleness in all but the hope for a God of which I could approve, with my moral critic fully and fearlessly engaged) but because I feel a need for change, to accompany the profound inward revolution that is going on inside me. Nevertheless I still believe that the three words and one single idea behind "Love thy enemy" contains the solution to all that men and women have done to fuck up the world.
The search for national values
David – great piece, and timely.
Being an atheist and having dabbled briefly in Anthropology years ago I have long given up the idea of moral absolutes. I vaguely recall a lecturer asserting that the only universal taboo (across all human cultures) was incest, although I’m sure murder lurks there too. Much of my sense of ethics comes, I admit, from Christianity, but it isn't backed by the authority of a God for me - it just feels right.
And, who knows, I might have picked up one or two things from The Lion King, too.
The evolutionary reasons that Dawkins summarises for altruism etc. make sense to me. There were obvious advantages for survival for groups of hunter-gatherers to stick together and help each other out, and rules were needed to override individuals’ self-serving instincts. Ethics have obviously come a long way since we lived in caves, but with regard to dealing with the ‘other’ we hardly seem to have moved on. As David says, ‘"be kind to one another" has traditionally been the circumscription of 'one another' to a severely reduced subset of humanity”’.
I think there is still a huge paradigm shift necessary before we are able to accept that we’re all in this together, and that if we don’t find a way of overcoming our pack instincts we’re really going to mess up the planet. I mean, look at John Howard’s early, absurd position on climate change: Australia will help try to save the planet, but only if it doesn’t cost Australian jobs or dent the economy. I know that goes to all kinds of other things – short-term political pragmatism, mainly - but it’s symptomatic of the problem.
Our treatment of asylum seekers shows how quickly values like compassion evaporate when we’re dealing with the ‘other’ – those not like us (or so we’re told).
What interests me most is the current search for a commonly agreed set of values in Australia and how it is being dealt with politically. Howard is making a big deal out of it, but his position seems paradoxical to me. Leaving aside his Government’s hypocrisy in pushing values that they seem to have little interest in upholding themselves, Howard has done more than any other Australian Government to hand moral power over to the market. I don’t want to sidetrack this thread into an IR debate, but the WorkChoices legislation seems to put a huge amount of faith in Adam Smith’s ‘invisible hand’, which frankly I don’t believe in. The Government’s own statistics on AWAs since the introduction WorkChoices give the lie to that notion.
I also find it paradoxical that Howard is hell-bent on re-asserting a collection of warm and fuzzy (and blurry) Australian ‘values’, but is openly hostile to the idea of a Bill of Rights.
Why is that ?
Talking about ‘fair go’, freedom, and ‘care and compassion’ is all very well, but to me those values are meaningless without being reflected in either legislation or, preferably, a Bill of Rights in the constitution. I don’t want to sidetrack the thread on this issue, either, but to me there is considerable moral power in a Bill of Rights. As Margo once pointed out, for all the difficulties a Bill of Rights presents, it would at least give us a solid reference point with which to judge the ethics of legislation and Government behaviour - and everyone else’s, of course. To me, it is nothing short of a nation’s statement of its fundamental values. So why the antipathy?
A few comments
"That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn."
- Hillel the Elder, Jewish sage active in the first Century BCE.
Hillel does not mention God in this saying, nor does he say "fellow Jew." He was talking about "your fellow" human being.
Why do I use that quote? Partly because it's my favorite, and it's an early formulation of the "Golden Rule" which predated Jesus' teachings by several decades. But mainly because Dawkins and this essay omit the many ways in which mainstream "normative" religions have moved far beyond the the Old Testament norms which Dawkins uses to characterise modern religious movements. Hillel was part of a long line of Talmudic scholars before him and since (including Jesus, whatever you may believe or not about his divinity) who have interpreted and re-interpreted the Hebrew scriptures so that few people today who practice Judaism or Chistianity live literally by the "Old Testament."
The literalist and absolutist views that Dawkins imputes to modern religious movements have been long modified by centuries, if not millennia, of scholarship and interpretation. As they must be; what happens when the Commandments come into conflict? Thus, for example, the rabbis long ago ruled that it is better to break the Sabbath to save a life, if observing means allowing someone to die.
In suggesting that the original commandment "thou shalt not kill" only applied to other Israelites, Dawkins ignores the Noahide Laws, which also prohibit murder. (Along with other nasty bits of behavior which I think we would all accept as unacceptable.) According to Jewish tradition these are laws were given to Noah (of Ark and Flood fame) long before the Mount Sinai Ten. Rabbinic Judaism holds that these laws are binding on all mankind.
I agree that if children are taught (even implicity) that it's acceptable to "utterly destroy all that was in the city" at least some of them would come away with a favorable view of such utter destruction. But in most places the story of Jericho is not repeated as something acceptable to do today. In Israel, one of the countries mentioned by Hartung, school textbooks today teach "that the biblical ethic is not the ethic of today; the killing of the Amalekites, man, woman, and child, it is explained, would now be considered genocide."
(Schoolbooks can indeed be used as tools to teach acceptance or hate. See my post of 13 December 2006 at 5:07 PM in the thread "Confronting Islam")
I agree with this essay, and with Dawkins, that a God or Gods is not necessary to construct a morality. But people have always, tragically, found justifications and rationalisations to do nasty things to each other with or without God-given rules. Think atheism is the answer? I have three names for you: Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot.
Finally, in asserting there is no God, Dawkins falls into the trap of substituting a dogma of his own for the religious beliefs he seeks to overthrow. He can no more "prove" there is no God than believers can prove there is one.
question for Will
Stalin & Co.
Mike Lyvers: "did Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot really kill in the name of atheism, or was it rather in the name of their own personality cults, paranoia, and the religion-like ideology of communism?"
I think it was the the latter. I didn't mean to suggest that these dictators did anything in the name of "atheism" as such. They did substitute a "secular" religion-like ideology, Communism, for traditional religion, and then used it to justify mass slaughter. Just as the Nazis constructed their own religion.
Author Michael Burleigh, interviewed on Radio National's The Spirit of Things, explores totalitarian ideologies such as Communism and Fascism, noting they have played the role of political religions. The transcript of the interview is well worth reading.
David, I'm not claiming that believers are "better people" than atheists either. But I do think people have a strong need for meaning, and belief in something. I think that need, whatever its source, abhors a philosophical and moral vacuum. So when it appears traditional belief systems have failed, people are fair game for anything that offers "meaning" even it's a morally deformed meaning like Nazism. So replacing "God" in constructing a moral framework needs to be done very carefully.
The ultra-orthodox settlers in the West Bank who take the story of Joshua as a prescription for political action are no more representative of Judaism or mainstream Zionism than the Exclusive Brethren are of Christianity.
Reply to Will
Hi Will
A few specifics on your comments.
Dawkins doesn't in any way claim that atheists are better people, only that there is no inherent reason why religionists are better people than atheists either.
Clearly some people in Israel amongst the settler community do indeed take the lessons of Joshua to heart (most specifically in the definition and borders of Greater Israel).
What counts as a "modern religious movement" is debatable. Dawkins (and my) fear is that it's the fundamentalists of each flavour that are most typical of new and growing religion, and being most inventive in creating new dogma out of the Old Testament and the writings of some of the more lurid of Mohammed's immediate successors: the creationists, pentecostalists, the people who want the Ten Commandments on all schoolroom walls, and rapturists are the "modern', in the sense that they are new (no serious theologian of the first to eighteenth centuries would have thought of taking all of the bible literally),and that they are rapidly becoming the dominant flavour of practising religionists.
Not a ghost of a chance
Thank you David Roffey. I will eventually read Dawkins’ book. Thank you also Simon for your most interesting interview link. All very thought provoking. But the opening quote:
“If this book works as I intend, religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down......."
....is intellectually arrogant and I would not be holding my breath if I were Dawkins. It is interesting the investment some atheists have in trying to convince believers they should become atheists. Dawkins has about as much chance of turning me into an atheist as I have of turning the Scot here into a believer. Why? Because I have a closed mind? No. Rather because there is not one atheist I know who has been able to convince me that my life has been diminished by my religious beliefs, quite the contrary. And none of them will ever be able to provide me with definitive proof that the hand that made us does not exist let alone be divine. (Apologies to Addison).
I suppose it is hard for atheists to understand how and why believers can reject their rational arguments against any form of religion, against the existence of any God/s and their discrediting of the religious texts and the teachings therein. I think if they spent a bit more time trying to understand why people believe they might start to realize what they are really up against and switch tactics.
An analogy from the other thread. You have little hope of convincing a young person bent on suicide of not taking his/her life through rational argument. You have to address the reasons for the loss of a will to live.
A lot is written about spirituality, the spirit and the soul and the dictionary gives a wide range of meanings. It would be most interesting to hold a forum of believers and atheists to discuss just exactly what they understand by the spirit and spirituality.
Morality without God. What makes a person a moral person. I asked Ian that this morning as he is a person of very high moral standards and is a non believer. But what made him like that? Who or what shaped his thinking from an early age to know what is right or wrong and to do good. He replied “probably my mother”, and then admitted “yes she was a Christian”. Religions have clearly been the vehicle through which moral codes have been passed down through the centuries. And even if we do away with God, that legacy may live on – for quite a long time. If and whether God is finally and forever laid to rest, then it will be interesting to see what sort of societies prevail.
But if as Roger says we are genetically wired to do good for the rewards it brings, then we will probably be OK. But what of those large number of people through history who have done, and continue to do evil. What went wrong with their genetic wiring?
Organised religion has its problems but it will probably never die while there is poverty in the world. It is not surprising that it is in Africa that there is a huge growth in religious belief, mainly Christian and Muslim. And believers will continue to come together within some formal or semi formal structures. When society fails man, then he will be readily receptive to the notion that there is a better life beyond the misery of his earthly existence. But the contrary is the case in the affluent West where religious belief is declining. Whether we will be a better society for that decline remains to be seen. But it is interesting how often you read claims these days that we in the West have lost our way becoming a materialistic and selfish society, less caring, compassionate, giving, and civil. Non believers will argue that that, if true, has nothing to do with a decline in religious belief. They might be right, and they might not be.
I think the fundamentalist lunatic fringe is probably more likely to turn people away from religion than all the anti religion tomes that currently are on the market. There will no doubt always be believers and non believers and in between will be the religious bower birds. Never send anything to the tip in case you might need it one day. Stash it in the attic just in case.
Roger Fedyk: I was hoping you would come in on this thread even though like you I seem to have just returned to where I started from. There is a lot to think about. Cheers.
believers and delusions
Jenny, Dawkins would probably point out that the reason believers are unlikely to respond to the logic and evidence offered against the existence of their deity or deities is not so different to the reason schizophrenics who are caught up in a psychotic delusion are unresponsive to such arguments. If one person says they believe in something that is patently absurd, we call it a delusion, but if many believe it we call it a religion and treat it with respect. This does not do a service to believers any more than treating an adult's continuing belief in Santa Claus does. At some point, people should grow up and accept reality as it actually presents itself to us, for their own good.
On another note, I think that anyone here who purports to discuss Dawkins' book should not do so until they have actually read it. Dawkins is not talking about spirituality or a sense of the spiritual - he claims to have that himself. When he refers to "the God delusion" he is talking about a belief in powerful beings that control the cosmos.
Mike. No reason to burn the church and evict God.
Mike: Dawkins would probably point out that the reason believers are unlikely to respond to the logic and evidence offered against the existence of their deity or deities is not so different to the reason schizophrenics who are caught up in a psychotic delusion are unresponsive to such arguments
Then with respect I don't think Dawkins would have a clue what he was talking about. And I wonder how his so called evidence would stand up in a court?
Having had to deal with more than one person in my life having delusions as a consequence of paranoid schizophrenia, I am acutely aware of the difficulty they face in any suggestion that their reality is theirs and theirs alone, and that others are not seeing or hearing the things that they believe they are. I can understand why they resist logic and evidence as it would be extremely frightening to have to accept that your whole reality is not actually such as it appears to you, or as your senses and perceptions tell you it is.
It is not surprising therefore that about 80% of people with the illness never make the awareness breakthrough needed to help them better understand and therefore better manage their illness. The very organ required to gain that awareness is the one that is dysfunctional. A truly dreadful situation for the sufferer.
(It is in fact possible at times to provide hard evidence to a person suffering a mental illness that the things he/she claims they can see are not in fact there. For instance you can provide a camera and ask them to take a photo,and then get the film developed when that person is out of the episode.)
But faith and belief in a God in this incredibly amazing thing called the universe is entirely different. Believers do as a rule suffer from a mental illness, though of course some do, just as some atheists do. They are quite often highly educated intelligent people who quite rightly, without irrefutable evidence that there is no God, see no reason to become atheists. Logic is not evidence. It is just a procedure of argument. And argument is just that, argument. It is not evidence either.
As a believer, if anyone put before me irrefutable evidence that there is no supreme being or power behind the creation of the universe, then I would readily accept that I was wrong in my faith and beliefs in any such being. But they cannot and will I suggest, never be able to. That must be very frustrating for atheists.
I have seen so much good done in the world by those who do believe and who see it as their Christian duty to do that good and I have seen religious faith help so many people mend very fractured lives. It also provides for many a comfort in times of grief, loneliness, loss and despair in the face of war, poverty and disasters. And for many it provides hope of a better life in some form beyond the earthly life. But importantly it provides the moral and ethical framework within which they live their lives.
So why would anyone want to ridicule or oppose the God believers believe in, and whose teachings through Christ (for Christians) provide the moral framework of their lives? Sure believers are capable of evil and immoral deeds, but when so much good can come of adherence to religious belief, why burn down the church and evict God, just to get rid of the rats?
Frankly Mike, I don't think ridiculing either the believer or the thing in which he or she believes would really achieve very much. In fact I can think that lot of harm could come of it.
David Roffey. You wrote: What does interest / appal me is how many other people want to use their belief in their God to interfere in my life and morality.
I am curious as to how you see they interfere in your life. I move amongst believers and non believers and I very rarely, if ever, see either parties questioning let along interferring with each other's lives and /or morality. I am not sure what interfering in morality actually means. Questioning it maybe, but interfering?
One could just as easily say that atheists, in attacking and ridiculing beliefs held by a huge number of people around the world, are in fact trying to interfere in the lives and morality of those people.
In reading all the comments here, it is clear most posting on WD are probably atheists, but none of the comments have convinced me to back away from my beliefs and my faith. My faith has survived despite some pretty big challenges these past ten years. It will take much more than Dawkins and a few atheists to destroy it. I could live without it, but I see absolutely no reason for doing so.
Jenny and Ian
Jenny, atheists don't advocate burning churches or forcing theists to change their beliefs, but all too many theists advocate burning atheists or outlawing their beliefs, have done so in the past and are doing so today in some parts of the world; why do you think that is so? Any ideas?
Your argument that the nonexistence of God must be proven first has completely reversed scientific reasoning, which states that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and that in the absence of such the null hypothesis must be retained; and you violate the principle known as Occam's razor, which says theoretical entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily. As for religion being the basis for ethics, research cited by Dawkins shows that in general, religious people are NOT more ethical or moral than atheists. Thus ethics need not be based on belief in God or Gods. (Buddhism and Confucianism might be cited as examples.)
Both of you should read Dawkins' book, because in it he addresses each of the points you have made here.
Speak for yourself mike lyvers
What, exactly, is wrong with burning churches? It was quite popular in Poland for generations and, while Cromwell was not torching them, a sledgehammer comes in mighty useful in the war against idolatry.
Interfering b**ers
Hi, Jenny. you ask how believers interfere with my life. Well,how about:
War And Liberty
Of the eight specific life interferences listed above, five are merely examples of people exercising their rights well within the bounds of any decent liberal democracy. One is an example of religious freedom that is of interest or concern only to people who have chosen to take the principles of a particular religion seriously.
The other two are acts of an especially brutal resurgent global fascist ideology and politico/religious movement with which we happen to be at war. A war which I for one wholeheartedly support. A war incidentally, that if we don't stop smudging our gunsights and blurring our vision and focus on the enemy with spurious moral equivalence claims and worse, we may very well lose.
Not interfering
Worse than those, David, is the failure of faith communities to reel in the excesses at their own fringes. Sometimes on the grounds of 'not wanting to offend', sometimes to give in to a good little earner, sometimes due to outright abuse of the notion of "spiritual".
Then when evil is nurtured under the noses of the faith communities, the politicians grasp the opportunity play power games.
Pardon me now, I have to dust off the flag, light a hundred candles and pray a blessing for John Howard and George Bush.
Ok Ok- bit of a slip there
Mike Ok Ok. Bit of a slip there. Believers do not as a rule suffer from a mental illness........Clearly time I went to bed. Cheers.
Get over it, Dr Dawkins
So much of Dawkins' work these last years seems to be a series of undergrad stunts, as if to say, "Look groovy campus cohorts! I'm a radical godless atheist. How cool is that?"
Kind of like a Carl Sagan on speed.
While this may be admired by some members of campus philosophical societies, and devotees of the Freudian revelations wonder at Dawkins' patricidal proclivities, most of the rest of us have moved on from the 'controversy'.
Those who may identify themselves as atheists (or perhaps 'agnostic' on a good day) tend to merely shrug, realising as they do that the 'God delusion' is not one that's amenable to persuasion, even when arguments are set out in articulately written formulations, footnoted and cross-referenced.
Or perhaps, particularly so, since a printed tome can easily be relegated to some index of proscribed works, and the author perhaps even subjected to fatwah for his troubles.
In short, the people Dawkins thinks desperately need to read his book will not read it, except maybe to summarily dispatch the weakest links in his argument.
You know, kind of like what happens on the average WD thread.
PS: G'day Margo, welcome back!
Futility and Need
David, thank you for your very interesting article.
Having to-and-fro'd for the past 35 years I had hoped to gain a unique perspective by now. Unfortunately while I have become more informed and articulate on both sides of the philosophical arguments I remain pretty much where I started, answerless in spite of the vast array of "-ologies" at my disposal.
What I can say with absolute certainty is that the quest for understanding is a good one, and everyone should undertake it with a life-and-death seriousness, but ultimately it is futile if we imagine that the quest leads to any certainty.
It appears to be simple. There are only two propositions to consider; God exists or God does not exist.
If one examines the affirmative position then we are immediately confronted by the "supreme" paradox, namely how does a human being with limited intelligence get to grasp any aspect of the existence of a supreme intelligence. It is the height of delusional arrogance to believe that we can exercise that level of control; what I call "I've got God in my pocket".
It is impossible, to my mind, to conceive of a situation where supreme power and intelligence could meaningfully reveal itself to any human being. The best that we can do is to imagine how such an interaction might take place and take comfort in that anthropomorphised fiction.
This is not to say that God does not exist, just that our interactions with God can only be governed by a "foolish" meme. Nor does this suggest that this is not a natural order for the human species, even a billion years of scientific learning could not bring us any closer to being supreme which is what we would need to be to understand a supreme God.
The contra position, God does not exist, is similarly infused with paradoxes. What do we accept as evidence that there is no God? Do hunger, pain, misery, degradation and death qualify as valid qualia for the contra position?
What is irrefutable is that the human life, being DNA-based, suffers exactly the same fate as all other life forms. We are not exempt from the basic unfairness of existence.
Which leads to the main point of your article, can we have morality without a God? The answer is plainly yes! We operate our daily lives "without God". By that I mean that very few of the billions of moral decisions that are made by people every day would be prefaced by a request to God for guidance. Like so much of what we do to negotiate daily life, we are on "automatic pilot" most of the time. We have a rich vein of learned behaviour to utilise which occasionally embodies altruism, empathy and fairness.
The interesting result of our using our capacity for "good" is the immediate pleasurable reward that we receive. It seems clear that we are hard-wired genetically to benefit from acting in this way. We are automatically drawn to embrace the ethos of Gandhi, or Mother Theresa, or Buddha, or Christ. We are happiest, literally awash with "happy" endorphins, when we are emulating a selfless lifestyle.
What I have written so far really only talks about the personal spiritual experience. As has been pointed out here, the spiritual and the religious are not necessarily two sides of the same coin. One cannot question the benefit to society of spirituality; the same cannot be said for religion.
Unfortunately this distinction is not universally understood.
Ah. It was all
Ah. It was all sectarian, David Roffey.
Goodnight.
Wot! David Roffey? "If
Wot! David Roffey?
"If you're prepared to accept other people's deities ..then I'm not really sure you can really be described as a believer in your own God."
No, it's the same god. That's the point. Personified in different ways culturally, of course. It doesn't really matter what you call him/her.
Well, that's what I learned in catholic school in the 1950's.
David: that's why Catholicism is a "carnivorous memeplex" - it tries to eat other people's ideas while it pretends that digesting them isn't going to change their essence. If they really believed that stuff, why bother to care about whether the Pope is more worth listening to than, say, Ian Paisley, and praying to Shiva has just as good a chance of getting you a result. (though that last bit is almost certainly true).
a new ethics
Great piece David, raising the really big picture political questions on our times, ones I've been pondering for some years. I was so glad that Dawkins exempted Buddhism from his critique of religion, cause that's the one I'm exploring now, although I reckon that if you take the "I am the only God" thing away from Jesus, he's very Buddhist too. I've always been a big Jesus fan.
Last year I was lucky that my existential crisis coincided with that of a friend, and we had long talks about life's meaning on long bushwalks. I used to believe human beings we inherently good, but now I don't. So what then? I gave her Care of the Soul by Thomas More and she gave me The Power of Now by Canadian mystic Eckhart Tolle. That book was the first spiritual type book to click with me; he decries organised religion and seeks to find the essence of spirituality described in different ways by most founders of religious movements. But I really loved his 2005 book A New Earth, which set out the wildly romantic notion that what humanity needed, and could attain, is an evolutionary leap in human consciousness which would save us and the planet. I quote:
I've only started thinking (oops) about this sprituality thing, and getting out of mind stuff is pretty hard for the likes of me. But there's something in it, I reckon.
SHY HOPE AND IDIOTIC RUPERT’S COMIC MOSCOW GOLD
A PARABOLA FOR EVERY GIG ….
Then there’s Manning’s “shy hope”, Margo, a most inspiring Australian call to arms of downunder national spirituality.
We are mostly made of this land, and shouldn’t desire too much of it. It’s given us eternity, after all.
And gumtrees, messmates and banksias, sticking up out of old preCambrian soils.
Drought or not, troubles or not, this is the beauteous place, and sublimates all other urges and wants and desires.
Except for the scabrous, traitor, agents of influence monkeys who fed, or laundered roubles to the Moscow Mafia in the not so shy hope of digging out a musty file or two disproving, i.a., that Manning’s joke was on them, and on Lenin and Leonid.
At least it fed Das Kapital to the Sanctuary Cove Moscow Mafia Mob, with the News Ltd stockholders none the wiser. Just as none as the lit. mob ever knew that Lady Assad Shopkeeper’s stupid counterpunch to one of our early lit greats was precisely what you’d expect from a worm-raddled pack of neoCons intent on elevating the great Mammon on a plinth higher and higher above the Emerald Harbour. With banal, flat, monchrome Nazi drivel.
Meanwhile, way back, that crazy young/old Buddhist Jesus was big one for Manning’s kinda jokes, and cracked them often; turning jugs of water into free piss for his Mum’s mates at Qana was, after all, a bloody cracker, as were the loves and fishes, and the numerous thundering facedowns of the scribes and Pharisees, who wanted to do him for healing on the Sabbath, or healing at all. It was always Nazareth 5-0 to Jerusalem going home grumpy to conspire with the Temple Guard Mob.
And the gospels are full of irony and Vedic spells learned with extreme Galilean patience after more than decade on the road. Try to imagine JC before the crowd at Edinburgh.
Talk about “and did those feet.” Routines and one liners learned from those who had a long history of learning at the feet of masters, at gigs from Samaria to Kashmir.
Ah, comedy is a great religion, if that’s your taste. Or just try it straight, or on the rocks.
Speaking of which…it’s a fat lot of good a notoriously racist PM blasting a Muslim bloke for religious hatred, then sucking up to a mob of extremist supposed Christians, just for the sake of catching more fiery, dirty, loathsome bigot votes.
Frère Jihad Jacques OAM née Woodforde
Margo: Hello Peter. Passion unspent, I see. Good stuff.