Divided by a common language: Richard Dawkins clarifies his position

Thank you for trying to bring the fratricide to an end.

Actually in England: State schools are run by the government, Faith (used to be called "Church") schools are run by permitted religious groups (Christian, Jewish, Muslim only at present, I believe) but are funded by the government, Private schools are privately funded and Public schools are generally the most exclusive private schools.

Scotland, I think, is different.

Fun indeed...

I was just thinking yesterday, most European countries are far more secular in culture than the U.S.- less of a strong force of Christianity in their nations. And most of them don't have a strong tradition of separation of church and state- not as much as the U.S. There might be something to this. That the strength of Christianity in the U.S. directly correlates to our commitment to separation of church and state, and as long as we stay committed to the latter, the former (or some other similar belief system) will prevail.

Meanwhile, ID is to be taught in English religious education classes. Hmmmmm.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2524442.html

Obviously the petition was vague enough to cause knee jerks, but in my years of arguing with strict libertarian-types, as a progressive or 'leftist' even attempts to merely raise public awareness are interpreted as direct attempts to get government force legislation.

Actually in England: State schools are run by the government, Faith (used to be called "Church") schools are run by permitted religious groups (Christian, Jewish, Muslim only at present, I believe) but are funded by the government, Private schools are privately funded and Public schools are generally the most exclusive private schools. Scotland, I think, is different. Fun indeed...

No moral person could possibly object to the petition. Needless to say, most Amereicans are immoral. Specifically, I live in a state (Arizona, one of many) that specifically protects the "rights" of religious parents to physically torture and kill their children in the name of religion.

The Apostrophe Avenger (Elf Eye's alter ego [apostrophe for possession--used with nouns only!]) has arisen like Cthulhu, hungry for the flesh of writers who profane the sacred marks of punctuation. Not meaning to pick on Peter Henderson particularly, but it's (apostrophe for contraction!) not "The Roman Catholic church has it's own schools/education system...." Therefore, will the aforesaid writer please return the misappropriated apostrophe to the supply room so that it will be there when you really need it. I know this may seem like a really petty point, but, hey, an apostrophe there and an apostrophe there, and pretty soon we're talking real language decay. OK, having thoroughly embarrassed myself and revealed my true identity as a pedantic English professor, I will now shut up and slink back into my cubbyhole, where I will caress semicolons and dream of ellipses.

Peter, no offense I hope. Your post just happened to be the one to hand. I certainly don't want to start a Henderson versus Apostrophe Avenger "kerfluffle"! Eeek! I can see it now: the partisans of possession beating up on the connoisseurs of contraction.

Cthulhu, I really am embarrassing myself!

Nick, thanks very much for your efforts. I am both a strong atheist and a strong civil libertarian. I become very concerned when atheists make statements or take actions which might in any way be interpreted as advocating limiting civil liberties, particularly freedom of conscience (or religion, if you prefer). In his ranting about theism, Dawkins has not been clear enough about his views on freedom of religion, and thus I have been bothered that people would think that Dawkins represents all atheists. I especially appreciate that he admits he has been "out of my depth" on the issue, something that was very apparent to me from reading his book. I hope his consciousness is being raised in this regard. The public image of atheists is poor, and we don't need people like Dawkins (and PZ Myers) adding fuel to the fire. Now I agree with them that theistic beliefs are silly and are properly criticized, but we should emphasize that, in America, at least, freedom of religion is the law of the land. I am much more concerned about whether people understand and support civil liberties (including freedom of religion) than I am about whether they are theistic or not.

It is quite clear that the British position is more rational and civilized, but for whatever reason Americans prefer to guard their private land with shotguns as if their lives depended on keeping everyone else off.

"one people separated by a common language"

I dunno if it should be attributed to Twain,Wilde,Shaw,Churchill or others but I do know that the confusion can be embarrassing.

Don't tell a Brit that you shag flies or an Aussie that you root for the home team.

One Yank consultant posited a foreign firm the question: "Do you have corporate muscle to pull it off?"

I'll leave it at that.

Cheers!

OK, having thoroughly embarrassed myself and revealed my true identity as a pedantic English professor

Meanwhile, ID is to be taught in English religious education classes. Hmmmmm.

Peter,

Right! Now I will have to be vewy, vewy cahful.

For extra fun and confusion, in the U.K., the "private" schools are run by the government and the "public" schools are privately funded.

No, the "state" schools are run by the government - although sometimes in collaboration with various faith groups or (in recent years) private contractors (hence the Peter Vardy controversy). "Private" schools and "public" schools are both privately run, the difference being that the "public" schools are extremely posh - e.g. Eton. I'm sure that makes it all clear.

My understanding is that public schools in the UK were originally called that to distinguish them from the church-run schools. Any member of the public could attend (provided they paid the fees).

Years ago when I had to take religious instruction in school (before there had been much non-Christian immigration) most of us regarded it as a boring drag. From what I recall we concentrated on parables and similar uplifting stories. We were seldom encouraged to ask questions about the bible because invariably someone would find one of the passages most Christians would like to keep quietly hidden. All in all I think it acted as a fairly effective inoculation against the more extreme religious views.

"Alcohol: In the U.S., alcohol is absolutely forbidden until the late age of 21" . . .

Not "absolutely." The National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 allows alcohol to minors for the following:

An established religious purpose, when accompanied by a parent, spouse or legal guardian age 21 or older

Medical purposes when prescribed or administered by a licensed physician, pharmacist, dentist, nurse, hospital or medical institution

re SteveF's comment #152481:

Most unintentionally funny quote in that Times article:

"Canon Jeremy Davies, Precentor of Salisbury cathedral, said: "I don't see why religious education should be a dumping ground for fantasies."

Scariest quote in same article:

"Lord Pearson, a Tory peer and supporter of ID, who asked the question that prompted Adonis's statement, said: "Advances in DNA science show that the DNA molecule is so complicated that it could not have happened by accident. It shows there is a design behind it."

It's 31 December. Shouldn't you rather be deciding on the silliest words or deeds by an ID supporter over the last year?

"Alcohol: In the U.S., alcohol is absolutely forbidden until the late age of 21" ... Not "absolutely." The National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 allows alcohol to minors for the following:

How much more evidence do you need to see that these kinds of antics are dividing the pro-science side and uniting and motivating the creationists? To my mind, Kenneth Miller--who is a devout Catholic--has done more to stop ID from insinuating itself into the public schools than Dawkins will ever do. His testimony was pivotal during Kitzmiller, and the results speak for themselves.
I'm an atheist, but personally I admire Christians who can think their way past Biblical literalism and can accomodate their faith with the modern world. Dawkins, on the other hand, is becoming a liability to the movement by making it appear as if the rest of us have an anti-religious axe to grind. These kinds of games are starting to wear a little thin.
The struggle isn't against mainstream Christians. It's against the fundies who want to sneak their religious beliefs into the public schools.

No moral person could possibly object to the petition. Needless to say, most Amereicans are immoral.

I have junked a comment both because it was a bizarre detour (something about the n-word) and it was plagiarized from here.

Well, that should give us a respite of at least a week until someone else decides to prove their 'moderation' by going after the best contemporary expositor of evolutionary biology because he happens (horrors) also be an atheist who has the effrontery to articulate his world-view.

It is quite clear that the British position is more rational and civilized, but for whatever reason Americans prefer to guard their private land with shotguns as if their lives depended on keeping everyone else off.

but for whatever reason Americans prefer to guard their private land with shotguns as if their lives depended on keeping everyone else off.

I've spent large amounts of time in Europe, Australia, and elsewhere. The biggest thing that you said in your final comment that I actually agreed with is that Americans are unfortunately litigious. That's an embarrassment and a terrible fact of life here.

But I mostly disagree with your opinions on a lot of the rest of it. In the end, that's not really the point of your post or this space, so I guess I won't bother writing a long comment about it. But I do hope you're aware that there are people who HAVE spent significant amounts of time overseas, but still think you've got a lot of it wrong.

Meanwhile, the site is great, and your post here is helpful.

Well, that should give us a respite of at least a week until someone else decides to prove their 'moderation' by going after the best contemporary expositor of evolutionary biology because he happens (horrors) also be an atheist who has the effrontery to articulate his world-view.

If that is all Richard Dawkins did I would not have a problem with him. It is his ignorant forays into philosophical theism and Christianity I object to.

— A Courtier

Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

— A Shepherd

I am glad that this is settled. I really enjoy reading Dawkins' popularizing of science, but would have eliminated him from my reading altogether over this. I find myself mostly agreeing with him, on his clarification of his views.

I am also horrified to learn what I have about the British school system/s?, as a result of this. Being the ignorant American (though I read a lot of British lit), I assumed that their public schools were much like those here. While the U.S. has it's quirks and negatives, I am damn glad to have recieved the education I did.

Given the litigious nature of American society, and the screwed up fact that trespassers can successfully sue landowners for injuries suffered on private property, perhaps their lives do depend on it in a sense.

Nick, this effort at clarification is appreciated. Thanks!

I do think you have "statue" where you probably meant "stature," however.

[/lawyerly nitpicking.]

And now I have mis-typed "stature" where I meant to type "statute." Yeesh!

Nick, as Elf Eye said, thanks for working to end what is essentially a family squabble. By bringing light to the matter, especially by giving the inimitable Dr. Dawkins a chance to explain, in his unmistakeable prose, exactly what mistakes were made, you performed an inestimable service for all of us interested in defending quality science education.

Or to put it another way, 'blessed are the peacemakers.'

Just a few notes on public access to private lands in New Zealand:
1) There is a Queen's Chain next to many waterways. This is a Chain of land which the public should have unrestricted access to. Often this is ignored or rendered unusable by intervening private land.
2) As much of New Zealand was planned by English people in England we have many 'roads' that are legally public access but are unformed and are treated as private land by the 'owners'. Access is regularly denied to these public roads. A small survey found upwards of 80% of public roads have no access to them. A better example would be the English concept of Walkways, Bridleways and Carriageways, public access routes through private land that are maintained to a set standard.
3) A significant amount of the high country is leased by the landholders from the government. There should be public access to most of this leased land, but it is often denied. There is however tenure review occurring where the public rights are becoming more defined.
4) Having said that many farmers are really good about allowing access to their land but there is significant conflict between Farmers and Old users on one hand (who respect the land and the farmer's needs in things like litter, gates and asking for permission) and people who disrespect the land on the other. However those who disrespect the land do it to public land too. If you have a reputation for respect (or belong to a club with a reputation) you have significantly more access.

Steven

1. EdBrayton - Dec 31st 2006 at 4:28 pm For what it's worth I have quote from Richard Dawkins: Who cares what Richard Dawkins says? -dt Comment by EdBrayton --- December 31, 2006 @ 4:28 pm 2. PZMyers - Dec 31st 2006 at 4:30 pm I think what he meant was Who cares I'm banning everything you say and you suck and don't come back, homo. -dt Comment by PZMyers --- December 31, 2006 @ 4:30 pm 3. RichardDawkins - Dec 31st 2006 at 4:33 pm I just thought I'd elaborate on my post, which was taken out of context. To wit: To wit, RichardDawkins is no longer with us. -W.A.D. Comment by RichardDawkins --- December 31, 2006 @ 4:33 pm

404 - Page not found Our web servers cannot find the page or file you asked for. The link you followed may be broken or expired. Click your browser's Back button to return to the previous page.

This brings up a simple fact often ignored; people that are pro-rational and pro-science still have to play in the oft irrational arena of public realtions and publicity. Nothing changes that, and a few ill-advised words or actions can have repercussions - especially with people in the ID crowd watching for anyone of a scientific, rationalist, humanist, or atheist position to screw up in public.

It is quite clear that the British position is more rational and civilized, but for whatever reason Americans prefer to guard their private land with shotguns as if their lives depended on keeping everyone else off.

Why is it "quite clear" that the British position is more "rational and civilized"?

>I'm an atheist, but personally I admire Christians who can think their way past Biblical literalism and can accomodate their faith with the modern world. Dawkins, on the other hand, is becoming a liability to the movement by making it appear as if the rest of us have an anti-religious axe to grind. These kinds of games are starting to wear a little thin.
The struggle isn't against mainstream Christians. It's against the fundies who want to sneak their religious beliefs into the public schools.

Dr. Dawkins needs to be careful, but fundamentally, it looks to me he's on the correct course. The "difference" between mainstream and fundy xians is like the "difference" between micro and macro evolution. Backing away from that may or may not be politically effective, but there does seem to be a cost in terms of intellectual honesty.

Religious freedom and child abuse are in tension here.

At one extreme, we can imagine xian skinheads or Muslim fundies raising their kids to raise hell. One might be tempted forestall the likely results of that sort of upbringing, not only for the sake of the kids, but for the sake of society in general. And it might be tough to do that while allowing everyone to indoctrinate their kids as they see fit. If there's enough of that sort of stuff going on, we're in the realm of tough choices.

Hopefully, mainstream religious instruction is less harmful, and may fall below the line where a wise society would take action. But it's a moot point. We have no shot at anything other than pointing out negative effects of such junk. e.g. The assault on critical thinking ability/inclination; Impact on stem cell research; Faith based foreign policy; etc. But, for god's sake, we surely have an obligation to do at least that. It is to the benefit of everyone to object to magical thinking. It does little good to claim the emperor is wearing underwear.

Well, that should give us a respite of at least a week until someone else decides to prove their 'moderation' by going after the best contemporary expositor of evolutionary biology because he happens (horrors) also be an atheist who has the effrontery to articulate his world-view.

— Robert O'Brien

If that is all Richard Dawkins did I would not have a problem with him. It is his ignorant forays into philosophical theism and Christianity I object to.

The British are oh so much more civil because they don't allow trespassers to be shot? 50 out of 50 US states do not allow shooting trespassers during the day, and 49 of 50 don't allow it at night.

IIRC, the British have higher crime rates than Americans. So perhaps the question is, why aren't the British as civil as we are?

Folks,

I can understand everyone's sensitivity to the civil rights of parents to "discuss" religion in the privacy of their homes, a right to free speech that must be protected. But parents are legally responsible for protecting and nourishing the physical and mental well being of their children. Why should they have the right to so thoroughly indoctrinate their children that they can no longer think objectively about matters pertaining to religion?

There is a reason why the vast majority of believers in Islam were raised by parents who are believers in Islam, and the vast majority of believers in Christianity had parents who were like minded about that religion, and so on. After ten years of heavy indictrination of a young and fragile mind, it is very difficult for that mind to consider the issues from a skeptical or at least neutral perspective. This constitutes educational child abuse and no civil right to engage in such activity exists.

A distinction needs to be made between "speaking about" religion in the home and "indoctrination" in religion by parents. I realize this requires some fine legal work. But to ignore this distinction is to sit back and do nothing about the wholesale educational child abuse going on in the world today. Folks like Dawkins must re-evaluate their position on this, otherwise all their ranting about the ill effects of religion amounts to spitting in the wind.

if the creationists can't properly allow for the cultural contexts out of which the bible arises, how do you expect them to do it for a petition?

IIRC, the British have higher crime rates than Americans.

Niok, by this point what Professor Dawkins says in response to your questions should not be a surprise. Nonetheless, it sets the record straight once and for all, so thank you for your trouble and for posting the outcome here. Beyond that, I've had my say on the other blogs.

Posted by Carol Clouser on December 31, 2006 7:42 PM (e) Folks, I can understand everyone's sensitivity to the civil rights of parents to "discuss" religion in the privacy of their homes, a right to free speech that must be protected. But parents are legally responsible for protecting and nourishing the physical and mental well being of their children. Why should they have the right to so thoroughly indoctrinate their children that they can no longer think objectively about matters pertaining to religion? There is a reason why the vast majority of believers in Islam were raised by parents who are believers in Islam, and the vast majority of believers in Christianity had parents who were like minded about that religion, and so on. After ten years of heavy indictrination of a young and fragile mind, it is very difficult for that mind to consider the issues from a skeptical or at least neutral perspective. This constitutes educational child abuse and no civil right to engage in such activity exists. A distinction needs to be made between "speaking about" religion in the home and "indoctrination" in religion by parents. I realize this requires some fine legal work. But to ignore this distinction is to sit back and do nothing about the wholesale educational child abuse going on in the world today. Folks like Dawkins must re-evaluate their position on this, otherwise all their ranting about the ill effects of religion amounts to spitting in the wind.

I've added a comment in my own blog if anyone is interested, but I can't resist adding a further point here. There are many things that we might consider morally wrong, while also believing that they must be politically tolerated. Usually it is people with, for example, statistically unusual sexual tastes who not only argue for the morality of their actions but also, as a last resort, at least for toleration by the state. Sometimes it is suggested that the liberal call for toleration is a sham, that what is really wanted is simply the overturning of traditional morality. There may even be some force in that - I, for one, think there is a fair bit in traditional morality that actually should be overturned.

But here we have a good example of toleration in action. At least some kinds of religious indoctrination, especially those that demand a rejection of rational inquiry in later life or involve threats of hellfire, are very unpleasant to behold. I am happy to condemn them morally, but I think they must be tolerated by the law, even if we get to the point one day where a majority believes otherwise. The state's power of fire and the sword - I argue - can't be used against every kind of moral aberration, but needs to be confined fairly narrowly. I'm glad to see that Richard Dawkins apparently takes a similar position.

Thanks for such a clear and levelheaded response, Nick. Hopefully Dawkins will be a little more cautious about what he puts his name to, and Ed Brayton will be a lot more cautious about speculation on Dawkins' hidden agenda.

I've gotten a bit behind. Is Telic Thoughts breaking from the ID ranks in so openly trumpeting its contributors' religiosity, or have the writers just been sloppy in their eagerness to rail against Richard Dawkins? Alternatively, have the ID people largely abandoned the charade about ID being an arligious concept since Kitzmiller vs Dover?

>Posted by Duane Tiemann on December 31, 2006 7:00 PM (e)

Dr. Dawkins needs to be careful, but fundamentally, it looks to me he's on the correct course. The "difference" between mainstream and fundy xians is like the "difference" between micro and macro evolution. Backing away from that may or may not be politically effective, but there does seem to be a cost in terms of intellectual honesty.>

Depends somewhat on one's aims, n'est pas?

If one is defending the integrity of Scientific Methodology (natural causes, common rules/laws of nature across the universe (as above so below), repeatability of tests, logical inference etc) then the belief set of the person defending it isn't relevant.

If the aim is to convert the world to atheism then mocking the beliefs of others may work on some; damn few though. I suspect from his recent book (not available yet here in Saudi, I wonder why :o), so most of my knowledge of it is from Dr Dawkin's web site) that is Dr Dawkin's aim in TGD.

Please do one or the other but don't pretend that they are the same thing.

As far as I can see, science is Agnostic (doesn't give a flying fig) about the God question and Agnostic is not a synonym of Atheist.

Oddly enough it is some religious and some atheists who seem to believe this equality.
The fundies seem to think that asking questions will lead to disbelief and some atheists think that Agnostics are Atheists stuck in a closet.

Happy 2007 to all and thanks to all the hard working scientists who have shared their knowledge with me and the world on this site and their other writings.

Oh, about trespass rules in the UK, the laws in Scotland differ from those in England/Wales.

This is a little bit misleading on the alcohol issue. In fact, many states allow minors to drink alcohol as long as it's served by their parents or in the presence of their parents.

And Europe is not all a wonderland of moderation: check out the rates of cirrhosis in Finland, for example. I don't recall seeing any culture of moderation when I went to uni in Glasgow, either, among the English, Welsh, Scots, Germans, and any other nationality who I happened to run across at parties or pubs.

I would also point out that US *corporations* are definitely extremely litigious---they clog up most of the dockets in court---but I doubt very much you would find the average American has ever seriously considered a lawsuit, much less file one, despite the propaganda of tort reform lobbyists.

Given the litigious nature of American society, and the screwed up fact that trespassers can successfully sue landowners for injuries suffered on private property, perhaps their lives do depend on it in a sense."

— Bill Gascoyne

Well done to Dawkins for getting all those ID'ers Knickers in a twist at least.

The situation in the UK is rather different to that in the US of course, and you'll have to excuse the prof for forgetting that some people think the entire cosmos mainly consists of the recently colonised bit of ground they happen to be standing on. This same bit of ground also happens to be the same bit favoured by the Intelligent Designer, who seemingly has transferred his loyalties recently from a rather smaller bit of ground somewhere in the Middle East.

Most people in the UK are atheists or agnostic - quite possibly because of the rather boring attempts at indoctrination in state schools. Most are also opposed to expansion of state-funded 'faith schools' - especially as this means rapid expansion of Islamic Schools here.We really don't need more divisions in our society thank you.
However Tony Blair happens to run the country - and thinks more 'faith schools' would be a good thing - mainly because it allows the pushy middle classes to escape the tougher state schools by pretending to be Christian or whatever. Although he has been a great prime minister in may ways he's been a complete idiot on this matter. He has been very relaxed about a situation where wealthy evangelicals have been allowed to 'sponsor' a state school - and then twist the curriculum to promote creationism and intelligent design. A lot of us Brits get pissed off about this, including Dawkins, and i don't blame him for signing a loosely worded petition on the subject.

If anyone is interested in the situation here I'd recommend:

www.justscience.org.uk

which got a lot of inspiration from the Panda's Thumb.

As for all the American atheists who seem to be embarrassed by Dawkins and seemingly want him to shut up - I'll point out another little irony - whilst free speech may not have the legal protection here it has in the US, in practice its the norm. If you wish to criticise Dawkins, you should really address his arguments - not what you perceive to be his 'tactics'.

One final thing - anyone know how to change the dictionary in Firefox so it stops trying to make me spell like a Yank??

Happy New year to one and all from Merry En-ger-land!!

Oh and incidentally - thew UK government have just set up this on-line petition system as an excercise in 'open government'. There is a bit of a craze for these things at the moment - which will quickly disappear once people realise that any petition getting less than a million signatures will go straight into the bin.

All the same I've just signed up to the thing - badly worded or not, the principle is right; even if the best way to turn out more atheists is to teach religion as another boring subject at school.

Nick,

We already have significant federal and state regulation of private schools. How about limiting the time spent on religious indoctrination in those schools and compelling them to provide some balance on religious issues?

And I am at all not concerned about the regulations impacting atheists in a similar way. I don't know of any private schools set up for the purpose of indoctrinating youngsters in the religion of atheism, and I doubt any such schools exist. But if any such institutions do exist, well, they too ought to be regulated. I certainly am no atheist, as many here who know me are aware. But I am opposed to the crippling of young minds by indoctrination for ANY purpose. Young minds ought to be trained in careful, rational and objective analysis, in order that they can truly make up their OWN INDEPENDENT MINDS as they mature.

You just don't seem to think of this as a life and death issue. You should.

>If that is all Richard Dawkins did I would not have a problem with him.
> It is his ignorant forays into philosophical theism and Christianity I object to.

What about theists ignorant forays trying to tell others that they should be taken seriously? It's amazing you theists band together when you have such widely different beliefs to attack people just because they don't believe any fantasy. Answer one question, why should anyone even consider theism in the first place? Because some ancient people couldn't explain their surroundings? Is everyone supposed to give credence to a generic god or some particular one? Or is it you just want them to believe in *something* for which there is no evidence?

Philosophical theism - please believe me. I don't have any evidence. I just need you to acknowledge my beliefs. I need them.

There is a dragon in my garage that created the universe. And don't you dare question my beliefs because he is god and that makes me a theist!

James,

You seem blissfully unaware of the various rational, philosophical arguments for the existence of a non-corporeal entity (referred to as God) as the necessary first cause for the existence of a physical universe with specific characteristics, initial conditions and seemingly arbitrary constants. Your mocking theism only serves to display your own shallow intellectual skill set.

I say let the young hear all the arguments, be motivated to think for themselves, then as they mature let them make their own independent judgements, including an evaluation of the mutual mocking of ignorant proponents such as you in both camps.

You seem blissfully unaware of the various rational, philosophical arguments for the existence of ... God as the necessary first cause for the existence of a physical universe

Stevaroni,

To go into a detailed analysis of this age-old complex subject would necessarily derail this thread, something I am loathe to do since I have often been accused here of doing precisely that. This is why I limited myself to merely alluding in passing to the arguments for God. My point was not that there is evidence (in the scientific sense) for the existence of God, let alone that there is proof of same. I intentionally used terms such as "rational" and "argument" in this regard, to counter James' description of theism as "fantasy" and "irrational". One may not agree with a line of reasoning or its conclusion and yet recognize that it is based on reason.

To amplify just a little bit, consider what we do know, instead of all that we do not know about the universe. We DO know that it is governed by very specific rules which, for all we can ascertain, could have been different. We DO know that those rules contain various constants that, again, as far as we can ascertain at this point, could have had very different vales and thus would have led to a very different universe or no universe. We DO know that the present universe (the only one we have evidence for) evolved from initial conditions that, yet again, could have been otherwise.

So, how did all these come to be the way they are? Is this not the type of question science always asks about any and every phenomenon we encounter? HOW DID THIS COME TO BE THE WAY IT IS?

You are right, science has no satisfactory solution, in the case of the universe. And I dare say, with some trepidation, likely never will. An efficient argument (not proof or evidence) is to blame it all on the inscrutable (to us) whims of an entity regarding which all these questions cannot be asked. That entity is not governed by particular rules (so called supernatural), nor by any constant values, nor does it consists of specific physical characteristics, so no initial conditions can be specified or inquired about.

The only problem with this is that you (and I) cannot imagine or perceive such an entity. But there is a rational argument (there comes that word again) for that too. Our brains are the product of evolution and no survival or reproductive advantage ever existed for those brains to develop the skill set necessary to perceive the non-corporeal.

So, science itself provides the basis for why not everything can be discovered or studied scientifically.

Well, I certainly wouldn't want yet another thread to go crashing off the rails, but so far we've already had religion, politics, alcohol, lawers, gun control and masturbation discussed in this one, so maybe the other people in here will indulge me just a bit.

Isn't marveling about how perfectly suited this universe is for a life-form like us sort of like the ice cubes marveling at how miraculous it is that the freezer tray would be the exact right size and shape to fit them so perfectly?

Maybe it's just me.

I'm very sorry to have to say this, but I simply don't believe Dawkins' clarification. I'm British and when I read the petition, which is very short, I came to the same conclusion that most people have - that it would make it illegal to indoctrinate children with religion or define them by religion, period. English - that is, the language I was brought up with - just isn't that ambiguous and that is what it plainly says. The notion that Dawkins read this and signed it thinking it meant something else is very far-fetched. And FWIW, the idea that no-one in the UK could take the literal meaning seriously is mistaken. There are plenty of people in the UK, especially on the left, who would be delighted to ban religious teaching for children by law. If you doubt that, check how many people did sign. Are they all illiterate?

And before anyone starts, I'm an Atheist, but I hold atheism to a high ethical standard, and I'm starting to think that Dawkins is a very slippery character, as willing to shade the truth for the sake of Atheism as the worst fundy is to shade it for the sake of religion.

Answer one question, why should anyone even consider theism in the first place?

Or is it you just want them to believe in *something* for which there is no evidence?

James, You seem blissfully unaware of the various rational, philosophical arguments for the existence of a non-corporeal entity (referred to as God) as the necessary first cause for the existence of a physical universe with specific characteristics, initial conditions and seemingly arbitrary constants. Your mocking theism only serves to display your own shallow intellectual skill set. I say let the young hear all the arguments, be motivated to think for themselves, then as they mature let them make their own independent judgements, including an evaluation of the mutual mocking of ignorant proponents such as you in both camps.

Stevaroni,

What I said above is in no way linked to the anthropic argument you allude to. Even if no life or humans ever appeared in the universe, the same questions could be asked and answered as above.

And your ice cube stuff is not an adequate response to the anthropic argument. The only way around the anthropic argument is to postulate the existence of an infinite number of diverse universes with most of them not evolving life forms. There is no shred of evidence to support such a notion, but even if it is the case the questions I enumerated above can still be asked.

Carol,

I understand the philosophical arguments. But can you answer this, why should the concept of god even be raised? Does there need to be any evidence or only something that we call god *could* have done it?

Truth is, theists aren't referring to *some* entity but the one *they* believe in.

Carol, please don't refer to someone as ignorant when you want them to acknowledge the possibility for something for which there is no evidence or compelling reason to believe. Please tell me what the difference is between a dragon in my garage that created the universe and any other entity? What makes yours more reasonable than mine. Mere blowing me off, shows you don't have any real reasons.

> I think it is correct; that's why.

That's it Robert, you convinced me. How could I have been so blind. God is real! But your going to have to tell me which one because there are many thousands and I want yours not any false ones. But since you theists just want to talk about the wonders of theism here, I guess any one would do, wouldn't it?

And your ice cube stuff is not an adequate response to the anthropic argument. The only way around the anthropic argument is to postulate the existence of an infinite number of diverse universes with most of them not evolving life forms.

James,

No sir, you do NOT understand the arguments. If you did, you would not be repeating those stupid questions, such as what is the difference between your dragon and God.

For an avowed atheist, your writing is very poorly structured. Genuine atheists I know are almost always intelligent, educated folks who can write.

Carol,

You have said absolutely nothing. But that is all you have so I will excuse you.

on January 1, 2007 7:24 AM (e)

Given the litigious nature of American society, and the screwed up fact that trespassers can successfully sue landowners for injuries suffered on private property, perhaps their lives do depend on it in a sense."

— Just Another New Lawyer

What nonsense. This is a perfect example of the idiocy tort reforms try to trick the uninformed with. Not that it's your fault you don't know about licensees, invitees, trespassers, and the like, of course, but it's still a shame that people accept such piffle unquestioningly.

Carol wrote... And your ice cube stuff is not an adequate response to the anthropic argument. The only way around the anthropic argument is to postulate the existence of an infinite number of diverse universes

Our brains are the product of evolution and no survival or reproductive advantage ever existed for those brains to develop the skill set necessary to perceive the non-corporeal.

Religious freedom and child abuse are in tension here.

The notion that Dawkins read this and signed it thinking it meant something else is very far-fetched.

And Europe is not all a wonderland of moderation

I doubt very much you would find the average American has ever seriously considered a lawsuit

private land is often open to the public by default

"You may have not noticed that Dawkins missed the full text"

No, I didn't miss that. I'm talking about what he did read, and what the other signers presumably also read. "We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to make it illegal to indoctrinate or define children by religion before the age of 16."

What I'm saying is that I find it implausible when he says "I of course assumed that it referred to schools, not parents in the privacy of the home." He's a write and an academic. He knows that words count.

Are we supposed to believe that Dawkins and hundreds of other signers all shared the assumption that the petition doesn't say what it plainly does say, or that it says something that it doesn't say? You don't need the "more details" to understand what the petition says; the one-sentence summary says it quite nicely.

In the UK, if one wanted to "end religious instruction in state schools", one would say that. It's a widely debated idea. The phrase is very familiar. You would hardly word a petition that didn't mention schools in the hope that people would assume that it did. You've got twenty or so words to make your point, so why omit the word that counts?

Stevaroni,

For a complete and balanced analysis of the anthropic argument I highly recommend "The Anthropic Cosmological Principle" by John D. Barrow and Frank J Tipler, Oxford Univ. Press. It is widely available and, no, I was not involved editorially in the production of that work.

I look forward to your reaction when you're done.

Flint,

You MUST be joking.

Just in case you're not, would you kindly proffer a specific example of how the ability to perceive the non-corporeal would or could endow an organism with some avantage in the competition for survival?

In the UK, if one wanted to "end religious instruction in state schools", one would say that.

If you could point me to a cogent explanation of the anthropic argument, I'd love to take a gander at it.

the necessary first cause for the existence of a physical universe

science has no satisfactory solution, in the case of the universe. ... The only way around the anthropic argument is to postulate the existence of an infinite number of diverse universes with most of them not evolving life forms.

Stellar carbon cycle.

Torbjorn,

Thank you for so thoroughly misrepresenting what I said.

Stevaroni,

I would suggest you just ignore Torbjorn's incoherent drivel and find out about the anthropic argument from knowledgable sources, such as the one I recommended above.

randomly originated

carol clouser wrote:
You are right, science has no satisfactory solution, in the case of the universe. And I dare say, with some trepidation, likely never will. An efficient argument (not proof or evidence) is to blame it all on the inscrutable (to us) whims of an entity regarding which all these questions cannot be asked.

The exact same "efficient" argument has been used for every natural phenomenon from thunder to comets to volcanic eruptions and everything in between. As science has gradually explained each one there is less and less for this entity, as you call it, to be responsible for. Finally, we're down to the last chance, why the universe is the way it is. No doubt theists are praying hard that science doesn't explain that or this entity will just have to exist without purpose.

Due to the spam filter, I have to cut up the comment in parts.

carol,

What did I misrepresent?

It is easy to see from Wikipedia anthropic principles ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle ) and fine-tuning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-tuned_universe) that you were wrong on the physics.

carol:

It is also easy to see from Ikeda-Jefferys (http://quasar.as.utexas.edu/anthropic.html) and Mark Chu-Carroll ( http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2006/08/messing_with_big_numbers_using.php )

carol:

that the cosmological argument ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_argument ) is wrong. Note that I didn't call you a kook, but that Chu-Carroll mentions that "this comes up in creationist screeds".

Finally, I realize I may misrepresent Barrow's and Tipler's text which I haven't read.

But Wikipedia says "The most thorough extant study of the anthropic principle is the controversial book The Anthropic Cosmological Principle by John D. Barrow, a cosmologist, and Frank J. Tipler, a mathematical physicist. This book contains an extensive review of the relevant history of ideas, because its authors believe that the anthropic principle has important antecedents in the notions of intelligent design, the philosophies of Fichte, Hegel, Bergson, and Whitehead, and the omega point cosmology of Teilhard de Chardin. Barrow and Tipler carefully distinguish teleological reasoning from eutaxiological reasoning; the former asserts that order must have a consequent purpose; the latter asserts more modestly that order must have a planned cause. They attribute this important but nearly always overlooked distinction to Hicks (1883).[14]

Barrow and Tipler set out in great detail the seemingly incredible coincidences that characterize our universe and that permit human beings to evolve in it. They then maintain that only the anthropic principle can make sense of this raft of coincidences." [bold added] ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle )

In the light of the possibility of exact fundamental theories and the extensive treatment of something which is an elementary mistake and not relevant to science, I think I am entitled to call their book slanted.

that the cosmological argument ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_argume... ) is wrong.

Herr Larsson, a nit:

I think you mean binge drinking, great quantities in a short time.

Bilge is the bottom inside of a ship, and the unpleasant fluids which accumulate there.

At least I hope you don't mean bilge drinking. I've never been to the Baltic, however, so you may be right.

This seems to have started to change to the better (since bilge drinking is dangerous) with increasing cultural exchange.

Whoops, didn't refresh in time to see fnxtr. I've had this window open too long....

So, how did all these come to be the way they are? Is this not the type of question science always asks about any and every phenomenon we encounter? HOW DID THIS COME TO BE THE WAY IT IS? You are right, science has no satisfactory solution, in the case of the universe. And I dare say, with some trepidation, likely never will. An efficient argument (not proof or evidence) is to blame it all on the inscrutable (to us) whims of an entity regarding which all these questions cannot be asked.

— carol clouser

That entity is not governed by particular rules (so called supernatural), nor by any constant values, nor does it consists of specific physical characteristics, so no initial conditions can be specified or inquired about.

And your ice cube stuff is not an adequate response to the anthropic argument. The only way around the anthropic argument is to postulate the existence of an infinite number of diverse universes with most of them not evolving life forms.

There is no shred of evidence to support such a notion, but even if it is the case the questions I enumerated above can still be asked.

I've had this window open too long....

Carol wrote... For a complete and balanced analysis of the anthropic argument I highly recommend "The Anthropic Cosmological Principle" by John D. Barrow and Frank J Tipler, Oxford Univ. Press.

The wikipedia article on Tipler is interesting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Tipler

Thanks for publishing this email online. I live in the UK and, to be honest, it took some time work out what the big deal about this was. My initial reading of the petition was that it would apply to schools / government systems and nothing else. Obviously things mean something else in the US.

Anton wrote:

"An even more efficient argument is to declare that all those questions cannot be asked of the universe itself."

The difference is that you are declaring so by fiat, without any reason whatsoever, whereas in the approach I outlined above the questions become not applicable and whither away.

It is as if you and I are looking at a green horse. I ask: How did this horse get to be green. Your solution - shhh, it is forbidden to ask questions about green horses! My solution - some entity must be responsible for painting it green.

"If that entity's responsible for setting the laws and constants of nature, that's a characteristic which can be inquired about. "

If you mean to inquire as to why that entity chose to create the universe we know, you are on to something. But that is a different, less onerous question. It is one thing to inquire into, for example, the value of constants that supposedly could have taken on many other values but did not do so, it is quite another to inquire into the motives of an entity so different from our existence that we cannot even perceive it. The inability to solve the latter is far more palatable because it becomes intertwined with the mysterious and unimaginable nature of the entity itsdelf.

"One can postulate the existence of a single universe going through an infinite (or large) number of iterations. Or a single universe, with natural laws such that it had to feature conditions such as ours. Or a single universe whose laws were selected randomly and just popped out as ours."

The first is basically the same solution as many universes, and no evidence exists for either. If you are going to propose solutions for which not a shred of evidence exists, than you cannot belly-ache anout there being no evidence for God. The second begs the question. What compelled the universe to feature such conditions? The third goes against the axiom most reasonable people accept that things happen for a reason. Universes don't just "pop out" out of nowhere on any given afternoon.

Stevaroni,

No pain, no gain. It is a big subject if you aim to get to the bottom of it.

It is as if you and I are looking at a green horse. I ask: How did this horse get to be green. Your solution - shhh, it is forbidden to ask questions about green horses! My solution - some entity must be responsible for painting it green.

No pain, no gain. It is a big subject if you aim to get to the bottom of it.

Stevaroni wrote:

"I went into it trying to keep an open mind, I figure that I owe you that since you argue politely. I was hoping that you could direct me to a cogent summary so I wouldn't be dismissing it out of hand, but everything I've turned up so far has the distinct flavor of pseudoscience, lots of "it is obvious" quotes, but little backing evidence."

You really will do yourself a lot of good by reading that book I recommended. Nobody ever accused Barrow, a prominent physicts, of engaging in pseudoscience. And you will learn a lot of physics in the process. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.

Therefore, will the aforesaid writer please return the misappropriated apostrophe to the supply room so that it will be there when you really need it.

— Apostrophe Avenger

would you kindly proffer a specific example of how the ability to perceive the non-corporeal would or could endow an organism with some avantage in the competition for survival?

"An even more efficient argument is to declare that all those questions cannot be asked of the universe itself." The difference is that you are declaring so by fiat, without any reason whatsoever, whereas in the approach I outlined above the questions become not applicable and whither away.

— Carol Clouser

It is as if you and I are looking at a green horse. I ask: How did this horse get to be green. Your solution - shhh, it is forbidden to ask questions about green horses! My solution - some entity must be responsible for painting it green.

"If that entity's responsible for setting the laws and constants of nature, that's a characteristic which can be inquired about. " If you mean to inquire as to why that entity chose to create the universe we know, you are on to something.

But that is a different, less onerous question. It is one thing to inquire into, for example, the value of constants that supposedly could have taken on many other values but did not do so, it is quite another to inquire into the motives of an entity so different from our existence that we cannot even perceive it. The inability to solve the latter is far more palatable because it becomes intertwined with the mysterious and unimaginable nature of the entity itsdelf.

"One can postulate the existence of a single universe going through an infinite (or large) number of iterations. Or a single universe, with natural laws such that it had to feature conditions such as ours. Or a single universe whose laws were selected randomly and just popped out as ours." The first is basically the same solution as many universes, and no evidence exists for either. If you are going to propose solutions for which not a shred of evidence exists, than you cannot belly-ache anout there being no evidence for God.

The second begs the question. What compelled the universe to feature such conditions?

The third goes against the axiom most reasonable people accept that things happen for a reason. Universes don't just "pop out" out of nowhere on any given afternoon.

Therefore, will the aforesaid writer please return the misappropriated apostrophe to the supply room so that it will be there when you really need it.

— Period Avenger

Will the aforesaid avenger please return the misappropriated period to the supply room and replace it with a question mark, which is the common form of indicating an interrogatory?

"...view any particular activity as either (a) illegal and absolutely forbidden or (b) an absolute civil right and therefore completely without restriction of any sort..." Yes, we all think like this without exception, unless we've had help from the old world.

"...the British position is more rational and civilized..."

Yes, we all sit around with shotguns in anxious paranoia waiting to kill people. You have done an excellent job of characterizing an entire people with accuracy and fairness.

Three cheers for relevance and style!

Please, look up the Gricean Maxims.

Flint,

You are confusing the ability to perceive the non-corporeal, that is to comprehend its existence, with the ability to predict how it will act in the future coupled with the ability to then proceed to circumvent those actions and intentions. These are not the same.

In any event, even if you do find some evolutionary advantage to perceiving the non-corporeal, it can still be postulated that evolution has not yet evolved to the point that our brains can do so. Its really quite as simple as that.

Anton wrote:

"The questions only became inapplicable because you declared so, by fiat. Why is your entity not governed by particular rules or constant values? Why does it have no specific physical characteristics? Why are its motives and mechanisms of creation unknowable? Because you said so?"

No, I did not declare anything of the sort. You insist on missing the point. The reason these questions are inapplicable is because the basis for them has disappeared. You cannot ask why is the horse green unless it is or appears green. If a non-corporeal entity created the universe and its rules, does it make sense to ask why those rules don't apply to itself? They don't because the entity didn't design them that way!

Anton continued:

"And when I ask, "How and why did that entity come to paint the horse green?" you answer that it is forbidden to ask questions about green-horse-painting entities. Thus the Divine Painter needlessly complicates our picture of the world without actually providing any explanation for the horse's color."

I never said anything is forbidden. You must resort to such contrivances. As far as I am concerned, you may ask any sensible question you wish. And the divine painter provides a satisfactory explanation for how the horse came to be green, although we may shake our heads at the motives. In contrast, you provide nothing but fiat, prohibitions and silence.

Anton continued:

"Um, it's more palatable to declare the origin of the universe theoretically unknowable, than just to admit it's currently unknown? I don't think any scientist would agree with that."

It is far more palatable, it seems abundantly clear to me, to postulate purposeful creation by an entity that our limited brains cannot perceive and whose motives maybe difficult for us to ascertain, than that the universe appeared suddenly without cause, with parameters, rules, constants and initial conditions all part of the package, all POOF here I am!

Anton continued:

"We're entitled to propose as many evidenceless solutions as we want, God included, provided they're not actually contradicted by evidence. But the fact that there's a bazillion such solutions means that it's unreasonable to pick one of them in particular to believe in."

And we are entitled to favor those theories that seem to make more sense, seem to be most efficient, seem to leave as few loose ends dangling as possible, until contradicted by REAL evidence.

Anton continued:

"Beyond that, again, there does exist evidence for several of the multiverse-implying physical theories. Every bit of experimental evidence for QM, for instance, is also evidence for QM under the many-worlds interpretation. And if you give the anthropic argument any credence, it itself is evidence for a multiverse."

That is stretching the definition of "evidence" totally beyond recognition. Evidence consists of data that directly (within reason) confirms an hypothesis.

Anton continued:

"How do you know? When was the last time you built a spontaneously-appearing-universe detector?"

Well, for one thing, in thousands of years of recorded human history there is no record of anything ever appearing suddenly out of nowehere, for no apparent reason.

Anton continued:

"For another, most scientists accept that things in quantum mechanics happen for no reason at all...unless you restore determinism to the theory via the many-worlds interpretation."

Incorrect. Quantum Mechanics operates under the rubric of various rules. It does NOT turn the universe into a free for all, where anything and everything can happen. This is the case for all views of QM, even the non-deterministic view.

Re "It is far more palatable, it seems abundantly clear to me, to postulate purposeful creation by an entity that our limited brains cannot perceive and whose motives maybe difficult for us to ascertain, than that the universe appeared suddenly without cause, with parameters, rules, constants and initial conditions all part of the package,"

Reality is under no obligation to be palatable to us.

Henry

And so, despite my ignorance of biology, I would think the ability to perceive any meaningful non-corporeal entity would be AT LEAST as useful as being able to perceive light. Natural evolutionary processes would produce a wider variety of god-sensing organs than light-sensing organs.

— Flint

"The questions only became inapplicable because you declared so, by fiat. Why is your entity not governed by particular rules or constant values? Why does it have no specific physical characteristics? Why are its motives and mechanisms of creation unknowable? Because you said so?" No, I did not declare anything of the sort. You insist on missing the point. The reason these questions are inapplicable is because the basis for them has disappeared. You cannot ask why is the horse green unless it is or appears green. If a non-corporeal entity created the universe and its rules, does it make sense to ask why those rules don't apply to itself? They don't because the entity didn't design them that way!

— Carol Clouser

In contrast, you provide nothing but fiat, prohibitions and silence.

"Um, it's more palatable to declare the origin of the universe theoretically unknowable, than just to admit it's currently unknown? I don't think any scientist would agree with that." It is far more palatable, it seems abundantly clear to me, to postulate purposeful creation by an entity that our limited brains cannot perceive and whose motives maybe difficult for us to ascertain, than that the universe appeared suddenly without cause, with parameters, rules, constants and initial conditions all part of the package, all POOF here I am!

"We're entitled to propose as many evidenceless solutions as we want, God included, provided they're not actually contradicted by evidence. But the fact that there's a bazillion such solutions means that it's unreasonable to pick one of them in particular to believe in." And we are entitled to favor those theories that seem to make more sense, seem to be most efficient, seem to leave as few loose ends dangling as possible, until contradicted by REAL evidence.

"Beyond that, again, there does exist evidence for several of the multiverse-implying physical theories. Every bit of experimental evidence for QM, for instance, is also evidence for QM under the many-worlds interpretation. And if you give the anthropic argument any credence, it itself is evidence for a multiverse." That is stretching the definition of "evidence" totally beyond recognition. Evidence consists of data that directly (within reason) confirms an hypothesis.

"How do you know? When was the last time you built a spontaneously-appearing-universe detector?" Well, for one thing, in thousands of years of recorded human history there is no record of anything ever appearing suddenly out of nowehere, for no apparent reason.

"For another, most scientists accept that things in quantum mechanics happen for no reason at all...unless you restore determinism to the theory via the many-worlds interpretation." Incorrect. Quantum Mechanics operates under the rubric of various rules. It does NOT turn the universe into a free for all, where anything and everything can happen. This is the case for all views of QM, even the non-deterministic view.

The wikipedia article on Tipler is interesting

My solution - some entity must be responsible for painting it green.

The first is basically the same solution as many universes, and no evidence exists for either.

Universes don't just "pop out" out of nowhere on any given afternoon.

The first is basically the same solution as many universes, and no evidence exists for either.

Universes don't just "pop out" out of nowhere on any given afternoon.

That is stretching the definition of "evidence" totally beyond recognition.

It does NOT turn the universe into a free for all, where anything and everything can happen.

...No wonder lawyers and diplomats need special training. I'm out of my depth here.

Richard Dawkins

Reading a petition, and thinking about it, before signing it, is "out of his depth?" And then he tries to pretend he's more intelligent and civilized than us superstitious colonial rubes. And then, on top of all that, he blames Ed Brayton for not reading him "charitably" enough. Like a scientist of Dawkins' caliber is suddenly in need of "charity?"

I nominate Dawkins for the 2007 "Upper-Class Twit of the Year" award. Having run over himself, just like in the sketch, he's pretty much earned it. (Of course, Sam Harris has almost a year to come up with something dumber...)

Anton wrote:

"You just decided that the entity has the property of "non-corporeality." We can ask how and why it has that property. It also, clearly, has the properties of "ability and intent to create a universe with constants and laws such as we perceive," and that means that every single question about "Why does the universe have property X?" is still here, in the form, "How and why did this entity give the universe property X?"

Well, this brings us back full circle to what I argued earlier that not all questions of the form "How come" and "why" are of equal poignancy. I, for one, am significantly less annoyed at not being able to get a handle on the motives and methods of an entity totally beyond my experience and comprehension, than I am at being unable to fathom why and how come the universe exists with the particular conditions, constants and characteristics that it has.

You could have gone a step further and asked, "How come the entity exists?" But, aghain, considering that the entity is non-corporeal, that is less of a dilemma than how come the universe has, this or the other parameter.

Anton continued:

"You confuse "without cause" with "due to a currently unknown cause, if any."

Not at all. All the theories pertaining to origins only shift the questions up, down or sideways to other times or conditions, they do not resolve them. Science provides framworks, models and mechanisms, concerning "how", not "why". The questions never end until there is reason for them to end, when they are no longer applicable or when they are not particularly annoying. That is, when you bump up against the first cause.

All the theories now in play and those yet to be conceived, are a compatible with the first cause, since physical theiries provide mechanisms for how, not reasons for why. Therefore, I am not precluding any theory, but you are. You preclude the first cause. Now, what do you have against that?

Anton continued:

"Ah, now you're invoking parsimony. Trouble is, an undetectable, incorporeal creator is a perfect example of a "loose end."

Not as loose as the others, for the reasons described earlier and others.

Anton continued"

"Are you joking? Do you really think that a hypothesis cannot be unconfirmed, yet supported by some evidence?"

That's not what we are talking about. A hypothsis could be supported by some evidence if it directly supports the hypothsis. You are proposing that aspects of a hypothesis be considered supported by evidence that tends to support other aspects of the hypothesis that the hypothesis claims are related to each other.

More Anton:

"Who says that if universes appear spontaneously, they would have appeared within recorded human history, in front of humans, in a way humans could detect?"

I didn't mean it as a serious argument but, come on, maybe not a universe but could not at least a little pebble have appeared somewhere out of nothing?

I didn't mean it as a serious argument but, come on, maybe not a universe but could not at least a little pebble have appeared somewhere out of nothing?

I'd like to thank Orac, Uncivilized Yank, jon livesey, and Raging Bee for their relevant and much-needed remarks about this whole stupid mess. You folks saved me the trouble of commenting. I also congratulate the various Grammar Avengers for providing us with a most delightful extended metaphor.

In his ranting about theism, Dawkins has not been clear enough about his views on freedom of religion

Reading a petition, and thinking about it, before signing it, is "out of his depth?" And then he tries to pretend he's more intelligent and civilized than us superstitious colonial rubes. And then, on top of all that, he blames Ed Brayton for not reading him "charitably" enough. Like a scientist of Dawkins' caliber is suddenly in need of "charity?"

It is far more palatable, it seems abundantly clear to me, to postulate purposeful creation by an entity that our limited brains cannot perceive and whose motives maybe difficult for us to ascertain, than that the universe appeared suddenly without cause, with parameters, rules, constants and initial conditions all part of the package, all POOF here I am!

I can't pass up this opportunity, especially since carol has done such a good job of misrepresenting it. It is indeed a large subject. If you want introductions with pointers to references (including carol's) try both articles about the anthropic principle and the fine-tuned universe in Wikipedia. The anhropic argument itself is an old religious argument. As you yourself suggest, and the Ikeda-Jefferys argument shows, it is simply a variant of the texas sharpshooter fallacy in a probabilistic setting.

But, aghain, considering that the entity is non-corporeal, that is less of a dilemma than how come the universe has, this or the other parameter.

You preclude the first cause. Now, what do you have against that?

You are proposing that aspects of a hypothesis be considered supported by evidence that tends to support other aspects of the hypothesis that the hypothesis claims are related to each other.

come on, maybe not a universe but could not at least a little pebble have appeared somewhere out of nothing?

What I'm saying is that I find it implausible when he says "I of course assumed that it referred to schools, not parents in the privacy of the home." He's a write and an academic. He knows that words count.

Are we supposed to believe that Dawkins and hundreds of other signers all shared the assumption that the petition doesn't say what it plainly does say, or that it says something that it doesn't say? You don't need the "more details" to understand what the petition says; the one-sentence summary says it quite nicely.

In the UK, if one wanted to "end religious instruction in state schools", one would say that.

It's a widely debated idea. The phrase is very familiar.

You would hardly word a petition that didn't mention schools in the hope that people would assume that it did.

You've got twenty or so words to make your point, so why omit the word that counts?

Like a scientist of Dawkins' caliber is suddenly in need of "charity?"

Reading a petition, and thinking about it, before signing it, is "out of his depth?"

Twit of the Year

If there IS anything non-corporeal, if the non-corporeal actually DOES anything

I think he refers to the principle that IIRC Dennett discuss

The anthropic argument is a rebuttal of the sharpshooter fallacy.

"It was this carol choose to call "the anthropic argument"" - It was this carol choose to call "the anthropic argument" and then refers to the whole subject when pointing out an introductory text.

The Principle of Charity is often associated with Willard Quine, one of Dennett's mentors.

he naively assumes that people aren't ignorant louts.

It is as if you and I are looking at a green horse. I ask: How did this horse get to be green. Your solution - shhh, it is forbidden to ask questions about green horses!

My solution - some entity must be responsible for painting it green.

If you read further

It was this carol choose to call "the anthropic argument". If you have a better name, I would be eager to know it.

I see that it is considered to prevent introducing fallacies more than erecting straw men.

Suppose all God does is show up and smite sinners? If you can't dodge divine wrath, what's the evolutionary benefit in seeing it coming?

Well, for one thing, in thousands of years of recorded human history there is no record of anything ever appearing suddenly out of nowehere, for no apparent reason.

We're entitled to propose as many evidenceless solutions as we want, God included

Nobody ever accused Barrow, a prominent physicts, of engaging in pseudoscience.

Duane Gish and the creationists, Willis Carto and the Holocaust deniers, and physicists John Barrow and Frank Tipler--to name just a few of those Shermer takes on--are at least as intelligent as their opponents. When an intelligent person believes something for which there is little more than faith to support the belief, what else can you say except that the person believes simply because he or she wants to? For example, Barrow and Tipler think they have a new and improved argument from design which uses only physics to prove God exists. And Tipler thinks he has proved the immortality and the resurrection by physics alone. Yet despite his enormous intellectual endeavors to prove Christianity by physics, Tipler comes off a bit disingenuous when he admits that the only thing really going for his theory at this point is its "theoretical beauty." Since beauty is in the eye of the beholder, that is not saying much. In short, for all his brilliance, Tipler's theory is an elaborate construction which can only be accepted on faith. Since there are probably only a handful of people who could even understand his argument, refuting it seems unlikely to be very rewarding, but Shermer gives it a go. The argument is very complicated and likely to produce more yawns than hurrahs.

It's a teleological argument, specifically a fine-tuned universe argument.

The Antropic Principle article seems too heavily based on Tipler's writing.

And your ice cube stuff is not an adequate response to the anthropic argument.

The only way around the anthropic argument is to postulate the existence of an infinite number of diverse universes with most of them not evolving life forms.

I say let the young hear all the arguments, be motivated to think for themselves, then as they mature let them make their own independent judgements

The thing that surprises me is that not all atheists have figured this out yet. They often seem to have this bizarre kind of wishful thinking, wherein they naively think that (a) governmental blocks on private religious instruction would actually work (in fact, they would backfire and push religious people towards fundamentalism and radicalism), and (b) that such power, if given to the government, would not be applied to atheists. The reality is that atheism would be first on the chopping block if the government ever got power to regulate private discussions about religion between parents and children.

50 out of 50 US states do not allow shooting trespassers during the day, and 49 of 50 don't allow it at night.

...one should read an argument in the most charitable way when in doubt.

If there is any room for doubt -- i.e., if an argument is so poorly worded that the less-charitable interpretation(s) are at all plausible -- then the person making or supporting that argument should be called on it. Which is exactly what we do in response to poorly worded arguments by theists (like Carol above). That's the issue here -- not what Dawkins actually meant to say, but how clumsy and lazy he was to either (a) support a petition that didn't clearly express what he actually believed; or (b) take a position and then run away when questioned and blame others for misinterpreting the position he supported.

(Funny how this "charity" principle only gets mentioned when a prominent atheist gets in trouble for supporting a poorly-worded argument. Bit of a double standard, innit?)

It's really quite foolish to make the utterly implausible assertion that this petition was intended to call for laws against parents saying certain things to their children, a position with virtually no support.

There's nothing foolish about holding the authors and signers of a petition accountable for writing a piece of crap that can so easily be misunderstood. If the authors and signers of this rubbish REALLY cared about freedom of speech and religion, why didn't they take care to ensure that the petition really reflected their priorities? If they didn't mean to say or imply something, why did they say or imply it? If they only meant to attack a particular policy of a particular government, why did they not make their wording more specific? Both their competence and their motives are open to question here.

Pops, I worry about you. When do you sleep?

And another thing...

It's really quite foolish to make the utterly implausible assertion that this petition was intended to call for laws against parents saying certain things to their children, a position with virtually no support.

Many of the more militant atheists here have expressed support for policies very close to this one. Whenever they equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse" (or, worse yet, with the sexual abuse of children by priests), they are laying the groundwork to justify such laws. Taking such extreme positions, and then running away and claiming that such positions have "virtually no support," is yet another sign of the intellectual dishonesty and cowardice of at least some militant atheists.

So Dawkins is both a high caliber scientist and isn't more intelligent than you?

Appealing to authority already? I thought only creationists were supposed to do that.

Being brilliant in one field has never prevented anyone from being an utter nincompoop in other fields. Which is why we should be a little less quick to believe what Dawkins says about religion.

Torbjorn wrote:

"'First cause' (and its relative 'origin') is folk psychology and philosophical concepts without any operational definition. There is no 'first cause' in physics. Indeed, causality itself is a derived and not fundamental property of spacetime. Physics concerns itself with patterns ("laws") and boundary conditions ("initial conditions"). So the proper questions to ask in science is: "why these laws and initial conditions". These questions are as described above discussed in theoretical physics and cosmology...."

Attaching a derogatory label such as "folk Psychology" to an idea constitutes no argument, it is just empty rhetoric. Nor does labeling any idea as "not scientific", or decalaring that it "doesn't exist in physics" or that "it is not proper in science" constitute an argument, even if correct (which you essentially are). Ideas must rise or fall on their own merit.

It is, after all quite possible that certain truisms are beyond the reach of the scientific method. Science is limited by its tools and methods, which constitute both its great strength and its potential weakness. To dispute this is entirely illogical. Your label of ideas as "philosophical" is actually a compliment, although you didn't intend it as such.

Now, science is as you say concerned with patterns and conditions, in other words, cause and effect relationships. None of the theories at play in physics address the ultimate issue of the cause of it all, whatever the "all" includes. They all just jostle the effects to other causes. This is fine as far as it goes, it is all we expect from science.

It seems to me that raising this issue causes irritation among some scientists. Probably because those scientists see the cup as "half full", are rightfully proud of all the great accomplishments of the past three centuries of scientific endeavor, develop a sense of hubris about what science can do, and feel helpless at not having much to offer pertaining to ultimate issues. These usually become your atheists.

On the other hand are scientists who see the cup as "half empty", realize that we really have only "played with a few more pebbles at the sea shore (to parahrse Newton) while the great ocean of truth remain yet to be discovered", develop a sense of humility about what science can achieve and humans can understand, and acknowledge the importance of confronting the ultimate issues. These usually become your theists or at least agnostics.

I can sympathise with both camps of scientists. What I will having to do with is the silly discourse of the likes of popper's ghost whose shrillness only highlights the vacuity of the nonsense he/she spouts.

Carol, you coward. It is obvious you haven't even considered the substance of PG's comments, or the references he provided.

So Dawkins is both a high caliber scientist and isn't more intelligent than you? Appealing to authority already? I thought only creationists were supposed to do that.

Being brilliant in one field has never prevented anyone from being an utter nincompoop in other fields.

Carol, you coward. It is obvious you haven't even considered the substance of PG's comments, or the references he provided.

PG: first you respond to me (and apparently just about everyone else) with grade-school name-calling, completely ignoring all of the actual points I made about Dawkins' behavior; then you stoop even lower by referring to Carol as an "it." Way to dumb down the debate! If Dawkins knew you were doing this in support of him, would he be proud, or ashamed?

After a performance like that, you're certainly in no position to question anyone else's intelligence. Even Carol comes off sounding more intelligent, mature and honest than you. Next time Dembski sends Dawkins a thank-you note for making him look smart, perhaps he should CC you.

A review of Dawkins' book:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19775

Many of the more militant atheists here have expressed support for policies very close to this one. Whenever they equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse" (or, worse yet, with the sexual abuse of children by priests), they are laying the groundwork to justify such laws. Taking such extreme positions, and then running away and claiming that such positions have "virtually no support," is yet another sign of the intellectual dishonesty and cowardice of at least some militant atheists.

— Raging Bee

completely ignoring all of the actual points I made about Dawkins' behavior

Without even having to consider cultural differences between the US and UK, which of these do you think is a more charitable reading? I know being defensive to the point of paranoia can be fun, but I'd hope desire for accuracy carries some weight.

After a performance like that, you're certainly in no position to question anyone else's intelligence.

AC: obviously option 2 is the best response. But once you equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse," as many atheists have been doing here, loudly and shrilly, option 1 becomes very plausible (that's the standard response to actions we call "child abuse"); so you really can't complain when others express doubts about your intentions.

But here's where things get a little complicated: once you speak out against "private religious indoctrination," you would be asked what actions, specifically, are bad and should be stopped, and why they're bad; so you might as well dump the vague generalizations about "indoctrination" now, and start talking about specific "abusive" or harmful actions -- you'll have to go there sometime anyway, if you want to be taken seriously.

I know making sweeping generalizations can be easy and fun, but I'd hope desire for accuracy carries some weight.

...the clousers of the world.

Pinhead wrote:

"She really does deserve to found a category: sincere, articulate, intelligent, polite, opaque, obtuse, afflicted with an enormous blind-spot.
Not quite a "concern troll": her inimitable clouserosity is simply clouseresque to the degree of clousericulousness, if not clouseromity."

Hope your having fun.

You forgot to add to the list of my many attributes "and correct".

How are those gerbils doing in the Mideast? Catch any lately?

How are those gerbils doing in the Mideast? Catch any lately?

Being brilliant in one field has never prevented anyone from being an utter nincompoop in other fields. Which is why we should be a little less quick to believe what Dawkins says about religion.

Or have ever read a book by Dawkins.

Gotten around to that yet, Bee?

Hi, Carol and Happy New Year!

I rather expect the Iraqui gerbils would appreciate a cessation to the conflict currently occurring in their habitat.

Not speaking Gerbil, however, that's more of a reasoned supposition than a certainty. Needless to say, if your gerbils are being more communicative, let us know!

And I guess that'll bee the last time that I second anyone's nomination to nominalization! If the nominee's going to start raging about it, and making me wish I'd jammed my toe instead. I mean, tobjorn it and dawkins-gone it anyway, this is not to be borne! No more poppering off, trying to convey a ghost of humor! I might as well heave myself ashore and katarina my hull-strakes, or something...!

Sheesh!

And I guess that'll bee the last time that I second anyone's nomination to nominalization! If the nominee's going to start raging about it, and making me wish I'd jammed my toe instead. I mean, tobjorn it and dawkins-gone it anyway, this is not to be borne! No more poppering off, trying to convey a ghost of humor! I might as well heave myself ashore and katarina my hull-strakes, or something...!

Arrhh! I'm plumb sorry, matey, but a well-set-up feller-me-lad with tentacles all hung about his face with care done strolled off with me salty-to-lubberly translatin' thingamajiggy whilst I was a wee mite under t'influence of t'grog.

And all like that.

Or have ever read a book by Dawkins. Gotten around to that yet, Bee?

Of all the people who have trashed and ridiculed Behe, Luskin, Dembski, and the rest of that lot, how many have read their books? Have you gotten around to them, Katarina?

or even knew wtf you were talking about when you speak of what Dawkins does and does not think.

So what, exactly, have I got wrong on that subject? Plenty of people here have called me ignorant, but none, so far, have cited any writings of Dawkins that actually contradict what I currently understand of him. Every quote they cite, and every explanation or justification they've offered, merely repeats or rewords those opinions of Dawkins' that I originally found uninformed, dishonest, and/or bigoted. If there's anything in his books about religion that prove me wrong, you have yet to quote it.

You've also failed to explain why so many avowed atheists are explicitly distancing themselves from Dawkins for the very same reasons as mine.

oh me! that's terrible.

here, matey, borrow mine:

http://www.syddware.com/cgi-bin/pirate.pl

have cited any writings of Dawkins that actually contradict what I currently understand of him

Glen: thanks fo rthe review of Dawkins' book. Seems I'm not the only one who thinks Dawkins is clueless about religion and twisting logic to drive it to his preordained conclusions. This paragraph I found among the most telling:

The result is The God Delusion, a book that never squarely faces its opponents. You will find no serious examination of Christian or Jewish theology in Dawkins's book (does he know Augustine rejected biblical literalism in the early fifth century?), no attempt to follow philosophical debates about the nature of religious propositions (are they like ordinary claims about everyday matters?), no effort to appreciate the complex history of interaction between the Church and science (does he know the Church had an important part in the rise of non-Aristotelian science?), and no attempt to understand even the simplest of religious attitudes (does Dawkins really believe, as he says, that Christians should be thrilled to learn they're terminally ill?).

Oh, and this one:

Exercises in double standards also plague Dawkins's discussion of the idea that religion encourages good behavior. Dawkins cites a litany of statistics revealing that red states (with many conservative Christians) suffer higher rates of crime, including murder, burglary, and theft, than do blue states. But now consider his response to the suggestion that the atheist Stalin and his comrades committed crimes of breathtaking magnitude: "We are not in the business," he says, "of counting evils heads, compiling two rival roll calls of iniquity." We're not? We were forty-five pages ago.

Any comment, PG?

Glen: thanks fo rthe review of Dawkins' book. Seems I'm not the only one who thinks Dawkins is clueless about religion and twisting logic to drive it to his preordained conclusions. This paragraph I found among the most telling:

..oh and since you now assume that the best way to read a book is through quote mines, you place yourself squarely in the same camp as those who argue for creationism using the same quote mining technique.

good job.

shall we start calling you Sal's little brother now?

I, for one, am significantly less annoyed at not being able to get a handle on the motives and methods of an entity totally beyond my experience and comprehension, than I am at being unable to fathom why and how come the universe exists with the particular conditions, constants and characteristics that it has.

— Carol Clouser

You could have gone a step further and asked, "How come the entity exists?" But, aghain, considering that the entity is non-corporeal, that is less of a dilemma than how come the universe has, this or the other parameter.

All the theories now in play and those yet to be conceived, are a compatible with the first cause, since physical theiries provide mechanisms for how, not reasons for why. Therefore, I am not precluding any theory, but you are. You preclude the first cause. Now, what do you have against that?

You are proposing that aspects of a hypothesis be considered supported by evidence that tends to support other aspects of the hypothesis that the hypothesis claims are related to each other.

I didn't mean it as a serious argument but, come on, maybe not a universe but could not at least a little pebble have appeared somewhere out of nothing?

Or suppose all God does is show up and smite those who have an ability to detect it.

— Popper's ghost

(Funny how this "charity" principle only gets mentioned when a prominent atheist gets in trouble for supporting a poorly-worded argument. Bit of a double standard, innit?)

— Raging Bee

AC: obviously option 2 is the best response. But once you equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse," as many atheists have been doing here, loudly and shrilly, option 1 becomes very plausible (that's the standard response to actions we call "child abuse"); so you really can't complain when others express doubts about your intentions.

But here's where things get a little complicated: once you speak out against "private religious indoctrination," you would be asked what actions, specifically, are bad and should be stopped, and why they're bad; so you might as well dump the vague generalizations about "indoctrination" now, and start talking about specific "abusive" or harmful actions --- you'll have to go there sometime anyway, if you want to be taken seriously.

(does Dawkins really believe, as he says, that Christians should be thrilled to learn they're terminally ill?)

— Raging Bee quoted someone else who

Dawkins doesn't believe that Christians do believe that, but that they logically ought to given their belief in an afterlife.

According to whose "logic?" Based on what premises? If a Christian actually enjoys the earthly life his God gave him, and the people he has in it, and if he believes his God put him on the Earth for a purpose, then he won't necessarily want it to end, nor would he want his relatives to be hurt by his departure.

For that matter, the popularity of stories about joyful martyrs and dying people anticipating heavenly bliss indicates that most Christians think they ought to believe it as well.

Oh really? Well, actually LISTENING to REAL LIVE CHRISTIANS indicates that they DON'T think that way, whatever you think they "ought" to believe. The only people whom I've heard to welcome the afterlife are the old, sick people whose lives are already mostly over and for whom death is merely the inevitable end of sickness and pain.

Your logic leads to a conclusion contrary to observable reality, therefore it is faulty. This just goes to show where listening to Dawkins will get you.

STJ: First you trash me for not reading Dawkins' book; then you trash me for getting information from to someone who actually HAS read the book, and can discuss it intelligently. You're really running out of excuses, aren't you?

Face the facts, Skippy -- you picked the wrong guy to lead you, he led you to a dead end, and now you're left holding the bag and looking like a fool. It's time you stopped making excuses and started learning from mistakes. Putting it off only makes you look sadder every day.

STJ: First you trash me for not reading Dawkins' book; then you trash me for getting information from to someone who actually HAS read the book, and can discuss it intelligently. You're really running out of excuses, aren't you?

you picked the wrong guy to lead you

This just goes to show where listening to Dawkins will get you.

two, how do you know the person whose information you infer is correct based on the quote mines you used actually IS?

Two reasons:

1) What he says about Dawkins' opinions/assertions is pretty close to what Dawkins' fans here have said about them.

2) If he got his facts wrong, you'd be pointing that out to us, in detail, rather than insulting me.

"three, the question was addressed to you that you haven't a clue what Dawkins thinks, based on the nature of your posts, and you were given DIRECT WORDS FROM DAWKINS CLARIFYING HIS POSITION in this very thread, and chose to think he didn't mean what he said."

2) If he got his facts wrong, you'd be pointing that out to us, in detail, rather than insulting me.

Of all the people who have trashed and ridiculed Behe, Luskin, Dembski, and the rest of that lot, how many have read their books? Have you gotten around to them, Katarina?

The most disappointing feature of The God Delusion is Dawkins's failure to engage religious thought in any serious way. This is, obviously, an odd thing to say about a book-length investigation into God. But the problem reflects Dawkins's cavalier attitude about the quality of religious thinking. Dawkins tends to dismiss simple expressions of belief as base superstition. Having no patience with the faith of fundamentalists, he also tends to dismiss more sophisticated expressions of belief as sophistry (he cannot, for instance, tolerate the meticulous reasoning of theologians). But if simple religion is barbaric (and thus unworthy of serious thought) and sophisticated religion is logic-chopping (and thus equally unworthy of serious thought), the ineluctable conclusion is that all religion is unworthy of serious thought.

If there is any room for doubt - i.e., if an argument is so poorly worded that the less-charitable interpretation(s) are at all plausible - then the person making or supporting that argument should be called on it.

If they only meant to attack a particular policy of a particular government, why did they not make their wording more specific?

Whenever they equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse" (or, worse yet, with the sexual abuse of children by priests), they are laying the groundwork to justify such laws.

it is just empty rhetoric.

in other words, cause and effect relationships.

It seems to me that raising this issue causes irritation among some scientists.

both camps of scientists.

tickled my funnybone

This paragraph I found among the most telling: The result is The God Delusion, a book that never squarely faces its opponents.

Torbjörn - thanks, good link. Heated comments section (just the way I like 'em).

Dawkins makes the excellent point in his book that the moderates set the stage for tolerance of extremists.

What about the moderates who use quotes from the Bible (or other holy text) to debunk the extremists? News flash: it happens all the time.

What about the moderate-Christian plaintiffs in the Dover trial? What about the official church doctrines (Catholic, Lutheran and others) that explicitly reject both creationism and literalism? How, exactly, are they "setting the stage for tolerance of extremists?"

What about the Christian abolitionists of the nineteenth century, or the Christian civil-rights activists of the twentieth? How, exactly, are they "setting the stage for tolerance of extremists?"

Dawkins' point here is based, not on the actual deeds of the moderates, but merely on their existence as religious moderates. It's guilt-by-association, a standard tool of bigots.

How would you feel if I accused moderate atheists of "setting the stage for tolerance of Stalinists?" Christian bigots do this all the time, and we rightly reject it as the work of mindless bigots.

If a Christian actually enjoys the earthly life his God gave him, and the people he has in it, and if he believes his God put him on the Earth for a purpose, then he won't necessarily want it to end, nor would he want his relatives to be hurt by his departure.

— Raging Bee

For that matter, the popularity of stories about joyful martyrs and dying people anticipating heavenly bliss indicates that most Christians think they ought to believe it as well.

Torbjorn wrote:

So you are protesting an interpretation of a petition text that is against free speech, while suggesting that free speech is bad.

Where do I "suggest" that free speech is "bad?"

You're really grasping at straws here...

Most real live Christians do not think the way their professed belief system would imply.

Just because you, or Dawkins, assert that a belief system "implies" something, does not mean the belief system "implies" the same thing to the believers. Has Dawkins asked the believers what it "implies" to them? This assumption about what a belief system "implies" is, at best, an extremely simplistic reading of other people's beliefs; therefore, any conclusion based on this assumption is suspect.

Therefore, says Dawkins, it seems that most Christians don't actually believe in the idea of Heaven.

Or their belief in Heaven is a bit more complex that Dawkins is willing to admit. The Christians I've talked to say that yes, eternal bliss awaits them after they die, but in the meantime, life on this plane is a gift from God that should be enjoyed, and learned from, not squandered or thrown away in pining for something better. (The Christians who have tried to convert me promise me both a blissful eternal afterlife and a happier life on this plane.)

...In spite of all that theology can do, heaven remains, to most people, an "unpleasant subject."

No, the loss of a loved one remains an unpleasant subject. So might the actual manner of said loved one's death (i.e., a grisly and/or pointless murder). It's quite possible to believe in Heaven and still miss a loved one, and feel pain at the evil or horribly unfair particular circumstances of the death. Is Russell really that obtuse about such an obvious matter?

AC: obviously option 2 is the best response. But once you equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse," as many atheists have been doing here, loudly and shrilly, option 1 becomes very plausible (that's the standard response to actions we call "child abuse"); so you really can't complain when others express doubts about your intentions.

— Raging Bee

But here's where things get a little complicated: once you speak out against "private religious indoctrination," you would be asked what actions, specifically, are bad and should be stopped, and why they're bad; so you might as well dump the vague generalizations about "indoctrination" now, and start talking about specific "abusive" or harmful actions --- you'll have to go there sometime anyway, if you want to be taken seriously.

Anton wrote:

"You're still unable to fathom the latter (as am I), you've just stopped worrying about it. Which is your prerogative, of course, but most scientists feel differently."

No. I am able to fathom the latter (why the universe is the way it is) by attributing them to the intentions and actions of the entity. Those intentions and methods, in turn, I cannot fathom. There is a real difference here.

Anton also wrote:

"It is? Is there some good reason for non-corporeal entities to exist which doesn't apply to corporeal ones? Or by "less of a dilemma," do you again mean "doesn't personally bother me as much because I like the idea of God?"

In a corporeal entity we are confronted with a multitude of effects that go around begging for causes, effects that do not arise with a non-corporeal entity. In a corporeal entity we demand to know why and how come it has this particular size and is not somewhat smaller or larger? Why is its temperature what it is and not higher or lower? And its color? And its mass-energy? And its charge? And on and on?

Anton continued:

"Oh, that happens all the time. Virtual particles, for instance. Not-so-coincidentally, some of the multiversal theories involve universes spontaneously appearing and disappearing via the same or a similar mechanism as virtual particles do."

Excuse me, here, but you are wrong. Virtual particles lead a virtual existance. Real particle production and anihilation always conserves mass-energy and momentum and other quantities, so nothing of significance appears or disappears. In the case of quantum fluctuations you could get a very fleeting and temporary violation of the conservation laws, including conservation of mass-energy, and this is where we invent the virual existance of so called virtual particles, but these are all based on the uncertainties quantum mechanics imposes on the original and final mass-energies and on the time elapsed. This is NOT a case of someTHING appearing from NOthing.

Way back in my doctoral student years I had occasion to work with the great physicist Edward Tryon, the proponent of the notion that the entire universe is merely a quantum fluctuation with the universe's agregate mass-energy equal to zero. I and others extensively debated these budding ideas with him. Even if correct, it doesn't resolve the key question of why the entire package (rules of QM, initial conditions, etc.) exists in the form that it does? This is where the first cause, an intellectual necessity, comes in.

AC: Now we're getting somewhere. I totally agree with your list of what constitutes emotional abuse of children. And this is why I think it so important to keep our criticism of "religious indoctrination" specific: vague generalized criticisms only waste time and allow the perpetrators of real abuse to avoid answering for their specific actions.

Another thing: once you get into specifics, you'll probably find that not all Christians support such abuses, and even the ones who disapprove of gays, wanking, etc., would not necessarily approve of threatening mere children with Hellfire over it.

Or their belief in Heaven is a bit more complex that Dawkins is willing to admit. The Christians I've talked to say that yes, eternal bliss awaits them after they die, but in the meantime, life on this plane is a gift from God that should be enjoyed, and learned from, not squandered or thrown away in pining for something better. (The Christians who have tried to convert me promise me both a blissful eternal afterlife and a happier life on this plane.)

— Raging Bee

Torbjorn wrote:

"No. Folk psychology is a description of common assumptions. "Folk psychology (sometimes called naïve psychology or common sense psychology) is the set of background assumptions, socially-conditioned prejudices and convictions that are implicit in our everyday descriptions of others' behavior and in our ascriptions of their mental states..... But the argument was that they are without any operational definition. That is that makes them outside science. You either did not understand this, or avoided it."

I know what "folk psychology" means, but thank you for the lesson anyway. But you seem to have missed the whole point, which was that labeling an idea as folk psychology does not constitute an argument against it. Nor does labeling an idea as "outside of science". Is that so hard to understand?

Whether or not "first cause" has an "operational" definition depends on your standard for operational. It certainly has an unambiguous definition. If that alludes you, do let me know. I will see what I can do about that.

However, all these beliefs, despite their ornateness, are still highly irrational. That is the essence of the atheists' complaints.

So what? Art, literature, music, film noir, tourism, sexual relationships, our choice of friends, etc., etc., are all, "despite their ornateness...still highly irrational" -- more so, in fact, than many of the religious beliefs I've heard. I don't hear any atheists complaining about them. If mere "irrationality" is the "essense" of the atheists' complaints (it isn't, really, but that's another matter), then what's the point?

Anton wrote:

"Or suppose all God does is show up and smite those who have an ability to detect it.

"Jewish theology in a nutshell."

You obviously know ZILCH about Jewish theology and yet have the temerity to comment on it!

AC: Now we're getting somewhere. I totally agree with your list of what constitutes emotional abuse of children. And this is why I think it so important to keep our criticism of "religious indoctrination" specific: vague generalized criticisms only waste time and allow the perpetrators of real abuse to avoid answering for their specific actions.

— Raging Bee

Another thing: once you get into specifics, you'll probably find that not all Christians support such abuses, and even the ones who disapprove of gays, wanking, etc., would not necessarily approve of threatening mere children with Hellfire over it.

So what? Art, literature, music, film noir, tourism, sexual relationships, our choice of friends, etc., etc., are all, "despite their ornateness...still highly irrational" --- more so, in fact, than many of the religious beliefs I've heard. I don't hear any atheists complaining about them. If mere "irrationality" is the "essense" of the atheists' complaints (it isn't, really, but that's another matter), then what's the point?

The problem is more specifically delusion - believing something relating to objective reality, despite a lack of evidence to support it, or even in spite of evidence against it, for subjective reasons.

These beliefs are not held "despite a lack of evidence to support it;" they're held based on subjective evidence, which is not the same as lack of evidence. (The two are, of course, pretty much the same in the natural sciences, but this is religion and spirituality we're talking about here, not science.) Ask a person to back up his/her religious belief, and chances are your answer will consist of feelings, life-experiences both good and bad, voices in the believer's head, remarkable coincidences, and maybe some incredible hallucinations whose import can't even be described in words. None of that may be real or relevant to you, but it's quite relevant to the believer.

As for whether it's "dangerous, and thus complaint-worthy," that depends on the specific belief, and the specific actions motivated by said belief. If the voices in someone's head tell him that creationism is a lie, or that his gay son is still a person deserving of love, or that he should listen to the Grateful Dead more, than I won't call that person "dangerous." (Pink Floyd? Different story.) Let's identify and focus on specific dangers while we're still young enough to fight them, shall we?

But as long as the shared, religious disapproval of various things makes strange bedfellows of moderates and extremists, the extremists will continue to evade the harsh light they deserve to sweat under.

Even when said harsh light is directed by disgusted moderates within their own churches? This does happen, you know. (Any response to the other examples I cited earlier?) Check out those gay-hating Anglican churches in Virginia: they've been isolated by a less-homophobic majority in their own country's church, so now they're having to look all the way to Nigeria for validation of their bigotry.

However, all these beliefs, despite their ornateness, are still highly irrational. That is the essence of the atheists' complaints. So what? Art, literature, music, film noir, tourism, sexual relationships, our choice of friends, etc., etc., are all, "despite their ornateness...still highly irrational" --- more so, in fact, than many of the religious beliefs I've heard. I don't hear any atheists complaining about them.

If mere "irrationality" is the "essense" of the atheists' complaints (it isn't, really, but that's another matter), then what's the point?

Carol, you coward. It is obvious you haven't even considered the substance of PG's comments, or the references he provided.

Glen: thanks for a nice and sensible post. All I can add right now (gotta go meet someone) is that in criticizing "religion" in general, we should do our best to avoid tarring the innocent with the crimes of the most extreme and/or dishonest religious nuts and charlatans. If we can't get a bead on who, exactly, is committing injustices, then we can't fight injustice. See ya Monday...

Raging Bee wrote:
Ask a person to back up his/her religious belief, and chances are your answer will consist of feelings, life-experiences both good and bad, voices in the believer's head, remarkable coincidences, and maybe some incredible hallucinations whose import can't even be described in words. None of that may be real or relevant to you, but it's quite relevant to the believer.

In other words, a personal experience born of one's imagination. That's all this non-believer has ever claimed about religion. I, for one, have no problem with people believing in such a fashion and doubt that any logic or argument will change that person's belief. Witness Robert O'Brien or Carol Clouser, for example. The problem, for me anyway, comes when these religionists, who claim these experiences, feel the need to force feed these very personal beliefs, hallucinations, whatever you want to call them, to captive audiences such as children, or students, or even prisoners.

I've seen it claimed that prohibiting them from doing so would violate free speech but free speech implies a freedom not to listen. Children and other captive audiences don't have that choice so there is no free speech issue involved. The only issue, as far as children are concerned anyway, is that parents own their children and can fill their heads with anything they please, whether mysticism, white supremecy, or anything else that strikes their fancy. Such is the law of the land, until it is changed.

To Anton: You obviously know ZILCH about Jewish theology and yet have the temerity to comment on it!

What about the moderates who use quotes from the Bible (or other holy text) to debunk the extremists? News flash: it happens all the time.

— Raging Bee

What about the official church doctrines (Catholic, Lutheran and others) that explicitly reject both creationism and literalism? How, exactly, are they "setting the stage for tolerance of extremists?"

What about the moderate-Christian plaintiffs in the Dover trial?

What about the Christian abolitionists of the nineteenth century, or the Christian civil-rights activists of the twentieth? How, exactly, are they "setting the stage for tolerance of extremists?"

How would you feel if I accused moderate atheists of "setting the stage for tolerance of Stalinists?"

Just because you, or Dawkins, assert that a belief system "implies" something, does not mean the belief system "implies" the same thing to the believers.

— Raging Bee

Has Dawkins asked the believers what it "implies" to them?

Or their belief in Heaven is a bit more complex that Dawkins is willing to admit. The Christians I've talked to say that yes, eternal bliss awaits them after they die, but in the meantime, life on this plane is a gift from God that should be enjoyed, and learned from, not squandered or thrown away in pining for something better. (The Christians who have tried to convert me promise me both a blissful eternal afterlife and a happier life on this plane.)

No, the loss of a loved one remains an unpleasant subject. So might the actual manner of said loved one's death (i.e., a grisly and/or pointless murder). It's quite possible to believe in Heaven and still miss a loved one, and feel pain at the evil or horribly unfair particular circumstances of the death. Is Russell really that obtuse about such an obvious matter?

Excuse me, here, but you are wrong. Virtual particles lead a virtual existance. Real particle production and anihilation always conserves mass-energy and momentum and other quantities, so nothing of significance appears or disappears. In the case of quantum fluctuations you could get a very fleeting and temporary violation of the conservation laws, including conservation of mass-energy, and this is where we invent the virual existance of so called virtual particles, but these are all based on the uncertainties quantum mechanics imposes on the original and final mass-energies and on the time elapsed. This is NOT a case of someTHING appearing from NOthing.

— Carol Clouser

Way back in my doctoral student years I had occasion to work with the great physicist Edward Tryon, the proponent of the notion that the entire universe is merely a quantum fluctuation with the universe's agregate mass-energy equal to zero. I and others extensively debated these budding ideas with him.

Anton wrote: "Or suppose all God does is show up and smite those who have an ability to detect it. "Jewish theology in a nutshell." You obviously know ZILCH about Jewish theology and yet have the temerity to comment on it!

Where do I "suggest" that free speech is "bad?" You're really grasping at straws here...

This assumption about what a belief system "implies" is, at best, an extremely simplistic reading of other people's beliefs;

The Christians I've talked to say that yes, eternal bliss awaits them after they die, but in the meantime, life on this plane is a gift from God that should be enjoyed, and learned from, not squandered or thrown away in pining for something better.

Virtual particles lead a virtual existance.

this is where we invent the virual [sic] existance of so called virtual particles,

Even if correct, it doesn't resolve the key question of why the entire package (rules of QM, initial conditions, etc.) exists in the form that it does?

labeling an idea as folk psychology does not constitute an argument against it,

Nor does labeling an idea as "outside of science".

Whether or not "first cause" has an "operational" definition depends on your standard for operational.

Anton wrote:

"Virtual particles do things."

Not quite, Anton. Events occur, measurements are made, data is obtained, and then WE, in our minds, attribute the events to the intermediate action of virtual particles. In other words, we build models in our minds, concisely summarized by Feynman diagrams, of the events based on virtual particles.

Whether these particles, or anything, are "physically real" depends on whether mass-energy exists. The classical law of conservation of mass-energy basically states, in so many words, that something cannot come from nothing. Quantum Mechanics allows for violations of this law over very brief periods of time, but this is based on uncertainty in our measurements of conditions before, during and after an event. It is the uncertainty in the data that allows us to encounter new mass-energy that didn't exist before, or old mass-energy that disappeared, over brief intervals of time. In other words, the mere fact of briefly existent created or destroyed mass-energy is uncertain.

Be that as it may, I think we can agree that no scenario as yet proposed for the origin of the universe (divine action, appearance out of nothing, endless iterations) has the attribute that all fundamental questions are satisfactorally unanswered. As such, they are all irrational. We can reasonably discuss which of them is most or least irrational, but they all leave key questions of "how come" and "why" unanswered. So atheists such as James above (which is how this discussion got started) who mock theists as irrational and theism as fantasy are just plain ignorant of the current state of affairs.

Please correct above to "satisfactorally answered"

Not quite, Anton. Events occur, measurements are made, data is obtained, and then WE, in our minds, attribute the events to the intermediate action of virtual particles.

— carol clouser

Whether these particles, or anything, are "physically real" depends on whether mass-energy exists. The classical law of conservation of mass-energy basically states, in so many words, that something cannot come from nothing.

Quantum Mechanics allows for violations of this law over very brief periods of time, but this is based on uncertainty in our measurements of conditions before, during and after an event. It is the uncertainty in the data that allows us to encounter new mass-energy that didn't exist before, or old mass-energy that disappeared, over brief intervals of time. In other words, the mere fact of briefly existent created or destroyed mass-energy is uncertain.

Be that as it may, I think we can agree that no scenario as yet proposed for the origin of the universe (divine action, appearance out of nothing, endless iterations) has the attribute that all fundamental questions are satisfactorally unanswered.

As such, they are all irrational.

We can reasonably discuss which of them is most or least irrational, but they all leave key questions of "how come" and "why" unanswered.

So atheists such as James above (which is how this discussion got started) who mock theists as irrational and theism as fantasy are just plain ignorant of the current state of affairs.

Raging Bee, gallant Bee, former comrade, brave defender of all things supernatural-yet-benign,

Haven't you considered that the same moderate and liberal Christians whose case you defend, believe, by their doctrine, that the extreme right-wing Christians, while wrong on some points, will nevertheless be joining them in Heaven so long as they recite a few specific words, which may be rephrased so long as "Jesus" and "believe" are worked in, while you my Bee, shall roast, Raging wings and all, in eternal hellfire, and that you deserve this fate since you're a Satan worshipper (since any entity or entities besides Jesus and I AM are Satanic)?

Unlike the valient defender Raging Bee, for Christians there is only one possible truth which necessarily shuts all others out.

My good Katarina: That would require Pill Popper's posts to be substantive.

— Rob

Anton wrote:

"Precisely as we do with real particles, and indeed with all physical entities. We apprehend neither electrons nor elephants directly; both are inferred from their effects."

Yes, but there is a difference, which is why we refer to real particles as "real" and to virtual particles as "virtual". The mass-energy of virtual particles (their "reality") is fundamentally uncertain and even that only fleetingly so, while the fact that real particles have mass-energy is certain over the long term.

We can conjure things up in our imagination that are not real, and our conjurings just may coincide with reality.

Anton continued:

"How does that follow? If a divine creator is one of myriad origin hypotheses, none of which explain every question and none of which can currently be confirmed or refuted, then choosing that hypothesis as true over all the others is irrational. The rational attitude is to admit that we cannot distinguish between them."

So you concede that atheism is irrational and the rational approach, in your opinion, is agnosticism. I think I smell progress in the air here. We are getting somewhere.

Now, if two or more theories exist to explain a set of phenomena, and physicists take sides, some becoming proponents of one theory, some supporting the other theory, do you conclude they all are being irrational? So, for example, the reputable physicists who currently oppose the Big Bang are irrational, as well as all the others who support it? Is that what you are saying? I doubt it.

To me the irrational approach is one and only one - supporting a theory against the evidence. Supporting one of a few theories, all of which fit the data or don't fit the data, is perfectly rational so long as you can give reason for the choice and keep an open mind for future evidence. The evidence always trumpts the theories!

Haven't you considered that the same moderate and liberal Christians whose case you defend, believe, by their doctrine, that the extreme right-wing Christians, while wrong on some points, will nevertheless be joining them in Heaven so long as they recite a few specific words, which may be rephrased so long as "Jesus" and "believe" are worked in, while you my Bee, shall roast, Raging wings and all, in eternal hellfire, and that you deserve this fate since you're a Satan worshipper (since any entity or entities besides Jesus and I AM are Satanic)?

— Katarina

How does that follow? If a divine creator is one of myriad origin hypotheses, none of which explain every question and none of which can currently be confirmed or refuted, then choosing that hypothesis as true over all the others is irrational. The rational attitude is to admit that we cannot distinguish between them.

The rational attitude is to admit that we cannot distinguish between them.

"Precisely as we do with real particles, and indeed with all physical entities. We apprehend neither electrons nor elephants directly; both are inferred from their effects." Yes, but there is a difference, which is why we refer to real particles as "real" and to virtual particles as "virtual". The mass-energy of virtual particles (their "reality") is fundamentally uncertain and even that only fleetingly so, while the fact that real particles have mass-energy is certain over the long term. We can conjure things up in our imagination that are not real, and our conjurings just may coincide with reality.

— Carol Clouser

One can interpret these so called vacuum fluctuations, as pairs of particles and anti particles, that suddenly appear together, move apart, and then come back together again, and annihilate each other. These particle anti particle pairs, are said to be virtual, because one can not measure them directly with a particle detector. However, one can observe their effects indirectly. One way of doing this, is by what is called the Casimir effect....here is thus a slight force pushing the plates together. This force has been measured experimentally. So virtual particles actually exist, and produce real effects.

— Stephen Hawking

Quantum mechanics allows, and indeed requires, temporary violations of conservation of energy, so one particle can become a pair of heavier particles (the so-called virtual particles), which quickly rejoin into the original particle as if they had never been there. If that were all that occurred we would still be confident that it was a real effect because it is an intrinsic part of quantum mechanics, which is extremely well tested, and is a complete and tightly woven theory--if any part of it were wrong the whole structure would collapse. But while the virtual particles are briefly part of our world they can interact with other particles, and that leads to a number of tests of the quantum-mechanical predictions about virtual particles....Thus virtual particles are indeed real and have observable effects that physicists have devised ways of measuring. Their properties and consequences are well established and well understood consequences of quantum mechanics.

— Gordon Kane

"How does that follow? If a divine creator is one of myriad origin hypotheses, none of which explain every question and none of which can currently be confirmed or refuted, then choosing that hypothesis as true over all the others is irrational. The rational attitude is to admit that we cannot distinguish between them." So you concede that atheism is irrational and the rational approach, in your opinion, is agnosticism.

Now, if two or more theories exist to explain a set of phenomena, and physicists take sides, some becoming proponents of one theory, some supporting the other theory, do you conclude they all are being irrational? So, for example, the reputable physicists who currently oppose the Big Bang are irrational, as well as all the others who support it? Is that what you are saying? I doubt it.

To me the irrational approach is one and only one - supporting a theory against the evidence. Supporting one of a few theories, all of which fit the data or don't fit the data, is perfectly rational so long as you can give reason for the choice and keep an open mind for future evidence.

I would imagine that many of the Christians who socialize with Bee, inasmuch as they're willing to do so in the first place, would accept well-intentioned unbelievers getting into heaven. Even C.S. Lewis pushed that idea, and he was quite conservative compared to the average pro-evolution Christian today. As a kid in a very liberal city, most of the Christians I was acquainted with said they thought I'd go to heaven.

— Anton

I believe in God, the Father Almighty the Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord: Who was conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. The third day He arose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, whence He shall come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Amen.

We believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father by whom all things were made; who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man, and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, and the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And he shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end. And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, who proceedeth from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified, who spoke by the prophets. And we believe one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins. And we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

Some religious groups such as Oneness Pentecostals, Church of Christ, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Jehovah's Witnesses adhere to Christian scripture and identify themselves emphatically as Christians, but reject the Nicene Creed as an error or a misinterpretation and further reject the more recent Lausanne Covenant that affirms the Creed. As a result, many other Christians regard these denominations as not being Christian at all.... In modern interfaith relations, there have been many heated clashes between Nicene and non-Nicene traditions over the definition of Christianity, and of what constitutes a Christian.

Katarina wrote:

Haven't you considered that the same moderate and liberal Christians whose case you defend, believe, by their doctrine, that the extreme right-wing Christians, while wrong on some points, will nevertheless be joining them in Heaven so long as they recite a few specific words, which may be rephrased so long as "Jesus" and "believe" are worked in, while you my Bee, shall roast, Raging wings and all, in eternal hellfire, and that you deserve this fate since you're a Satan worshipper (since any entity or entities besides Jesus and I AM are Satanic)?

Very few Christians actually believe that, and you'd know it if you actually litened to them. First, according to just about every Christian I've talked to, one gets to Heaven through sincere belief and desire to be one with Christ, not merely by "reciting a few specific words." And since Christians cannot read each other's souls like their God allegedly can, they judge each other's sincerity and spiritual condition by their actions; which leaves plenty of room for disagreement among Christians. Second, they're all aware of the existence of "false prophets" and other hucksters who use their God's name for ungodly purposes, so there is always, for them, the possibility that someone who calls himself a Christian might actually be evil and insincere. Third, Christians understand that people can do great evil and then be "saved" and forgiven (if they sincerely repent and ask the right God for forgiveness, of course); so merely believing someone will go to Heaven, does not constitute support for any of their actions on Earth; they're still human, still imperfect, and can still fall from grace. Fourth, even when moderates recognize wingnuts as "fellow Christians," this alone does not stop them from opposing their worldly policies, by both word and deed.

Third, Christians understand that people can do great evil and then be "saved" and forgiven (if they sincerely repent and ask the right God for forgiveness, of course);

— my valient friend

Dawkins' argument, so far as I've read, is not that moderates don't do such things, but that it doesn't work out very well; they shoot themselves in the foot by promoting the factual or moral legitimacy of the Bible, because in fact it says many things that are extreme.

Here's a hypothetical situation: Imagine a right-wing "Christian" who thinks the Bible commands him, and all other good Christians, to (to take a random expmaple) punish all Jews for killing Christ. Now imagine that two people are trying to refute and discredit his claims: one of them is an atheist, and the other is a fellow Christian in the wingnut's own church. Which of these two is most likely to convince the wingnut -- or, at least, others in his church -- that he's on the wrong track?

It's a pretty safe bet that the wingnut will reject out of hand whatever the atheist has to say -- atheists, in his eyes, have nothing good to contribute to anything. But the words of a fellow churchman will not be so easy to brush off, if he's quoting the Bible and appealing to any chunk of the church's shared beliefs.

Of course, the wingnut himself is not likely to be convinced, but if his fellow churchmen hear an alternative reading of the Bible, from one of their own, then they will be less likely to hear the wingnut's extreme claims without a bit more thought and skepticism. And the more doubt and skepticism one moderate churchman can sow, the greater the possibility that the wingnuts will find themselves isolated and embarrassed among their own friends -- and this can deter extreme actions where reason alone might fail.

As for Dawkins' claim that "it doesn't work out very well," that might have more credibiliy if Dawkins could show better results of his own.

First, according to just about every Christian I've talked to, one gets to Heaven through sincere belief and desire to be one with Christ, not merely by "reciting a few specific words."

In order to get to heaven, you are required to at least try to lie to yourself and others by saying the words. Hopefully you are also willing to pray to a Man in the Sky, to help your unbelief. Just keep brainwashing yourself and you'll be in heaven in no time.

In order to get to heaven, you are required to at least try to lie to yourself and others by saying the words.

If you're lying to yourself by saying the words, then they won't get you anywhere. You may fool others by lying to them, but just because they think you're going to Heaven doesn't mean you really are.

I agree. In the meanwhile, my point stands that the same people whose views you defend believe, if they are Christians, that you and I are going to hell.

It's a pretty safe bet that the wingnut will reject out of hand whatever the atheist has to say --- atheists, in his eyes, have nothing good to contribute to anything. But the words of a fellow churchman will not be so easy to brush off, if he's quoting the Bible and appealing to any chunk of the church's shared beliefs.

— defender of all things supernatural-yet-benign

You say that Dawkins should not discuss the problems of indoctrination, because it is "laying the groundwork to justify such laws". Since he isn't suggesting the later (quite contrary is against it) you claim that his free speech is a bad thing.

First, I did not suggest that Dawkins should not discuss the subject of religious indoctrination at all. Second, your conclusion that I'm calling his free speech a "bad thing" is a ridiculous non-sequitur.

Here's a hypothetical situation: Imagine a right-wing "Christian" who thinks the Bible commands him, and all other good Christians, to (to take a random expmaple) punish all Jews for killing Christ. Now imagine that two people are trying to refute and discredit his claims: one of them is an atheist, and the other is a fellow Christian in the wingnut's own church. Which of these two is most likely to convince the wingnut --- or, at least, others in his church --- that he's on the wrong track?

— Raging Bee

It's a pretty safe bet that the wingnut will reject out of hand whatever the atheist has to say --- atheists, in his eyes, have nothing good to contribute to anything. But the words of a fellow churchman will not be so easy to brush off, if he's quoting the Bible and appealing to any chunk of the church's shared beliefs.

As for Dawkins' claim that "it doesn't work out very well," that might have more credibiliy if Dawkins could show better results of his own.

But even though the church is splitting, belief in the divinity of Christ remains a pillar of the Christian faith, and most would say, the most important one. Those who diverge fundamentally from the Apostle's Creed or the Nicene Creed are considered heretics.

— Katarina

Some religious groups such as Oneness Pentecostals, Church of Christ, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Jehovah's Witnesses adhere to Christian scripture and identify themselves emphatically as Christians, but reject the Nicene Creed as an error or a misinterpretation and further reject the more recent Lausanne Covenant that affirms the Creed. As a result, many other Christians regard these denominations as not being Christian at all....

If you're lying to yourself by saying the words, then they won't get you anywhere. You may fool others by lying to them, but just because they think you're going to Heaven doesn't mean you really are.

— Raging Bee

Speaking of popular views, the majority of people who are Christian have their own ideas about what Christianity means. Few examine what they say they believe, or what the leaders of their churches say they believe. Naturally, popular polls reflect the ignorance of the many.

But the core beliefs that the churches affirm mean a lot, because the people who attend/belong to these churches usually recite these beliefs as part of the service. That implies they accept these beliefs and all that they imply, in spite of the possibility that they may not really feel that way. And the thing that is recited is the Nicene Creed, in the majority of mainstream Christian churches.

C.S. Lewis still doesn't part from the view that one must accept Jesus as Lord to get to heaven. My point still stands. He also says that Aslan is not a Tame Lion. Think about that a minute.

Two thousand years of schisms, sectarian wars and heretics' purges argue against that hope.

How, exactly? The mere fact that human progress is not as easy or clean as you would like it to be, or that people in past ages didn't behave according to modern standards, proves...what? Your offhand reference to the horrors of the past is a bit of a non-sequitur.

Problem with this hypothetical: If the fellow Christian disagrees with said wingnut about the culpability of Jews, it's unlikely that he was in the same church in the first place, and even less likely that he'll continue to be welcome there. Extremist Christian churches are not known for the diversity of views among their members.

This assumes that everyone's views remain unchanged over a long period of time, and churches get permanently divided as a result. The reality is that people who once had uniform views very often have disagreements as new people come into a community, new public issues arise, a charismatic preacher introduces a new idea (either moderate or extreme), and/or people react to such new ideas. So yes, there's plenty of opportunity for disputes both within and between churches, and for all sides to push their respective opinions. As I've said before, it happens all the time, whether or not the dogmatists admit it.

Again, I'll mention the recent split with in the Anglican Communion: a moderate majority has isolated the rigid "traditionalists" (already confined to a few churches) to the point where they have to look as far as Nigeria for validation of their extreme views. These extremists were marginalized by moderates within their own church, not by atheists.

The Christians of your acquaintance are apparently very conservative, so I suspect they're exceptionally hostile to this idea, just as the Christians of my and Bee's acquaintance are probably exceptionally receptive to it. religioustolerance.org lists several polls which asked Americans about this subject. Note the USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll which found 44% of respondents (necessarily including some Christians) agreeing that "good atheists will enter heaven." Christians who think nonbelievers can be saved may not be in the majority in the US, but they're out there.

First, I did not suggest that Dawkins should not discuss the subject of religious indoctrination at all.

Second, your conclusion that I'm calling his free speech a "bad thing" is a ridiculous non-sequitur.

I think Glen is right on the money. The bigger issue is that non-believers are considered outsiders, not to be trusted. It only goes to prove Dawkins' assertion that religion is divisive.

"Whenever they equate "religious indoctrination" with "child abuse" (or, worse yet, with the sexual abuse of children by priests), they are laying the groundwork to justify such laws."

How are you not "suggesting that free speech is bad" here?

Oh please -- do I really have to explain the difference between disagreeing with what someone says, and implying he has no right to say it?

Get a grip already.

Anton wrote:

"Stephen Hawking and Gordon Kane both opine that virtual particles do coincide with reality"

Well, your quote of Gordon Kane basically says that virtual particles are "real" because Quantum Mechanics says they ought to be. This is essentially what I said earlier, to the effect that we build models in our minds (in this case QM) to explain observed effects. It seems to me that there is some playing around with words going on here. And the same applies to what Hawking said (quoted by you). I still see a heck of a difference between the reality of real particles (detectable, with certain and long term mass-energy) and the "reality" they attribute to cirtual particles.

Anton continued:

"No, both atheists and agnostics hold the attitude I described above. It's conceivable that an atheist might go further and affirm that there was no deity of any sort involved in the origin of the universe, but few if any actually do this. Dawkins, for instance, merely says that the probability of a Big Bang-era intelligence is "very low," and again it's the absence of evidence he's concerned with, not evidence of absence."

Now you are really playing with words. An atheists is certain there is no God, whereas an agnostic is doubtful. If what you say about most atheists above is correct, then most atheists are agnostic. I realize there is a continuum in levels of certainty and doubt and the terms "atheist" and "agnostic" assume a rather sharp dividing line that may not exist. But I am glad you concede that the genuine atheist (as I defined it above) is irrational. I agree.

Anton continued:

"There's a difference between being proposing and supporting an unproven theory, and actually accepting it as true. Reputable physicists may feel very strongly that a particular theory will turn out to be correct, but they work very hard to try to show that it's correct, and don't consider their job to be done until the evidence is in. Most theists, on the other hand, are not just supporting the existence of god(s) as a promising hypothesis which might pan out one day; they're treating it as a fact, and basing their reasoning and behavior around that fact."

There is a range of certainty within the community of theists, just as there is within the community of agnostics and atheists.

Speaking of popular views, the majority of people who are Christian have their own ideas about what Christianity means. Few examine what they say they believe, or what the leaders of their churches say they believe. Naturally, popular polls reflect the ignorance of the many.

— Katarina

C.S. Lewis still doesn't part from the view that one must accept Jesus as Lord to get to heaven. My point still stands.

Anton,

My point is in the paragraph following the one you quoted.

I have The Great Divorce, but I haven't yet read it, so I won't discuss it. I have the Chronicles of Narnia and it's been 5 years now since I've read them, so I don't remember about your reference. Perhaps I'll get back to you about that later, on an appropriate thread.

Meanwhile, I still stand by what I said. The Christians whose views you and Bee here represent, (or misrepresent, as may be the case), view unbelievers as outsiders and hellbound. Eventually, whether it's before we die or after, we must repent. And I've already mentioned that there is a possible exception for someone who's never heard the good news, which I think is what C.S. Lewis had in mind, but as I said, I will have to check it out for myself. (note to Bee: I like to read a book before I comment on its author's views)

Carol Clouser wrote:
An atheists is certain there is no God,

Where do you get that from? Can you quote an atheist as being "certain" there is no god? Certainly not Dawkins. Non-belief is a far cry from certainty.

Two thousand years of schisms, sectarian wars and heretics' purges argue against that hope. How, exactly? The mere fact that human progress is not as easy or clean as you would like it to be, or that people in past ages didn't behave according to modern standards, proves...what? Your offhand reference to the horrors of the past is a bit of a non-sequitur.

— Raging Bee

Again, I'll mention the recent split with in the Anglican Communion: a moderate majority has isolated the rigid "traditionalists" (already confined to a few churches) to the point where they have to look as far as Nigeria for validation of their extreme views. These extremists were marginalized by moderates within their own church, not by atheists.

Tomh,

Got a dictionary? Mine reads as follows: "An atheist is one who denies the existence of God or gods." If you think an atheists is uncertain, than what does an agnostic claim?

Who cares what Dawkins says? Who elected him as spokesperson for atheists? Besides, I recall him saying he belives in God as much as he does in the tooth fairy. That tells me that he is convinced there is no God.

Carol Clouser wrote:
Got a dictionary? Mine reads as follows: "An atheist is one who denies the existence of God or gods." If you think an atheists is uncertain, than what does an agnostic claim?

A far more common definition, Mirriam-Webster for instance, defines atheist as, "one who believes that there is no deity". Belief or non-belief is just that, whereas certainty requires undeniable evidence. I may believe there is such a thing as dark energy but I am not certain about it. Attempting to make an argument by parsing the difference between an atheist and an agnostic is meaningless. Both are non-believers.

These beliefs are not held "despite a lack of evidence to support it;" they're held based on subjective evidence, which is not the same as lack of evidence. (The two are, of course, pretty much the same in the natural sciences, but this is religion and spirituality we're talking about here, not science.)

— Raging Bee

Ask a person to back up his/her religious belief, and chances are your answer will consist of feelings, life-experiences both good and bad, voices in the believer's head, remarkable coincidences, and maybe some incredible hallucinations whose import can't even be described in words. None of that may be real or relevant to you, but it's quite relevant to the believer.

As for whether it's "dangerous, and thus complaint-worthy," that depends on the specific belief, and the specific actions motivated by said belief. If the voices in someone's head tell him that creationism is a lie, or that his gay son is still a person deserving of love, or that he should listen to the Grateful Dead more, than I won't call that person "dangerous." (Pink Floyd? Different story.) Let's identify and focus on specific dangers while we're still young enough to fight them, shall we?

Even when said harsh light is directed by disgusted moderates within their own churches? This does happen, you know. (Any response to the other examples I cited earlier?) Check out those gay-hating Anglican churches in Virginia: they've been isolated by a less-homophobic majority in their own country's church, so now they're having to look all the way to Nigeria for validation of their bigotry.

Perhaps it would be well to bring up the old, generally well-known, distinction made between "strong atheists" and "weak atheists". "Strong atheists" are said to believe that there is no god, often claiming that there is evidence against God's existence, while "weak atheists" are said to believe that there is either no evidence, or insufficient evidence, to answer the "God question" in the affirmative. Weak atheists are frequently thought to be roughly the same as agnostics, and weak atheism appears (to me at least) to have gained numbers at the expense of "agnosticism".

Then there are people who think that the proper default condition (ignoring claims having insufficient evidence, as much as possible) should not be labeled as either atheism or agnosticism. Must we claim privation of what to all appearances is a figment of imagination and cultural competition, or are we simply humans lacking all of such faulty claims, rather than the lack of all-but-one of them that so many people opt for?

I'm far more in line with the latter thinking, but know that I would be called "atheist" in the dialectical metaphysical schemes that many religionists try to force everything and everybody into.

Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/b8ykm

Gglen Davidson wrote:
"Strong atheists" are said to believe that there is no god, often claiming that there is evidence against God's existence,

Yet this is still a belief. I have yet to see an atheist claim "certainty", as in Ms. Clouser's definition.

Now you are really playing with words. An atheists is certain there is no God, whereas an agnostic is doubtful. If what you say about most atheists above is correct, then most atheists are agnostic.

— Carol Clouser

There is a range of certainty within the community of theists, just as there is within the community of agnostics and atheists.

Meanwhile, I still stand by what I said. The Christians whose views you and Bee here represent, (or misrepresent, as may be the case), view unbelievers as outsiders and hellbound. Eventually, whether it's before we die or after, we must repent.

— Katarina

Perhaps it would be well to bring up the old, generally well-known, distinction made between "strong atheists" and "weak atheists". "Strong atheists" are said to believe that there is no god, often claiming that there is evidence against God's existence, while "weak atheists" are said to believe that there is either no evidence, or insufficient evidence, to answer the "God question" in the affirmative. Weak atheists are frequently thought to be roughly the same as agnostics, and weak atheism appears (to me at least) to have gained numbers at the expense of "agnosticism".

Thing is, although I'm aware of that distinction, I have yet to even hear of a "strong atheist" who actually fits that definition. Even with the people I've seen call themselves "strong atheists," it turned out that the God they actively believed didn't exist was a particular one, usually a personal god with a known "personality" who dabbles directly in the modern universe. See strongatheism.net,, or Chris Ho-Stuart's Why I am a Strong Atheist. Both pages set aside deist/pantheist conceptions of God as being inappropriate for that term.

It seems to me that this choice of definition of "God" is a large factor in most unbelievers' choice of label. If I believe that a benevolent, omniscient, omnipotent, active personal God does not exist, based on logical disproof or empirical evidence against; if I don't believe that a deist or "quantum-hidden" God exists, based on lack of parsimony and evidence for; if I can't decide either way about "God is love" or "God is the spirit of order in the universe," because I'm not really sure what those claims even mean; then I could be a strong atheist or a weak atheist or an agnostic, depending on which of those I think it's important to consider as "God," at least when talking to others.

Perhaps it would be well to bring up the old, generally well-known, distinction made between "strong atheists" and "weak atheists". "Strong atheists" are said to believe that there is no god, often claiming that there is evidence against God's existence, while "weak atheists" are said to believe that there is either no evidence, or insufficient evidence, to answer the "God question" in the affirmative. Weak atheists are frequently thought to be roughly the same as agnostics, and weak atheism appears (to me at least) to have gained numbers at the expense of "agnosticism".

— Glen Davidson

Yeah, I can see how before/after makes the difference. Well done. But I do think you're grasping at straws. I'm not convinced this exception of C.S. Lewis', if that is what it is, is what most Christians believe. Perhaps the conservative community I live in taints my judgement, but it's difficult to judge now how Christianity will change - will the fringe become mainstream? In the meantime, the churches speak for themselves, and the majority of these stick with the specific beliefs aforementioned, and uphold evangelical views (i.e. conversion of unbelievers). Most of the liberal and conservative denominations I've associated with hold the view that if you don't spread your faith, it is pretty much worthless. It really operates much like a business; without new converts, where will the money come from?

It really operates much like a business; without new converts, where will the money come from?

Ask a person to back up his/her religious belief, and chances are your answer will consist of feelings, life-experiences both good and bad, voices in the believer's head, remarkable coincidences, and maybe some incredible hallucinations whose import can't even be described in words. None of that may be real or relevant to you, but it's quite relevant to the believer.

Therein lies the problem: this "subjective evidence" tells one nothing about the world outside his own brain. Your list might as well read "neurochemistry, memories, selection biases, and all sorts of hallucinations". Its relevance to the believer is starkly contrasted with its sheer irrelevance to every other thing in the universe except the believer's brain.

Here's a hypothetical situation: Imagine a right-wing "Christian" who thinks the Bible commands him, and all other good Christians, to (to take a random expmaple) punish all Jews for killing Christ. Now imagine that two people are trying to refute and discredit his claims: one of them is an atheist, and the other is a fellow Christian in the wingnut's own church. Which of these two is most likely to convince the wingnut --- or, at least, others in his church --- that he's on the wrong track?

I'm not convinced this exception of C.S. Lewis', if that is what it is, is what most Christians believe.

— Katarina

Are you trying to say that only the religious could possibly understand and analyze what's written in the KJV?

It must have been a painful stretch to reach for that interpretation. No, I'm trying to say that moderate theists are more likely than atheists to discredit extremists among believers, simply because most of those believers will listen to one of their own before they listen to an atheist. (The extremists probably won't listen, as I've said before, but the goal here is to expose them as, well, extreme, and thus to isolate and neutralize them. Besides, even extremists can be responsive to peer-disapproval and ostracism when reason fails.)

Moreover, sectarian disagreements can be the most vehement of all. You should have seen some of the vitriol amongst the Lutheran community a few decades ago. I hardly think the folks on either side of that great debate would have prefered the "wisdom" of those opposing them, even though they were fellow lutherans.

Is there any indication that they gave the "wisdom" of atheists any hearing at all?

You're absolutely right about sectarian disagreements -- and one reason for this is that opposition coming from within a community is the hardest to ignore or brush off.

Moreover, it more seems that most of the "fiathful" of this type use religion to explain the context of their own incredulity, rather than actually asking the question they should be asking themselves:

What ELSE might explain these voices in my head, the apparent coincidences, etc.

Sure, there are other possible answers that are "better" from a rational-inquiry standpoint -- but that's no guarantee that the believer would either understand them or be able to use them in his own life.

Take my stock example of a drug-addict: if he were to interpret a recent firing or drug arrest as a "sign from God" that he had to clean up his act, a rational observer would consider this claim laughable -- but if the power of that belief helped him to do what was right, against the force of his addiction, then that "delusion" will have done more good than harm; and mocking such thinking would serve no useful purpose. Treating addiction as a biochemical issue may be perfectly "rational" and true from a scientific standpoint; but treating it as an "enemy" to be fought through radical changes in one's attitude and lifestyle is what actually gets the job done.

A religious belief of this sort may be a "delusion" contrary to reality; or it may be an important truth, expressed in terms an ordinary person can understand and act on within his own life. "Subjective" does not equal "wrong."

Thing is, although I'm aware of that distinction, I have yet to even hear of a "strong atheist" who actually fits that definition. Even with the people I've seen call themselves "strong atheists," it turned out that the God they actively believed didn't exist was a particular one, usually a personal god with a known "personality" who dabbles directly in the modern universe. See strongatheism.net, or Chris Ho-Stuart's Why I am a Strong Atheist.

politically popular thing to say.

ever consider that maybe it SHOULDN'T be a business to begin with?

Oh please --- do I really have to explain the difference between disagreeing with what someone says, and implying he has no right to say it?

You aren't merely disagreeing with what Dawkins say, you are suggesting it has bad consequences, even when he argues against those consequences. As you say, do I really have to explain the difference between implying that it has bad consequences when someone says something, and merely disagreeing with what he says?

— Torbjörn Larsson

Paulina's Peril

Claiming some statement has negative consequences doesn't equate to claiming people shouldn't be allowed to make that statement, though.

A former student of mine, Paulina Essunger, developed a vivid example that takes the issue out of philosophical fantasy-land into cold reality. She has worked in AIDS research, and knows the perils that face that field well, so I will call her example the Peril of Paulina:

Let's say I were to "discover" that HIV can be eradicated from an infected individual under ideal circumstances (total patient compliance, total absence of events inhibiting drug-action such as nausea, etc., total absence of contamination with extraneous virus strains, and so on) with four years of a certain therapeutic regime. I can be wrong about this. I can be wrong in quite a simple, straightforward way. Say I've miscomputed something, misread some data, misjudged the enrolled patients, or perhaps extrapolated too generously. I could aslo be wrong in publishing these results even if they are true, because of their potential environmental impact.(Further, the media could be wrong in carrying the story, could be wrong in how they carry the story. But some of their responsibility seems to fall back on me. Especially if I use the word "eradicate," which in viral contexts usually refers to wiping the virus off the face of the earth, not "merely" ridding one infected individual of it. For instance, an irrational complacency may spread among, let's say, male homosexuals: "AIDS is curable now so I don't have to worry about it." The incidence of unprotected high-risk sex in this group might rise again due to this complacency. Moreover, the widespread prescription of the treatment might lead to a dramatic spread of resistant virus in the infected population due to periodic patient non-compliance. (Essunger, personal correspondence)

— Daniel Dennett

In the worst case, you could have a cure for AIDS, know you have a cure for AIDS, and yet be unable to find a way of making that knowledge publicly available in a responsible way. It is no good fuming at the complacency or recklessness of the at-risk community, no good blaming the irresolute patients who abandon their treatments in midcourse--these are predictable and natural (if lamentable) effects of the impact your publication would have....

Torbjörn: Just to clarify (in case you're interested in clarity), I'm blaming Dawkins for speaking out about the right issue (the evils of at least certain forms of religious indoctrination, especially when practised by state-funded institutions) the wrong way (by signing a poorly-worded petition, and making over-generalized statements that divert attention away from specific abuses and raise legitimate questions about his real intentions).

Katarina: thanks for the Paulina example. This example shows, at least, that one's choice of words, and choice of venue for propagating those words, is, in its consequences, just about as important as the actual content of the message itself. You can't have it both ways: if you want people to listen to what you say, then they will listen to what you say, and how you say it, not what you "really meant;" Blaming others after the fact for not understanding you the "right" way, is no substitute for getting your message right before the fact.

Bee, let's not go down this road again. Dawkins doesn't regret his words (do you know what they are?), only a document he signed. Are his subsequent statements not enough for ya? He's only human.

The Peril of Paulina was meant to illustrate how people mis-use, mis-represent, and mis-understand the words of those who make careful statements about their views.

The Peril of Paulina that we naturalists face is that whenever we put forward circumspect, precise versions of our positions, some of these guardians of the public good turn their cleverness to tranforming our careful claims into sound bites that are indeed foolish and irresponsible. I have found hat the more care I devote to making my message clear and compelling, for instance, the more suspicious these guardians become. What they say, in paraphrase, is this: "Don't pay attention to all the caveats and complications masked by slick rhetoric! All he's really saying is that you don't have consciousness, you don't have a mind, you don't have free will! We're all just zombies and nothing matters--that's what he's really saying!" How can I dael with this? (For the record, that's not what I'm really saying.)

So, is that intermediate output from somebody's Weasel program?

Henry

I mean, who will pay for the building, the staff, etc?

and one reason for this is that opposition coming from within a community is the hardest to ignore or brush off.,/quote>

but your point was that it was the most LISTENED to, which you just countered yourself.

indeed, third party arbitration WAS usefull in the debates between the liberal and conservative brances of the Lutherans, just as it can be in any given debate. As to whether that arbitration came from professed "atheists" or not, there is no way to get that kind of resolution at this point, though it hardly really matters.

sometimes the participants are TOO close to the issue to make reasoned arguments to begin with. I give you Francis Collins, as a perfect example.

If you want to discuss this in terms of the value of folks like Dawkins vs. Collins, you'll find they both make exactly the same scientific arguments in support of the ToE.

the rest is fluff, and diehard fundies don't listen to either one of them anyway, as you should well know by now. a fundie would find Collins' arguments on theology and science no more convincing than Dawkins' arguments for the complete divorcing of science and theology, and I could make a better argument that Collins' inclusion of his personal theology simply detracts from the primary message given in the rest of his book, which would only confuse those who actually ARE on the proverbial "fence".

I say your characterization of Dawkins as a negative in this "debate" is based purely on the fluff, and has little bearing on his actual efficacy, which is quite high actually.

as to Dawkins signing the petition, why on earth are you STILL going on about it, considering that not only did he retract his signature, he explained why he signed it to begin with AND why he removed his signature later.

go figure, he's human after all, and refreshingly honest to boot.

I don't know, STJ. Organized can be good, if people have a worthwhile objective. Such as debunking creationism. Or charity. I don't object to the organized part so much as I object to the objective of spreading the Word.

the wrong way (by signing a poorly-worded petition, and making over-generalized statements that divert attention away from specific abuses and raise legitimate questions about his real intentions).

hello having read these posts as a whole ,having bumped upon this page googling "war on science",
i'm happy to see that there are still on this planet free thinking people

some comments on comments (I spent all night writing,I'm on the other hemisphere):

153016,153377,153379,153061,153217,153114,153465,153488153846 and ...
Anton Mates,Torbjorn,Carol Clouser

anton and torbjorn (although i agree with you in principle opposing carol)some remarks:
determinsm is one thing causality is another. Quantum Mechanics is a non deterministic theory,NOT non causal.Very important distinction.
(i can't recall of a non causal physical theory,at least not at some level of persumed reality...)
ie causality according to present theories maybe breaks down inside black holes...that's partly why we don't think that we have the right theories...)
Everything in QM happens for a reason(instabillity of nuclei and so on),the non deterministicity is happening randomly with respect to time. Why is it like that happening we don't know...
Causality is not exactly derived from physical laws .they're correlated or perhaps equivalent but perhaps in a far abstract way.in fact one may define science as the ultimate search of and for causility but of the very (if existing)measurable objective kind.
ie initial values problems of differential equations require -physics-mathematics,mathematics require rational thinking aka causality(unfortunatelly selfreference but still...) .
Your whole discussion is in,on,at,by the front or boundaries of science but both sides treat frontline theories of theoretical physics as solid ground(ie parallel cosmoi(universe = singular) )

Carol as many others have explained the problem in your arguments is that you alternate between acceptance of scientific principles and non acceptance at will and at the same time you regard yourself as rational.To a scientifically thinking person science=rationality....
Explaining that the non material god exists and created the world in a way that we cannot understand ,leaving no proof and we cannot understand it because he intentionally created it thus, is an explanation of faith and not logic (classic false proof via self reference. Long Live Russel!).if you cannot tell the difference your apparent high and broad education was acquired i think in vain.
ie
1 if so why not assume that there are two(or three and so on) non corporeal non rational binded first causes and not name the former god and the latter hmmmm satan???? and lets say that the omnipotence property of these beings is shared 40 (former) to 60 (latter)...
2 i'm surprised and amazed.how can an obviously educated person in both modern (pseudo-) philosophy and science cannot cope with principles as occam's razor and so on?
3 jewish theology.the peaceful and philathropous judeo-cristian-muslim world-belief is based on the torah aka old testament.
any (non believer) reader of it can see that it's a quite interesting book.in fact in this lovelly holly book the chosen highly sophisticated nomad people of god slains or calls the fair god to slay the following minor civilisations of antiquity :Babylonians-Aegyptians-Phoenicians-Cretans-Greeks. :)
(no antisemism meant here but ... scripta manent)
and you talk about god.For the love of god!!!!!

Anton on the causality-first cause(aristotle's "proton kinoun" meaning first thing moving other things)-fundamental element ad infinitum upon f. element theories of everything
we come to the classical endless loop or chain.things may be so.maybe there isn't out there in the platonic or the material world the Divine M theory,the explanation of the rock,sex,dvd player,milky way,banana,...,everything.maybe we 'll always have to search to find the more basic more fundamental theory upon theory ad infinitum.there is no scientific proof of the opposite.But i think that (at least conventional) science aesthetics cannot deal very pleasantly or easely with this view as a true explanation.
and Although infinity (small or big) is commonly used in science have in mind that although as far as now we can't do without it it maybe the source of all of our problems, being equivalent or the creator of self reference problems that are still everywhere in science.v=dx/dt what really means-is dx or dt(continuum problem)? and if spacetime is discrete what is to move? and if mass equals energy then mass creates field that is energy that is mass that creates field ... and if the forces between particles came to being via virtual particles then the virtual one create real-virtual ones that create virtual that create real ... and if to define the field of mass you need a mass without field ...
Zeno,Zeno where are you? (also remember one of the schools of modern mathematics rejects every notion of infinity)

153494
Glen Davidson
quite right as a strategy but not very appauling to scientists

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Anton MAtes and Katarina

what's UM,UW church? meaning what um,uw stands for?
cristianity and-or religion isn't viewed outside US as you do in fact there are not 2,3,4,5 but maaany views.ie The main divisions of cristianity isn't according to other cristian dogmata catholic,protestants and ...others.You think in such terms because of the dominence there of these dogmata.
ie all of the (almost homogeneously) orthodox eastern europe barelly thinks protestants as cristians (on the borderline)and evangelists,jehova's witnesses,... as not at all

the following isn't exactly :) the nicene creed as you wrote...

We believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father by whom all things were made; who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man, and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, and the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And he shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end.
And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, who proceedeth from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified, who spoke by the prophets. And we believe one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins. And we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

This text has the so called filioque (latin for "and from the son") roman catholic addition to it.
(language of prototype -and of the last parts of the old testament and all of the whole of the new testament-was greek as greek was the lingua franca of the the roman empire and of the age.something that mel gibson seems to have -intentionally????- got totally wrong in his Truely(here,now we laugh) represented passions of the christ. america,america...)
The nicene creed is as the above without the filioque part (...who proceedeth from the Father,who with the Father...) (orthodox cristians keep onto the original mix :) )
The catholic wasn't the main nor the only cristian dogma before luther.catholics came to life at 1056 (changing formally to the above version of the creed) when the great schism took place between the western (latin dominated) and eastern (greek dominated) roman empire dividing the church into catholic(means "of the whole" in greek) and orthodox(means "of the right faith-dogma" in greek)
something (among infinite others) that dan brown also got wrong in davinci code (heretic from hereticus or haereticus as dan says isn't a latin word but the latin form of the greek word haeretikos meaning he who chooses.
many heresies had gone against the main or conventional or formal body of the church till the nicene creed and after it) have you americans(besides katarina) ever heard something of the above????)

in general Katarina i agree with you,in fact your posts show a quite fascinating cpmbination of knowledge and anticonformal boldness for an american (sorry guys but....)are you really one???

153105,153389,153452,153491,...
Raging Bee and others
As a general friendly comment.And to all of you out there proud citizens of the United Stated of
America.THERE IS A PLANET OUTSIDE THE USA.The World Series cannot really be world series because it's only in the U.S. .In fact most of humanity doesn't play baseball.The most popular sport on the planet is football meaning soccer...Your world champion of boxing is not the world champion of boxing but of the USA.Homo sapiens sapiens doesn't in his vast majority speak english(take all my spelling,grammatical or syntactical mistakes in this text as clues(go non anglophones go!),this is obviously meant for the brits also).The American Dream is the dream of the americans.WE the 5.5+ billion REMAINING HUMANS have MORE interesting things to dream about. It's maybe hard for you to grasp but the planet isn't the USA. states,laws,religions,customs,languages,ethics,... differ from yours.People don't think like you,don't live like you,and don't want to. Try to think in context of that...

sorrygreat schism took place in 1054ad not 1056ad and i would like to point out that the complete history behind those events is quite more complex (as always),here simplified...and by the way good morning :) to all of you out there here is 4:53am

sorry great schism took place in 1054ad not 1056ad and i would like to point out that the complete history behind those events is quite more complex (as always),here simplified...and by the way good morning :) to all of you out there here is 4:53am

Thanatos, welcome to PT.

By UM I meant United Methodist, and I am not sure what the other one is. You are right, I forgot to include Orthodox views. Shame on me for forgetting my "roots" (blame it on my commie daddy). But you are wrong, the posters here are very knowledgable and culturally aware, and they support the theory of evolution in spite of the popular tendency (in America, but now increasingly abroad) to dismiss it as "just a theory, not a fact," which is a testament to their independence of thought.

Thanks for your contribution to the discussion, late as it is, and I hope you stick around, this is a great blog with great people, most of whom are much more educated and knowledgable than myself.

Just a note, a constructive criticism, it was rather difficult to read your comment since you don't seem to care for, although you seem to be familiar with, the proper use of punctuation and capitalization. May I suggest that you make better use of these tools so as to make it easier for us to understand you without straining?

My good troll, Perhaps popping a pill or two would help you to actually participate in a thread.

Katarina (and others) I'm very sorry for my lack of punctuation or capitalization and for the -I'm sure- many other errors.As I mentioned,when I began reading the thread,I found it very interesting, so I started again from the top,writing down some major objections ,thoughts etc.Then having finished reading , I started writing my comment,realising that there were so many and diverse things to write that I had to choose only the most important and only the ones I could express without having to write a book (the major problem was and is that usually when talking to most americans (even educated,are your universities so specialised?don't you ever talk about (non trivial not on the news)things concerning the world outside US,aren't you curious at all?) one unfortunatelly discovers that they are so hyper-ultra-selfcentred at everything that one has to reinvent the wheel and rediscover America :-) backing his thesis up),so I stopped caring for punctuation rules etc and focused on expressing myself ,as better and as fast as I could ,in english again after a long long time on non trivial issues.

Commie daddy in america? You must have had a very interesting childhood over there ,trying to persuade your friends that commies don't eat children. :-)

Representing the other hemisphere good night to you all!

would have to take a chisel to my head

Commie daddy in america? You must have had a very interesting childhood over there ,trying to persuade your friends that commies don't eat children. :-)

determinsm is one thing causality is another. Quantum Mechanics is a non deterministic theory,NOT non causal.Very important distinction. (i can't recall of a non causal physical theory,at least not at some level of persumed reality...) ie causality according to present theories maybe breaks down inside black holes...that's partly why we don't think that we have the right theories...) Everything in QM happens for a reason(instabillity of nuclei and so on),the non deterministicity is happening randomly with respect to time. Why is it like that happening we don't know...

— Thanatos

3 jewish theology.the peaceful and philathropous judeo-cristian-muslim world-belief is based on the torah aka old testament. any (non believer) reader of it can see that it's a quite interesting book.in fact in this lovelly holly book the chosen highly sophisticated nomad people of god slains or calls the fair god to slay the following minor civilisations of antiquity :Babylonians-Aegyptians-Phoenicians-Cretans-Greeks. :)

cristianity and-or religion isn't viewed outside US as you do in fact there are not 2,3,4,5 but maaany views.ie The main divisions of cristianity isn't according to other cristian dogmata catholic,protestants and ...others.You think in such terms because of the dominence there of these dogmata. ie all of the (almost homogeneously) orthodox eastern europe barelly thinks protestants as cristians (on the borderline)and evangelists,jehova's witnesses,... as not at all

many heresies had gone against the main or conventional or formal body of the church till the nicene creed and after it) have you americans(besides katarina) ever heard something of the above????)

It's maybe hard for you to grasp but the planet isn't the USA. states,laws,religions,customs,languages,ethics,... differ from yours.People don't think like you,don't live like you,and don't want to. Try to think in context of that...

It's probably wise to find out how any one American thinks before deciding how

Panda seemed to have crashed-gone to sleep for some hours.Or is it just me?
prothysterally (oh my god I've written two pages)
Anyway

To Anton Mates

Regarding causality and physics.
Causality (aka aetioty :the property of having a cause) is usually defined as "An effect has A cause" ,cause preceding effect and determinism (aka aetiocracy:the rule of causes) as "The (same) effect has The (same) cause" (roughly speaking something like 1-1 function or not).Causality is much more fundamental than determinism.Determinism can't exist without causality ,causality can exist without determinism.Perhaps in future superhypersuper theories (I mean theories fully explaining and fully predecting not just the sperms (of them?) now existing) everything will be otherwise understood.But till then ,everything after the bigbang(leaving at this point the "before"-how else to put it? and the "event" itself- STILL to scientific research (and not god of course)) is being understood in its totality in tempore or cum tempore but not sine tempore.
(parallel cosmoi,multiverses,copenhagen and so on are semi-scientifical,semi-philosophical interpretations of QM ,not QM itself.The measurement paradox at least from what I have heard STILL stands....)

Regarding eastern christianity.
Eastern christianity has not "mixed" or "lived" together with prostestants(and offsprings) at all.It's what Katarina mentioned about the nicene creed and how (formal) christianity is defined around it.Since the eastern christian world (orthodoxy,monophysitism,koptism etc) never went through the lutheran ,calvinian,protestant ,in general, reform (and of course the relevant wars) ,

- and as it didn't also went through renaissenance end enlightment (mainly due to the turks) but bumped onto modernity in a very violent way -

the nicene creed and the "holy" tradition (mysteries,saints,seremonies,monastecism,language in use,non polyphonic byzantine music (not totally valid for rusia and some others) etc) in the east are strictly kept.

-Over here in a statistical weight manner of speaking
a. non orthodox-catholic-jew-muslims are simply non corporeal :-) and
b. the corporeals are in a random combination constantly at war with one another :-)

-Even if you are a non believer or an opposer of the religion and although the power of the church isn't now like in older times, religion,nationality,culture etc are so (homogenoously) closely intermixed-interweaven that there is no escape.
Ie for orthodoxs(!?! -es!?!) like catholics on each day in the calendar there is the in memoriam celebration of a saint-martyr-hosius (or of two or more). So even if you do hate christ and his teachings ,even if you indeed are a devoted atheist ,
you expect that your friends,relatives,... call you and wish you many years on your name's celebration (the celebration of the homonym saint mentioned above) and hold a grudge and feel very lonely if they don't.... :-)

The deniers ( aka you :-) ) of the above are simply either not considered because there are simply not around :) or considered not as simply heretics -like ie the catholics due mainly to the "filioque" - but as heretics to the point of another not dogma-doctrine but religion.
So yes much fewer as properly christian are recognised.
Damn you Heretics!!! :-)))))

Regarding faith and the creed
Yes in general you are right about the main body of the church and Synode of Nicaea(the complexity of the history of synodes,faith,people,doctrine,empire) but that's in general what I also meant(formality, historically, in christianity after all is defined by constantine's the great action of inagaurating christianity as the official religion of the imperium)
The problem is obviously inherent ->>>
"Should I mention this ,is this meant,should I mention that,does he-she knows what-where-when-why is that?"
Repeating myself again and again the problem is how to communicate with people that although are multicultural,multiethnical... ,they unfortunately STATISTICALLY also are ignorant of all the others and of their affairs in general. Politics,dreams,regimes,races,history,culture,religion,language(not just english and spanish for an increasing minority or some words-expressions of languages to be forgotten in two-three generations),economy,technology(do they use missiles or poison-darts? :-) ) ,geopolitics,geography , geography-location not in gps accuracy, simply on which continent on the globe :-) accuracy ,,,,,, ............... .
How many americans do you believe(and you live over there ---at least I suppose you do-so you are infinitely more trustworthy than me ) STATISTICALLY ie have ever heard of the nicene creed(not to forget some text driven to life by some event long long time ago somewhere far far away!!!!) ?????? In my country most would be lying if they said that they remembered what the Oecumenical Synodus of Nicaea was or was about, but everyone,I mean 99% everyone knows or knows about the nicene creed here being called the "Pisteuo"= "I believe" or "Symbolon tes Pisteos"= "Symbol of Faith".In my country chances are that one may point on the map to most major countries.I don't believe that most americans can point to my country or many foreign countries.
I understand that you mean that you are not all the same.OF COURSE.
I don't wish to offend you as in fact and indeed I'm very merry-happy :) communicating with penseurs like you.
I just want to point out to some people that Earth isn't " US Americans and others...",that infact Earth in most places isn't called Earth.

About Carol.
No I didn't know(or anyway happened to notice) about hers literallity of interpretation. I can't really understand the manichaism-binarity of such combined rational-non rational thought.
eeeennnn- does not compute - does not compute-divide by zero error at #0234A5432
Long live the kingdom of superfuzzy logic!

to Katarina
I'm from Greece.Greetings!

Dear Carol
please, please forgive me! I have indeed errored!
I'm wrong ,wrong,I'm totally wrong,
you obviously aren't well educated,not educated at all.

Although I must admit that due to my erroneous disregard of formality,due to the lack of practicing serious writing in english for a long time(some years I might say) and due to the other problems already mentioned elsewhere ,my writings were not so easy to comprehend, it's a plain fact to me now that my BABBLE of self-reference Russell paradox,Zeno of Elea infinity paradoxes,continuum problem,definition of a field,points and facts on the very history of christianity and so on, couldn't even in a thousand years be understood by you.

Bises :)

PS: By the way, it's Thanatos

Good night to you all!