Richard Dawkins' "Out Campaign"

[fnr]

My apologies – the above post was mine, not Mirdath’s. So if anyone takes exception or agrees with anything said in it, please direct your comments at me, not Mirdath, okay?

Having atheist friends, I agree that in some locations, they are pressured to hide their beliefs, viewed as untrustworthy or immoral, and accused of outrageous behavior. I would probably say that that’s the traditional means by which believers have treated non-believers. Locally, a nearby township board fought for a Unitarian Universalist church to be denied a permit to build an addition. The speculation is that the conservative Christian board members viewed the questionably theistic “UUs” as objectionable, and put public policy into place to try to suppress them.

However, among academic circles, I think there’s a different tone and culture. In college, as a physics major who also studied philosophy, I occasionally found myself in the midst of groups talking about the ignorant, “head-in-the-sand” religious believers in God. It took a long time in a class I took in bioethics to be viewed as a credible voice who put forth arguments that weren’t simply consumerist medical advocacy. But the problem was my having to “prove” my merit to people who initially viewed me as a kneejerk conservative.

There’s a split going on. More and more hostility is arising between believers and non-believers. Some of this is due to the media and authors on the “theist” side going on the attack. Fundamentally, I think both sides would do better to resort to empathy over polemics.

 

[tdgesq]

The atheists I have debated with and chatted to feel that they are forced to hide their atheism. tdesq’s comment above is astounding. Don’t you believe in free speech?

You missed my point. I do believe in free speech - for the atheist and the Christian. But by what right do atheists under their world view claim that they should be allowed to voice their beliefs comfortably? Whenever an atheist tells me that they “should” have such and such a right or they “ought” to be treated in this or that why, I just have to laugh. On what basis?

 

[Malcolm_McLean]

The atheists I have debated with and chatted to feel that they are forced to hide their atheism. tdesq’s comment above is astounding. Don’t you believe in free speech? In actual fact what is happening is that atheist are forming their own lobby group (power in numbers) to try and stave off what they see as a theocracy in the USA under Bush.

The US situation is very different to the British. In America the notion of a secular state has been tested to destruction. In Britain we have a formally Christian but de facto secular state.

I think it is an indictment though on the intellectuality of the Catholic scholars to not publically take Dawkins and his ilk on. Such debates generally turn out to be “smart-alec” contests, but these people say they can refute St Thomas Aquinas’ five proofs for good, that nature’s beauty and order points to a creator, etc. I’d like to see the Catholic intelligensia involved in public debate with these people. It could be a great opportunity to provide an intellectual basis for faith from our brightest minds.

The first step would be establishing the Gospels as recorded history, which mosts atheists deny.

I’ve never actually participated in a public face-to-face debate with an atheist. The real problem is getting adequate competition. As you say, a lot of atheists are Jesus Mythers, so it’s a bit like debating with Holocaust Denial people. There’s the illusion of a an academic debate, and if you are not very well briefed there is always the risk that they will pull some sort of coup - a lot of people don’t know that there were no gas chambers at Belsen, for example - however there isn’t anything constructive going on there. They don’t try to answer the strength of your point, which is what real philosophers do.

 

[mlchance]

Richard Dawkins might be a brilliant scientist, but, like all atheists, he is a theological hack. His entire argument against religion, especially against Christianity, is a giant mess of strawmen, falsehoods, sloppy thinking, and utter silliness.

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[steveandersen]

Richard Dawkins, noted scientist and author of The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion, has tried to turn his own personal brand of atheism into a movement. The web site is outcampaign.org/

Has anyone faced an “evangelical atheist” of the type Dawkins seems to be promoting? Not infrequently, I face people whose supposedly “scientific” worldview has made them feel more confident about their atheism.

Has there been a rise in one-on-one atheist evangelization?

Perhaps
Or maybe the web has just made them more visible

I’m not sure if evangelization is the right word though

But it is flattering in a backhanded sort of way.

If they imitate religious proselytizing that is because it has historically been successful

Appropriately (and ironically) enough that is consistent with his ideas concerning memes

 

[feargalmac]

I think this discussion between Richard Dawkins and David Quinn on Irish radio is worth a listen. It lasts about 18 minutes.

catholiceducation.org/articles/science/quinndawkins2.MP3

 

[Ammonius_Saccus]

Isn’t the problem rather that atheism is the state religion in much of the West, and will likely become so in America?

Can you name one Western country where atheism is the state religion?

 

[Ruben]

Dawkins’ behaves as though his esteem for others was some sort of currency to be withheld in order to make other people feel that by not believing like him, that they suffer from some imagined inadequacy or are excluded in some way from something he thinks is of value. Dawkins, you can keep your doctrine of self worship and esteem to yourself because we have no need of it, since it has no value except that you should keep it to yourself in order to learn it is ultimately useless to begin with. You express no true doctrine but a shrill cry of wrath.

 

[rlg94086]

I think this discussion between Richard Dawkins and David Quinn on Irish radio is worth a listen. It lasts about 18 minutes.

catholiceducation.org/articles/science/quinndawkins2.MP3

David Quinn verbally bested him. Very enjoyable!

 

[Gamera]

This may be true, but many use his books, especially the God Delusion as the basis for their arguments. One nice chappy told me that because I am a Christian and religion is the cause of all wars (yadda, yadda), the world would be better off without me.

Why? If there’s no such thing as God, then why is peace preferable to war? Why is life preferable to death? Why is happiness preferable to pain? Atheists just don’t seem to grasp that all values presuppose God’s existence. If God were not real, then nothing else would matter — war and death and anguish would be just as “good” as life and happiness, because “goodness” wouldn’t exist. Your atheist opponent failed to recognize that he was borrowing his value judgments from religion.

And this applies to the atheist apologists, too. If God did not exist, then truth is not preferable to falsehood, so why should they bother trying to persuade us of their viewpoint?

 

[theAuthor]

Why? If there’s no such thing as God, then why is peace preferable to war? Why is life preferable to death? Why is happiness preferable to pain? Atheists just don’t seem to grasp that all values presuppose God’s existence. If God were not real, then nothing else would matter — war and death and anguish would be just as “good” as life and happiness, because “goodness” wouldn’t exist. Your atheist opponent failed to recognize that he was borrowing his value judgments from religion.

And this applies to the atheist apologists, too. If God did not exist, then truth is not preferable to falsehood, so why should they bother trying to persuade us of their viewpoint?

I can’t believe I am defending them, but here goes. Life is preferable to death, because it is the only one we will get. They have no Heaven to look forward too. Altruism is has a social function to perpetuate society. They’d say many concepts of good came from the ancient Greeks and predate Christ, etc.

What gets me is that when I point out the ultimate futility of all things and actions in a life without God (if life goes nowhere), they say I am stuck in an emotional adolescence that requires more than this world, and that I should stop asking such pointless unanswerable questions!

 

[Palladio]

I can’t believe I am defending them, but here goes. Life is preferable to death, because it is the only one we will get. They have no Heaven to look forward too. Altruism is has a social function to perpetuate society. They’d say many concepts of good came from the ancient Greeks and predate Christ, etc.

What gets me is that when I point out the ultimate futility of all things and actions in a life without God (if life goes nowhere), they say I am stuck in an emotional adolescence that requires more than this world, and that I should stop asking such pointless unanswerable questions!

The historical dimension of their argument is thin: for the RCC is unthinkable without Judaism and Greek and Roman philosophy. St. Augustine got his notion of virtue, but hugely, from Cicero.

A friend recently mentioned how scientistism or perhaps even science or ‘pure rationality’ of a certain sort is not supposed to be able to ask the question Why?

Why not?

And if that is so, why can’t the rest of us? Along with thousands of years of art, literature, and music? Along with Job?

God bless.

 

[theAuthor]

Feargalmac, thanks for the radio link. Classic.

Richard Dawkins: “Free will doesn’t interest me.” I guess not, because you have no answer for it, nor for the origins of matter.

The historical dimension of their argument is thin: for the RCC is unthinkable without Judaism and Greek and Roman philosophy. St. Augustine got his notion of virtue, but hugely, from Cicero.

Would this not support the idea that morality did not have it’s origins with God. Can you explain a bit better for me?

 

[Palladio]

Feargalmac, thanks for the radio link. Classic.

Richard Dawkins: “Free will doesn’t interest me.” I guess not, because you have no answer for it, nor for the origins of matter.

Would this not support the idea that morality did not have it’s origins with God. Can you explain a bit better for me?

No, but the problem is convincing atheists, not Catholics like you and me.

The human expression of God’s will, for the RCC, comes in many forms, and within Sacred Tradition is the reading the Fathers did in Greek and Roman philosophy: neo-plationism and Cicero are two big influences on, say, Augustine, and all that can be studied, believer or no.

I believe the Holy Father has written of the more than fortuitous confluence which animated and animates our Church. I wish I could remember where!

It is easier to speak about this with atheists, I suspect, than to make solemn professions of faith about the workings of the Holy Spirit.

There is what we know is true, and then what we can profitably discuss with others outside of the faith, which I can set no a priori limit to, of course.

However, but for the reasonable and rational dimensions of our faith I would never have been convinced to return to it, after many years of agnosticism.

Readmitted to the RCC, I am bound to believe her. But I believed Her already!

Atheists will present other problems.

God bless.

P. S. If they are at the level of prove it all here and now for me, from God’s existence to the Pope’s infallibility, patience. On the other hand, leaving unbelievers alone is fine, too, and in engaging with them you may have planted seeds. Which would be a lot!

 

[theAuthor]

The human expression of God’s will, for the RCC, comes in many forms, and within Sacred Tradition is the reading the Fathers did in Greek and Roman philosophy: neo-plationism and Cicero are two big influences on, say, Augustine, and all that can be studied, believer or no.

I never thought of it that way before. Thanks. Of course the next argument is that if the Early Fathers gained their ideas from secular philosophers that God cannot take the credit…

Actually, one way to make headway with atheists would be to work through a specific example of Canonisation of a Saint. I believe two miracles are required post-humously, and that they must be attributed to that particular Saint. Such things are investigated very thoroughly by the Vatican I’d presume since Canonisation is an infallible action. Given the number of Saints that there are, and the number of miracles that have been attributed to those Saints, there’d be a good case for establishing causality. ie proving that prayer has an effect beyond statistical randomness. Any ideas how to do this?

 

[Palladio]

I never thought of it that way before. Thanks. Of course the next argument is that if the Early Fathers gained their ideas from secular philosophers that God cannot take the credit…

Actually, one way to make headway with atheists would be to work through a specific example of Canonisation of a Saint. I believe two miracles are required post-humously, and that they must be attributed to that particular Saint. Such things are investigated very thoroughly by the Vatican I’d presume since Canonisation is an infallible action. Given the number of Saints that there are, and the number of miracles that have been attributed to those Saints, there’d be a good case for establishing causality. ie proving that prayer has an effect beyond statistical randomness. Any ideas how to do this?

I think that what at least some of the Fathers got was a way of thinking, rationally, about God, which is more like talking about an integer than about a law in physics: you can strip an integer of all representation, and still see it, immaterial, was always already there, to be discovered, not invented: if the atheist does not like that theologians learn from philosophy or literature or art or the Bible, he is really just asking for a hocus pocus demonstration, not arguing in good faith.

Atheists, inspired directly or indirectly by Hume, love to go to town on miracles, and on the witnesses to them. I don’t know if that is a way to meet them head on, but it would depend on the atheist, I guess.

God bless.

 

[Bobby_Jim]

Richard Dawkins might be a brilliant scientist, but, like all atheists, he is a theological hack. – Mark L. Chance.

I don’t know about this part either. Most of the people I would characterize as brilliant scientists actually work on science. Dawkins is known more as a popularizer of science. Does he do any original research at this point in his career? Whatever research he ever did in the past, he’s certainly not on the short list or even the long list of people in line for a Nobel Prize.

I think he’s mostly brilliant as a shameless self-promoter.

 

[Malcolm_McLean]

Atheists, inspired directly or indirectly by Hume, love to go to town on miracles, and on the witnesses to them. I don’t know if that is a way to meet them head on, but it would depend on the atheist, I guess.

In chapter one of 12 Common Atheist Arguments, the “No Evidence” argument, I reply to it by giving three main lines of evidence for Christianity. From experience atheists who have read it always focus on the miracles and never engage with the other two.

 

[Palladio]

In chapter one of 12 Common Atheist Arguments, the “No Evidence” argument, I reply to it by giving three main lines of evidence for Christianity. From experience atheists who have read it always focus on the miracles and never engage with the other two.

Hume’s attack is on the credibility of the witnesses in the NT, whom he stigmatizes as being ignorant, benighted. In re-reading him, I feel he may have simply been exercising a certain line of reasoning to show up clerics, but anyway his characterization is patently false, so I find him to be unpersuasive.

Nothing seems clearer to me than that the NT is structured–by the nature of the witness offered first and last–by confronting doubt, by stressing the incredible events of Christ’s life. Both the witness and the NT itself are as sophisticated as anything I have ever read in several languages, ancient and modern.

 

[Benedictus]

In chapter one of 12 Common Atheist Arguments, the “No Evidence” argument, I reply to it by giving three main lines of evidence for Christianity. From experience atheists who have read it always focus on the miracles and never engage with the other two.

I just read your chapter on “No Evidence” with the expectation of seeing some evidence for Christianity, but I must admit there was none (Disclaimer: I’m an agnostic, not an atheist).

You have three main types of evidence: miracles, history, and ethics.

The miracles section can be summarized by saying that there are no proven miracles.

As for the history section, I found this one the most puzzling. You start by mentioning historical accounts in the Bible and discuss whether some of these accounts are miraculous prophesy, but then conclude that there is insufficient evidence to show that the accounts were written before the events described (like C.S. Lewis who kept mentioning Nazi ethics, but not much else).

You then go on to say that Christianity dominated Europe for about 1,500 years, as the Gospel writers predicted; although, you don’t say where it says that in the Gospels. You conclude that this prediction (wherever it is in the Gospels) is evidence that Jesus was the Incarnate Son of God. I think the transition between the two is at best an incomplete argument.

Your last argument, ethics, is the most interesting. The gist of it seems to be that no one has ever been able to improve on Christian ethics. I think the primary problem is that you don’t explore all the alternatives (similar to the error that C.S. Lewis makes in Mere Christianity, but his is much more blatant and disappointing). My time is a bit limited right now, so I can’t write a full critique of this argument, but let me conclude by saying that I would have liked to see more about other systems of ethics (Kantian, utilitarianism, perhaps Buddhism). You only discuss the most notoriously flawed ones.