@AdamF
No demands? This is from Dawkins in a Forbes article:
Agnostic conciliation, which is the decent liberal bending over backward to concede as much as possible to anybody who shouts loud enough, reaches ludicrous lengths in the following common piece of sloppy thinking. It goes roughly like this: You can’t prove a negative (so far so good). Science has no way to disprove the existence of a supreme being (this is strictly true). Therefore, belief or disbelief in a supreme being is a matter of pure, individual inclination, and both are therefore equally deserving of respectful attention! When you say it like that, the fallacy is almost self-evident; we hardly need spell out the reductio ad absurdum. As my colleague, the physical chemist Peter Atkins, puts it, we must be equally agnostic about the theory that there is a teapot in orbit around the planet Pluto. We can’t disprove it. But that doesn’t mean the theory that there is a teapot is on level terms with the theory that there isn’t.
Now, if it be retorted that there actually are reasons X, Y, and Z for finding a supreme being more plausible than a teapot, then X, Y, and Z should be spelled out—because, if legitimate, they are proper scientific arguments that should be evaluated. Don’t protect them from scrutiny behind a screen of agnostic tolerance. If religious arguments are actually better than Atkins’ teapot theory, let us hear the case. Otherwise, let those who call themselves agnostic with respect to religion add that they are equally agnostic about orbiting teapots. At the same time, modern theists might acknowledge that, when it comes to Baal and the golden calf, Thor and Wotan, Poseidon and Apollo, Mithras and Ammon Ra, they are actually atheists. We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.
@AdamF – The above is a demand, cleverly wrapped in rhetoric. The agnostic is given a choice – he must either admit that the concept of Pluto’s teapot is on par with that of god, or the belief is “ludicrous,” the thinking is “sloppy,” and the individual is being intellectually dishonest. This is, of course, a Hobson’s choice if ever there was one. It’s also sloppy logic in itself. First, it assumes a human capability to have a full understanding of all the material world such that it can eventually disprove the concept of god, because in order to be on par with Pluto’s teapot, it has to be a claim that is subject to refutation. It is conceivable that we will go to Pluto and find there is no teapot in orbit there. Second, regardless of whether one feels that god has influence on their lives or on the material world, if one assumes they must go through life believing there is no affect and still hold the belief they will still know that regardless of whether Pluto’s teapot exists, it does not have an effect on them. Finally, it allows Dawkins a privilege – those who don’t admit that their belief is equally meaningless to Pluto’s teapot are intellectually bankrupt, and need not be recognized. Therefore, one must either recompose the belief as meaningless, or is not part of the intellectual discussion. Of course, making the belief meaningless is the functional equivalent of giving it up.
The article continues:
In any case, the belief that religion and science occupy separate magisteria is dishonest. It founders on the undeniable fact that religions still make claims about the world that on analysis turn out to be scientific claims. Moreover, religious apologists try to have it both ways. When talking to intellectuals, they carefully keep off science’s turf, safe inside the separate and invulnerable religious magisterium. But when talking to a nonintellectual mass audience, they make wanton use of miracle stories—which are blatant intrusions into scientific territory.
The Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, the raising of Lazarus, even the Old Testament miracles, all are freely used for religious propaganda, and they are very effective with an audience of unsophisticates and children. Every one of these miracles amounts to a violation of the normal running of the natural world. Theologians should make a choice. You can claim your own magisterium, separate from science’s but still deserving of respect. But in that case, you must renounce miracles. Or you can keep your Lourdes and your miracles and enjoy their huge recruiting potential among the uneducated. But then you must kiss goodbye to separate magisteria and your high-minded aspiration to converge with science.
@AdamF – There is indeed a danger in believing in miracles as a practice standpoint. However, this is a specific demand that science encompasses everything that is explainable. One must therefore discount miracles as they describe material phenomenon in a mystical way. The result of this, of course, is not only that we don’t rest on the idea of miracles as a reason to refrain from investigating what the causes are for the phenomenon, but also that, since nothing can be considered a miracle, everything is describable through scientific investigation. If we accept that there is something that will not be explained so, one still cannot believe it is a miracle because that is un-scientific. The circular reasoning required is that there basically that either there is no magisteria that is outside the investigation of science, and therefore no miracles, but that even if they are it is un-scientific to describe such things as miracles! Therefore, one must abandon a belief in miracles – another demand.
The article finishes:
The desire to have it both ways is not surprising in a good propagandist. What is surprising is the readiness of liberal agnostics to go along with it, and their readiness to write off, as simplistic, insensitive extremists, those of us with the temerity to blow the whistle. The whistle-blowers are accused of imagining an outdated caricature of religion in which God has a long white beard and lives in a physical place called heaven. Nowadays, we are told, religion has moved on. Heaven is not a physical place, and God does not have a physical body where a beard might sit. Well, yes, admirable: separate magisteria, real convergence. But the doctrine of the Assumption was defined as an Article of Faith by Pope Pius XII as recently as November 1, 1950, and is binding on all Catholics. It clearly states that the body of Mary was taken into heaven and reunited with her soul. What can that mean, if not that heaven is a physical place containing bodies? To repeat, this is not a quaint and obsolete tradition with just a purely symbolic significance. It has officially, and recently, been declared to be literally true.
@AdamF – This is a criticism without value, as it assumes that there has been some form of convergence that is finished. That religion has developed to a point where it has dropped all of it’s “supernatural” claims, and that science has a place for all the “how” questions and can comfortably leave the “why” to religion. Of course, this in itself is a straw man of the theist argument – religion isn’t done developing in the same way that science is done. Neither are finished in any sense.
The above is a fully realized attempt to, essentially, push religion completely out of the picture. Regardless of whether the attempt was subconscious or conscious, I wonder if you take issue with my argument that the above can easily be understood to mean that Dawkins believes that anyone with theist beliefs is an idiot. And of course, not being able to fully back up this assertion in the end…he ends himself with a leading question. ;-)
The problem with the strategy that you’ve outlined is that it’s the atheist strategy as well – it’s in many ways the basic strategy of most argument/debates. The goal, I believe, should be to restrain those inclinations as much as possible. This is because with the ability to mine the media, we know that our statements and assertions echo and can be taken up and decontextualized and misinterpreted. Outside the internet – this is the very nature of language much of the time. Dawkins is smart enough that he should realize this – although, as a scientist, I do think that he is somewhat hampered in understanding that precision is not a quality of language since language in science is often jargonized so that it carries a precision not common to colloquial usage (consider the whole problem with referring to a “theory” in the world and a “theory” in science and how that confuses the evolution debate).
Finally, I have to raise an eyebrow at the “Nuff said” evidence. I saw the reference to BioLogos…and felt inclined to forgo using the article. But, the statement was one that I felt was germane and the reaction one that the rhetoric can cause…so for me it was an example of the sentiment. The statement therefore stands alone regardless of who said it – and attributing an agenda to the speaker doesn’t discount that, but is really, in many ways, the worst kind of ad hominem attack because it doesn’t go to anything in the content. It’s used as the final piece to prove your argument – and is only an attack on the character of the speaker.
This is where atheists often ruffle my feather – the argument ends up being “I know that these claims are true. What I don’t understand, can be explained by science. If it cannot be explained by science, it still can’t be explained by you.” It’s a false claim to a reasoned position.
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