Review: The Atheist's Way

Since I can't seem to stop saturating myself in books to do with religion, irreligion and philosophy, I have found myself racing through a wonderful little tome by Eric Maisel. It is called, The Atheist's Way: Living Well Without Gods (pictured left).  Maisel also has a blog -- though it seems a little inactive -- dedicated to the subject matter in the book.

Where Maisel's book differs from the spate of recent atheist literature (e.g., Hitchens, Dennett, Dawkins, Harris, et al) is in his focus: where a thick brace of literature has been dedicated to showing the poverty of the religious life, Maisel has written to draw attention to the richness, beauty, and meaningfulness of the non-religious life.  Hitchens writes to highlight the toxicity of religious thinking; Maisel writes to encourage meaning-making in the atheist's approach.  Dennett writes to convince the reader that religion is a mental spell, a collective notion that gods influence nature therefore we worship them; Maisel writes to spur the religious into letting go of their assumptions of beneficient gods and face an indifferent universe open to innumerable possibilities for self-actualisation.  Dawkins writes to dispell delusions and rationalisations about the supernatural; Maisel writes to reassure the disbelieving that making your meaning is better than adopting an already prescribed religious meaning.  Harris writes to discourage adherence to any religious systems, and to shun the moderates for their cowardly, yet inadvertant support of extremists; Maisel writes to enliven a sense of life in the irreligious, and to move on bravely toward a whole sense of selfhood--a quality he suggests cannot be had in the religious life.

I'm sure you already see that Maisel is taking a positive approach to an often overly negative subject: disbelief.  And by negative, I don't mean to say that authors like Hitchens and Dawkins are a bad influence, or inappropriately dark and cynical.  They're not.  Still, Maisel has gone in a direction the so-called New Atheists have not: rather than tearing down gods, God, and the religions that attest to gods and God, he has taken the opportunity to outline the positive side of disbelief.

Super-Christian

So, what are the positive net gains (if I can word it that way) of disbelief?  In a nutshell, Maisel argues that the disbeliever makes his own meaning.  He does not adopt, or super-impose over his own life the meaning that religious traditions have on offer, as if fitting himself into a body-suit with the symbol for a religion splashed across his chest.

Instead, the disbeliever chooses what he values, recognises the ultimate subjectivity of participation in life, and makes his own meaning.  This bears some similarity to Ayn Rand's stance on selfishness: people always act in such a way as to keep what they value; they are therefore "selfish" or self-interested.  The man who values personal freedom acts in such a way as to keep his freedom; he develops the virtue of productivity.  He does not allow others to hand him the value of freedom because it was never anyone else's to give to him in the first place.  And the mentality that suggests meaning needs to be earned by other's approval or permissions is the very same mentality that is on display in religion: your values, your meaning, your personal actualisation is imposed on you by an already established system, and that system gives approval or not to your worth.

The evidence for this is ample.  Consider, for example, the Catholic teaching that the use of condoms is immoral.  This article suggests that the Catholic laity is in disagreement with the current pope about the immorality of condoms; but does that change anything?  It might in private practice, but in public religious life, a lot of these same Catholics who disagree with their pope will still buckle under his imposed ruling: condoms should not be used (spare, of course, if your are interested in the propositions of male prostitutes infected with AIDS).  More, those Catholics who do sheathe their swords, as it were, will struggle uselessly (and infuriatingly, if you ask me) with guilt and shame for their choice to shag in latex.  They may even go so far as to confess their wicked deed, feel better, then repeat their "sin" and be told, after multiple confessions that their values are disorderly, not in line with the teachings of the church, or that their salvation is in danger because of habitual mortal sin.

The example above illustrates rather graphically that the struggling Catholic condomite is deriving his value from the teachings and constructed meanings of his chosen church.  Maisel, if I have understood him right, would suggest that that Catholic individual is allowing some of his meaning to be chosen for him, instead of making his own meaning.  Sadly, billions of people allow themselves to be bullied by clergy that tells them they have to seek their meaning in the teachings of the church, rather than make their meaning by the act of choosing and self-actualising on their own terms, and with their own resources.

And that, it seems, is Maisel's chief point: meaning is not something you need to seek.  It is not beneficial to you simply because it is prepackaged in the guise of religion.  It is not helpful because it can be easily accessed by the ministrations of clergy who tell you what to believe and how to believe it.  That is the structure those religious people choose, and in return, because of the structure they choose, their meaning is determined for them.  They are part of the overall meaning of that religion; they do not have a self-actualised meaning of their own.

You don't have to "find" meaning.  You have to make meaning.  In other words, you have to invest yourself into your own passions, your own interests, your own wants, and then you have to do what only you can do--because you're the only one who is you--to achieve your passions, maintain your interests, and gain what you want.  You have to choose your values, not piggy-back the values of others or use stand-in values such as those enforced by religions.  Maisel, in fact, goes so far as to state that religion itself is a stand-in for meaning; that is, religion takes the rightful place of personal meaning by imposing itself as over above self-chosen meaning.

Maisel's writing is clear, gentle, and inviting.  That last qualifier, however, sometimes serves to be a detractor from his efforts, as if by writing in an inviting style he is luring or tempting the reader to try on the religionless life.  I don't think I'd mind that so much if it weren't for the fact that I appreciate much more the blunt approach of Harris or Hitchens when it comes to addressing the moral necessity for atheism.  I'm not appreciative of saccharine, or glad-handed tones regarding major life decisions.  As minor a criticism as that is, I think Maisel's book adds a much needed, and excellent view of the areligious life, and how to self-actualise even after the experience of deconversion and the confusions such a switch can make.

On Immorality & Atheism

Click for larger picture.

The notion that atheists are immoral because they claim godlessness is tripe. There is no reason to suggest that a person is immoral because they don't believe a certain god, or any gods exist. Such a conclusion is hopelessly illogical: where's the connective tissue between the propositions "I don't believe in God/gods" and "disbelievers are immoral"? Something has to fit between those two propositions, otherwise concluding disbelief equals immorality is a categorical confusion and a lackluster syllogism, at best.

At worst, the implication that people can only be moral if they believe in a God/gods makes believers terribly dangerous people to associate with: are they suggesting that it's only their belief that restrains them from psychopathic rampages, and all manner of hideous crimes?

And what are we to make of pre-Judaic times, before the alleged giving of the 10 Commandments? Were people just given to their impulses with no thought to consequences? Were human beings wantonly viscious with no capacity for restraint until God burned a few words in stone? The fact is: people are moral despite their beliefs, and even without beliefs, because morality is part of our organising instincts and our efforts to promote the survival of ourselves and others.

Your morality is not a cape you are given by some God; it is part of your human composition and does not depend a whit on what brand of religion you choose to adopt.

Omnipotence and Omniscience

Stefan Molyneux

From an essay entitled, "Against the Gods", by Stefen Molyneux we have the following quote:

...omniscience cannot coexist with omnipotence, since if a god knows what will happen tomorrow, said god will be unable to change it without invalidating its knowledge. If this god retains the power to change what will happen tomorrow, then it cannot know with exact certainty what will happen tomorrow.

What are your thoughts?

Defending Ricky Gervais

Ricky Gervais, comedian extrodinaire.

I haven't written an interactive snark-piece in quite a while.  I suppose I lost my enthusiasm for it and tried my hand at new forms of literary scrutiny.  Tonight I find myself somewhat riled and inspired to lay a curmudgeonly type-lashing to a one Josephine Vivaldo of the Christian Post.

Aside from being exceptionally poorly written, Vivaldo's comatic awareness of her subject material reads as an insult to her own intelligence.  But to spare you from my own nitpicky appraisals of Vivaldo's technical abilities, let's just jump right into the slaughter, shall we?

In her piece, Vivaldo has singled-out Ricky Gervais, a public atheist, brilliant comic, and first-class actor (see: Ghost Town, The Invention of Lying) who, during the Golden Globe Awards, made a playful remark:  "Thank you to God for making me an atheist."

Vivaldo's ignorant little scribble can't even be bothered to quote Gervais properly, let alone take the comedian's jibe in context:

"During the Golden Globe Awards, host and professed atheist Ricky Gervais said, “Thanks to God for making me an atheist,” but in an interview with Piers Morgan on CNN, he says he was not mocking Christians."

The conspicuous absence of the personal pronoun "you" in Gervais's joke let's us know that Vivaldo's reporting is lackadaisical at best.  I wouldn't usually take interest in such a triffling detail, but let's face it: Gervais's comment wasn't so long as to make missing words a strong possibility.  But then to cite Gervais's rebuttal to the ridiculous allegation that he was mocking Christians only shows that Vivaldo is pedaling mealy-mouthed tripe fed to her by other jaded, evangelical alarmists.

Half a second of thought would illuminate to Vivaldo and any of her like-minded and equally addled co-conspirators that Gervais was taking a playful poke at the untold scores of actors who, year after year, curry favour with the wider public by tossing out superficial homages to 'God'.  This fact is made startlingly clear when Vivaldo goes on to report that CNN reporter Piers Morgan challenged Gervais with a note on the American Christian population:

Morgan began by pointing out to the British comedian and actor that millions of Americans are in fact Christian and it seemed obvious that he was poking fun at that particular religion. In response Gervais negated the assumption of offending American Christians, especially when he personally doesn’t find it offensive when people say “thank God” all the time.

Notwithstanding the fact that the use of the word 'God' is not exclusive to Christians, it really doesn't help Morgan's case to make such blunders when Gervais openly admits that he doesn't find people's use of the phrase "thank God" in any way offensive.  This highlights a strange irony: the demand for religious tolerance is openly upheld as long as no-one is irreligious.

In North American countries, a Christian can careen headlong into a blowhard speech about evil, gay Teletubbies, or the insidious, creeping poison of condoms; and in doing so, write off a whole culture of people as godless, sinning, reprobates who will never be whole without their particular brand of Christianity, and the God they envision.  But because Ricky Gervais took a harmless poke at a customary exit quip made during celebrity galas ("thank God"), he must be mocking Christians, and should damn-well be dragged through the media's kangaroo court.

Having turned his pedestal upside-down so he can more assuredly stick to it, Morgan pressed the issue further by "rephrasing" his original question:

Morgan continued on by rephrasing his question and Gervais, 49, said “no no, I’m not mocking them, people’s beliefs aren’t my concern at all, I certainly don’t differentiate religions either, I look at all religions the same, unlike religious people I look at all religions equally.”

American Christian Jesus

Gervais's response further emphasizes my point that the amorphous title 'God' is not the exclusive property of Christians, much less "American Christians" (as if their nationality makes their spirituality somehow a purer pedigree).  The fact that Gervais considers all supernatural views as part of a homogenous batter called 'religion' rips the stuffing right out of Morgan's juvenile insistence, and any other puerile attempts at directing Gervais's remark to any specific religion at all.  And good for Gervais for pointing out that segregating between religions is the practice of religions, not the areligious.

Gervais also pointed out that the religious don't have a monopoly on what is 'good', and that,

“Some people say who says what good is but you know what I say ‘I do’ I’m good to people because it’s the way I want to be treated and I don’t believe I’ll be rewarded in heaven, I will be rewarded now.”

Despite the awkward wording of Gervais's remark, he brings up a good point: what is 'good' is not good because certain people, or religions say it is.  What is good is 'good' on its own, and if you practice those things that are evidentially good (e.g., treating people the way you'd like to be treated), then that goodness will be its own reward now.  If you're religious, you may also believe that you'll have some kind of reward for your present goodness when you're in heaven.  But the point remains that by practicing what is evidentially good now, that goodness will be rewarded or enjoyed now, in the present.

Not to be undone too easily, however, Morgan moved on to suggest that atheists, in their dotage, must feel a sense of waste if this life is all they have.

Morgan expressed his sentiment about how “the problem for atheist it must be doom and gloom when you get to like at 70 or 80, to think that’s it, that’s the end of everything, so you must fear death ten times more than Christians”.

Morgan's intensely ignorant segue, notwithstanding, Gervais responded eloquently by noting that there are many different conceptions of 'God' and that, by implication, if the aggregate number of gods in the world has still not reasonably assured people of their present and future states, why should anyone think atheism is on the deficient end of the spectrum?  Says Gervais:

“I can’t help what I believe anymore than you can, it’s up to you what you believe in. This thing about not believing in God, there are 2,780-odd gods, and if you’re a Christian you believe in one of them and you don't believe in all the others.”

Far from being a "dispute" as Vivaldo mislabelled it, the exchange was a simple exchange between two people with contrasting points of view.  Gervais, I think, came out on top of the intelligible end of things.  And as far as I'm concerned, reviewing Gervais as a tasteless air-pounder with a preachment up his sleeve is the kind of moronic ignorance Morgan and Vivaldo should be repenting of.  Gervias was who he is: a comedian with an observation and ironic comment to make, not to Christians in specific, but for the sole purpose of a joke.  Besides, if celebrities can rig galas for the singular focus of "roasting" each other, why should Gervais be harangued for telling a joke when that is what he was specifically employed to do?

Religion and Teapots

Bertrand Russell

It's certainly no secret that people do horrific and absolutely insane things as an expression of devotion to their particular religion.  Christians conjured up regrettable notions of witchcraft and slaughtered thousands, sometimes purely on suspicion and without a shred of evidence.  Muslims have had their historical share of swinging the sword and tossing rocks.  And there seems to be no end to the number of fringe-group religions and eccentric cults enacting wanton violence on others simply because they think they're under some mysterious, divine fiat that only they know about, and that only they can confirm comes from their god/gods.

Whatever the peculiars of the case, one underlying question, in particular, undergirds any helpful criticism of such fanatical religious stupidities: how can the God/gods purported be proven to be in any way real?

One philosopher, Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), proposed that, in matters of the supernatural, the person who states there is a divine super-reality (including divine beings) has the responsibility to prove their statement(s) are evidentially true.

Russell used the analogy of a teapot in orbit around the moon:  anyone can say there is a teapot encircling the moon, but the person who states such a thing has the burden of proving that their statement is true by showing the evidence for their claim.  This responsibility for furnishing a positive position or proposition with accomodating evidence has become known as the "burden of proof."

In matters of religion, it is the person who states that God exists who has the burden of proof and give evidence for their claim.  The non-believer is under no such responsibility to give evidence for their non-position.  Or, to put it another way: person X claims God exists and offers evidence to prove their case; person Y makes no claim on the existence of God and therefore has no burden to prove a non-claim.

So where does this leave us?  Well, here is a clever little presentation (2 minutes) that illustrates not only the absurdity of some religious mindsets, but also incites the necessity for proving that the celestial teapot exists but only having the fanaticism of religious teapotists to point to.  Enjoy!

Thank you to Atheist Media Blog for this clever little video.

Christo-Solstice

Christmas will be happening a little late for the Saint Cynic household; I am scheduled to work the holidays. In any case, for the rest of you who have somewhat normal lives, Merry Christmas!

And for those of you who are of a different mind concerning Christmas, I hope you have a superb Solstice Season!

Richard Lynn: Disbelief and IQ

The Telegraph, a newspaper out of the UK, has put out an article detailing the findings of emeritus psychology professor Richard Lynn.  Lynn teaches out of Ulster University and has recently suggested that people with better than average IQs are less likely to believe in God.

Lynn's critics have labelled the findings "simplistic", and based on what I've read so far, I'd have to agree.

According to Lynn, the decline in religious affliation and belief in God dropped dramatically in the 20th century because people have become more intelligent.  A quick glance at the basic evolution of the human being, however, suggests that we may not have been as smart as our neanderthalic ancestors.  If that is true, then Lynn's findings are not only "simplistic", as his critics have charged, but inevitably wrong.

Neaderthals were highly religious (though not in an organised sense), even superstitious people, yet their overall cranial capacity suggests a larger brain, and therefore a possible better overall cerebral capability.  Mind you, as the documentary Battle of the Brains indicates, the jury's still out on whether a bigger brain means more potential capacity.  For some, smaller regions of the brain are more efficient than others who have larger regions, and visa versa.

So, while it is that neanderthals may have been smarter and people with better-than-average IQs may be less inclined to believe in God, there is no clear-cut link between belief in a set of propositions and the overall intellectual horsepower of a person's brain. 

And let's not fool ourselves into thinking that the world's major educational institutions are anything shy of nonreligious to begin with.  Hence people who flourish in academic settings are going to be much more highly influenced by the philosophical climate of the institutes they attend.  In our youth, we usually call that kind of exemplification "peer pressure", but somehow, when we peer into the upper-eschelons of academia the notion of that same "peer pressure" is overlooked, and people start exculpating themselves with unfounded excuses such as 'people are just smarter now.'  Nonsense!  People are able to access much more information now and, consequently, they are better equipped to meet the demands of reality face-on.

In any case, being better informed and having more ready access to information doesn't make a person smarter, and really doesn't show a link into disbelief.  The familiar logician's addage "correlation is not causation" is instructive here: while there may be an argument to suggest that readily available information can persuade people not to believe in God, that accessibility is not definitively the cause of a person's unbelief.  And let's not forget that there are many sincere, highly intelligent religious folk who have access to the same information that most other people do -- and they keep believing.

Things That Make You Go, "Hmm."

I'm not saying I agree, but it is certainly a thoughtful presentation. It has me thinking, that's for sure.

By way of The Thinking Atheist.

Pascal's Wager: Rejected

Pascal's Wager. The notion of wagering on God's existence occurs at note 233 of Pascal's Pensées (literally, 'Thoughts').

And as one reader noted last year, the idea is that "It is better to believe in God and find out that he doesn't exist, than to not believe and find out he does." That is not a direct quote from Pascal, but it is the best summation of his famous Wager that I have heard, to date.

I'm not a fan of the Wager, personally, for a number of reasons, one of which is that citing the options of polar opposites (belief and unbelief) is not a reasonable premise for me to choose either of those polarities. I already know as much.

On top of that, however, I question the relevance of determining whether this-or-that thing is 'better' than another without having any real content to demonstrate such a claim. For example, simply stating that cheese is better than non-cheese tells me nothing about cheese that I should consider it 'better'. Similarly, telling me belief is better than unbelief tells me nothing about the content of 'belief' or 'unbelief' that I would consider one or the other 'better'.

As a conclusion to a well defined argument, the Wager can have its place. Still, Pascal's Wager is wholly dependent on having a rational, well-placed argument to render any meaning or purpose to wagering at all. And, incidentally, Pascal was not attempting an argument when he penned his famous wager, nor did he consider his Wager to be a sufficient premise to bring about salvific understanding. Pascal simply intended the Wager as an observation of the fact that people ultimately make choices; and the existence of God is just another choice about which someone can be right or wrong. Thus it is a wager, and not an apologetic.

Unfortunately, the Wager has been used as an apologetic in and of itself to coerce people into making a decision for or against Christ. Sadly, the few times I've seen this tactic used one of two results occur:

1. The person feels anxious and afraid that they may choose wrong and suffer some terrible consequence -- hell, or some other uncertainty about death and after-death.
2. The person becomes riled and considers Christians to be a batch of noisy idiots.
   

So, as a tool for evangelism, I've yet to see Pascal's Wager have a postitive net effect. It's simply too confrontational on a deeply instinctual level, and people feel deeply insulted to find themselves in the position where they have to gamble on eternity without any real understanding of why they're gambling. As a finishing pen-stroke for a well-honed apologetic, it can be used, but it does beg certain philosophical questions that weaken its seeming strength.

Work, Pray, and Lager

On one of the chat-boards I participate on, a member was concerned that his job was in danger. The situation is simply that his two bosses -- one an evangelical Christian, the other an orthodox Jew -- were requiring that each work-day start in prayer. To add, the employees were informed that they would be required to lead prayer.

Being as the concerned board-member is an atheist, he wanted to seek out advice for how to handle the situation.

The most creative response so far has been the following:

Recite this prayer:

"Our lager, Which art in barrels, Hallowed be thy drink. Thy will be drunk, I will be drunk, At home as it is in the tavern. Give us this day our foamy head, And forgive us our spillages, As we forgive those who spill against us. And lead us not to incarceration, But deliver us from hangovers. For thine is the beer, The bitter, The lager.

Ramen."

My abdomen now hurts from laughing too hard.

What would you suggest this atheist do?

Alright...

...I've put some of my philosophical readings on hold to concentrate on fictional literature. Admittedly, I'm feeling the pangs of withrawal. I absolutely love reading philosophy, social commentary, and religious history. But I also love reading fictional literature. In fact, I think that Christopher Hitchens is entirely right when he notes that philosophical themes, and morality are best meted out in fiction.

So, because I am a nerd, and because I don't want to stray from my healthier habits (philosophy) and immerse myself entirely in fiction (which can be a negative form of escapism for me), I have settled on some philosophical fiction. Specifically, I am going to embark on two modern classics by the wonderfully innovative and insightful philosopher, Ayn Rand.

To begin with, I will tackle the massive story (1070 pages), Atlas Shrugged.

From there, I will read The Fountainhead.

And finally, I will take on a much shorter novel by Rand, Anthem.


This should be quite a trip down Philosophy Lane, while at the same time being a purposeful break from heady academics. At the same time, I'll be learning about Rand's philosophy, Objectivism, and growing in my understanding and appreciation of how other's look at the world around them.

I'll leave you with this penetrating quote from Ms. Rand.

"Damnation is the start of your morality, destruction is its purpose, means and end. Your code begins by damning man as evil, then demands that he practice a good which it defines as impossible for him to practice. It demands, as his first proof of virtue, that he accepts his own depravity without proof. It demands that he start, not with a standard of value, but with a standard of evil, which is himself, by means of which he is then to define the good: the good is that which he is not.

It does not matter who then becomes the profiteer on his renounced glory and tormented soul, a mystic God with some incomprehensible design or any passer-by whose rotting sores are held as some explicable claim upon him - it does not matter, the good is not for him to understand, his duty is to crawl through years of penance, atoning for the guilt of his existence to any stray collector of unintelligible debts, his only concept of a value is a zero: the good is that which is non-man.

The name of this monstrous absurdity is Original Sin. A sin without volition is a slap at morality and an insolent contradiction in terms: that which is outside the possibility of choice is outside the province of morality. If man is evil by birth, he has no will, no power to change it; if he has no will, he can be neither good nor evil; a robot is amoral. To hold, as man's sin, a fact not open to his choice is a mockery of morality. To hold man's nature as his sin is a mockery of nature. To punish him for a crime he committed before he was born is a mockery of justice. To hold him guilty in a matter where no innocence exists is a mockery of reason. To destroy morality, nature, justice and reason by means of a single concept is a feat of evil hardly to be matched. Yet that is the root of your code.

Do not hide behind the cowardly evasion that man is born with free will, but with a 'tendency' to evil. A free will saddled with a tendency is like a game with loaded dice. It forces man to struggle through the effort of playing, to bear responsibility and pay for the game, but the decision is weighted in favor of a tendency that he had no power to escape. If the tendency is of his choice, he cannot possess it at birth; if it is not of his choice, his will is not free.

What is the nature of the guilt that your teachers call his Original Sin? What are the evils man acquired when he fell from a state they consider perfection? Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge - he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil - he became a moral being. He was sentenced to earn his bread by his labor - he became a productive being. He was sentenced to experience desire - he acquired the capacity of sexual enjoyment. The evils for which they damn him are reason, morality, creativeness, joy - all the cardinal values of his existence. It is not his vices that their myth of man's fall is designed to explain and condemn, it is not his errors that they hold as his guilt, but the essence of his nature as man. Whatever he was - that robot in the Garden of Eden, who existed without mind, without values, without labor, without love - he was not man.

Man's fall, according to your teachers, was that he gained the virtues required to live. These virtues, by their standard, are his Sin. His evil, they charge, is that he's man. His guilt, they charge, is that he lives. They call it a morality of mercy and a doctrine of love for man."

Thank you to Atheist Media Blog for bringing this to my attention.

Now off to reading...

Saturday Quote

"Only religion could suppose an unjustified certainty to be an improvement on ignorance." ~Victor Stenger, Philosophy Now, Issue 78, What's New About the New Atheism?

Responses to the New Atheism: Like It or Not

While reading literature on Atheism, I also fed myself a steady diet of books responding to the New Atheists. As in the last listing of books I posted, I will drop a picture of the dust-jacket on the left, state my 'Like' or 'Like It Not' in bold, sum the book up, and then give a small evaluation.

Like: It is reasonable to have faith. The Bible is a reasonable book that conveys reasonable truths that we can reasonably believe. Science has not disproven the Bible or discredited its moral teachings. There is no reason to accept the half-truths of the 'New Atheists', and every reason to re-visit the truths of biblical revelation.

Dinesh D'Sousa is clear, straightforward, and enjoyable to read. He meets the New Atheists on their own grounds, and uses their own sources to foil their attacks on religion, and on Christianity in particular. For the most part, his arguments are reasonable. However, just like the New Atheists, D'Souza often earmarks one side of the argument instead of presenting a wholistic look at the issue he is contending. To his credit, D'Souza is a wonderful rhetoritician and a persuasive writer. A certain lack of savvy follows from his inability to grasp the irony of arguing for a logical basis for faith, however. All-in-all though, D'Souza has produced a fine volume to add to the cultural conversation between religionists and anti-religionists.

Like It Not: A full-on counter-attack to Sam Harris' two landbreaking volumes 'The End of Faith' and 'Letter to a Christian Nation'. The worldview Harris presents in his infamous essays is utterly bankrupt, underscored by a vast ignorance, and nothing more than a charlatan's attempt at pedaling snake-oil metaphysics on a largely ignorant, unobservant culture.

Ravi Zacharias is a prolific writer, and a compelling speaker. A former atheist himself, Zacharias has built up a large ministry to people of differing faiths, and non-faiths alike. His principle aim in this book, it seems, is to dispell the accusations Sam Harris has set out against religious people in general, and Christians specifically. Unfortunately for Zacharias, his book never gets off the ground. It stinks of reactionary emoting, not reasoned, and considerate truth-seeking. Oftentimes, Zacharias moves toward a point but suddenly drops off, leaving the reader attempting to estimate his conclusion, and never returns to finish his idea. He accuses Harris of being fundamentalist in his outlook, but does nothing to soften or diminish Harris' equal accusation that American evangelicalism, and radical Islam are dangerously fundamentalist themselves. More to the point, Zacharias' book, being from a former atheist, falls ironically short of showing why atheism is an illegitimate worldview. One wonders why a scholar of Zacharias' renown and intimate understanding of atheism could not offer a coherent rebuttal of atheism in a book that expressly sets out to do so. Sadly, Zacharias' book is a poor, poor read, and will most likely find its way to a used book store in the near future with a small inscription detailing the impoverished material inside. Caveat emptor, indeed!

Like: The so-called New Atheists have saddled themselves with the same burden as literalist Christians: they're both fundamentalists. Calling for the end of faith and religion while trumpetting utopian overtures about human moral progress is bipolar thinking at best, and does nothing to promote civil dialogue between atheists and theists. What is needed is not an end to faith, not an end to religion, not a new injection of Enlightenment utopian ideologies but the courage to engage reason where it leads, and embrace religion where it benefits humankind.

Chris Hedges is a poignant writer. In fact, I found myself elated, disturbed, frightened, and relieved by Hedges's critical appraisal of the New Atheists. And as much as the New Atheists want to balk at the notion of their position being fundamentalist, when their writings are distilled to their lowest elements, they come out just as fundamentalist as any typical literalist Christian group. Be that as it may, however, Hedges does not give quarter to religiosity, but attacks it just as fiercely as neo-atheism. So, all-in-all, Hedges's book is a hard-hitting attack on unthinking faith-heads, just as much as it is an attack on unthinking unfaith-heads. In that respect, it is a fair and balanced read.

Like It Not: Faith and belief in God have come under attack. Skepticism is undermining believer's confidence in the Word of God. People would do well to understand exactly what is being said about their faith, and exactly how to respond to it so that Christian faith can continue to flourish and nurture not just the believers, but the skeptics, too.

Timothy Keller, while he has a wide-open and compassionate heart, comes across far too pedagogical, even cheaply condescending in this epistle. While some of the resources he has mined from are quite creative, they are dulled by the beige use of information he rambles out. More, while Keller seems to have a wide-ranging grasp of literature, philosophy, history, theology, and contemporary music, there is nothing in Keller's presentation of the Christian agenda that would give pause to even the most simple-minded literary atheist. His greatest strength in this book is that he can reduce large concepts into easily accessible and graspable ideas. Unfortunately, that same strength is also his weakness and his undoing: such simple presentations of Christian ideas leaves far too much opportunity to cut against the grain of his logic and undo his conclusions in ways that work against his evangelistic efforts.

Like: All religions have at their core one essential message: compassion. The expressions we use to convey that compassion are what are known as 'religion'. We can class religion into two distinct spheres: mythos (what is believed and practiced) and logos (what is reasoned and taught). To write-off religion on the basis that it doesn't conform to modern concepts of science and reason is to give-up a great swath of rich cultural heritage, learning, and useful metaphysics that not only inform our deepest human yearnings, but provide the substance that recent skeptics have been parasitically feeding from.

Karen Armstrong has done the world a favour with this her latest book. Her writing is clear, sagely, incisive, profound, and beautifully informed. The occasional bursts of dry humour to break the weight of vast historical data are well-placed and drive the reader forward on to new insights and discoveries. After wading through thousands of years of philosophical and religious concepts, Armstrong finally cracks the whip on the New Atheists in her epilogue, giving them a solid scourging for their purposeful ignorance, but at the same time applying salves to their wounds by informing the reader that their perspectives help the religious ask necessary and important questions. There is no shortage of delight to be found in Armstrong's latest book, and I hope every serious student of religion and the philosophy of religion makes use of it to deepen their understandings of the strange creature homo religiosus.

Arresting the Pope: Good

Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens are planning on arresting the pope. Here is the article.

Good!

He should be arrested. Anyone else doing what he's done would be charged with conspiring, and aiding and enabling criminal activity. Oh, but because he's religious, he's beyond justice. *cough, cough* Bullshit!

Like It Or Not: Reflections on Skeptical Literature P. 1

As readers of my blog, you already know that I've been digging through a host of atheist literature this past year-and-a-bit. A workplace colleague of mine is convinced my decision to undertake atheist writings is Freudian: I'm reading their writings because I'm subconsciously looking to change my mind, alter my views on religion, or something to that effect. That could be the case, I'll admit, but unless that motivation graduates from the subconscious to the conscious, I will continue on not knowing if it's actually the case.

I will say this, though: I ventured into Atheist-land because I (consciously) wanted to research the reasons people reject supernaturalism and religion. I wanted to harvest from their writings a working knowledge of their philosophical and pragmatic decisions to be disbelievers, doubters, freethinkers, skeptics, even anti-theists.

Here is a small review of the books I read. I will classify each book beginning with Like or Like It Not. I will then sum the book up in italics, and follow-up with a small commentary.

Like It Not: The notion of 'god' and the faith that people claim are bad memes (culturally assumed bits of information and meaning passed down in an imitational evolutionary fashion; much the same as genes, but non-physical). Faith is a virus, and God is the delusional state of mind the faith-virus brings about.

Dawkins, in my opinion, is the least capable of the popular atheists. He is philosophically shallow, intellectually sophmoric, and unnecessarily aggressive. His summations of classical theistic arguments for God are simple-minded and, for the most part, the product of long hours playing in the straw. I agree with David Berlinski, who he called Dawkins out as a "crappy philosopher", and with fellow atheist philosopher Michael Ruse who expressed that Dawkins is "brazen in his ignorance of philosophy and theology", and "a man truly out of his depth."

Dawkins is a very good writer, to be sure, but style does not win-out over content when dealing with challenging philosophical issues. One simply cannot afford to throw away valuable insight for winning prose unless one intends to write sophistry. Still, I'd like to give Dawkins the benefit of the doubt that he wrote The God Delusion with the desire to be more than simply a literary snake-oil salseman.

The one redeeming quality Dawkins' book presents is that it provides a great deal of working material for the closet logician. It would be a great book for a Philosophy 101 class to play "spot the logical flaw".

Like: A sweeping narrative about the dangers of setting aside reason for religious claims. Harris examines the extreme ends of religious fundamentalism (particularly in Islam), and by association the culpability of moderate faith expressions, and builds a case for why religion itself is a vehicle for destruction, and moral regression.

Harris is eloquent, straightforward, and unmistakeably angry in this polemic against fundamentalist religions. His position that religion spits in the face of reason is backed by clear quotes from historical religious leaders, such as Martin Luther who averred that "Reason should be destroyed in all Christians." This is an unacceptable proposition for Harris, who, as I'm sure you've already figured out, argues that reason should take its primacy in people over above religion so that we can get on with practical progress in areas like physical and emotional health, social solidarity, and peace.

As an aside, Ravi Zacharias' paltry return, The End of Reason, is a horrific attempt at countering Harris' anti-religious, anti-faith stance. I don't recommend it at all. Save your money, and your time.

Like: A personal, and upset letter to fundamentalist Christians questioning the reasons, motives, and political interests of belief in America today.

Harris' second anti-religious volume, Letter to a Christian Nation, is a much easier read than his first installment, The End of Faith. It's something more akin to a Socratic interrogation, and hinges on hard-hitting, utilitarian premises expressed in rhetorical questions that reduce religious doctrines to the absurd. Still, it's uncompromising stance, while being admirable in itself, will not serve to edge fundamentalists toward reason, but, because of the book's harsh polemics, will more than likely drive the militant believer further into his/her camp.

Like It Not: Armstrong examines the origins of Judeo-Christian scripture, its use in early Jewish and Christian communities, the varying hermeneutic traditions, and the ways in which people (clergy and laity) applied holy writ to the formation of doctrine, and their personal lives. This highly detailed account forces the conclusion that no single religious group has the ultimately correct interpretation of scripture.

I had a hard time putting this book in the 'like it not' category because there were many highly enjoyable moments throughout its pages. I think it fair to say, however, that the book requires the reader come to it with a wide base of knowledge already in place. In my case, I already have that base in place, but I found myself glazing over when Armstrong meandered into obscure references, and long drawn-out examinations of traditions that may have had an indirect impact on the composition of sacred scripture. While marginally relevant, those meandering and drawn-out sections seemed, for the most part, like non sequiturs. I'm sure if I re-read the book, I could see how those sections fit the overall scope of the Bible's composition, but on first read, the book really ought to be apparent enough that I don't have to go back and map my way through.

Like: As any good theologian should, Bart Ehrman closely examines the issue of suffering, the continuance of suffering, and the supposed 'goodness' of God. In particular, Ehrman walks through scripture showing how the 'good book' does not answer to the reality of suffering and evil in this world.

At times, it seems like Ehrman plays fast and loose with logic on the issue of suffering. Overall, however, I enjoyed Ehrman's blending of personal experience, theological insight, and philosophical acumen. An ex-Christian, now agnostic, Ehrman doesn't take any shortcuts when dealing with the common explanations for why God would allow suffering. He is courteous, but exacting, and he simply doesn't think that Judeo-Christian scripture gives any reasonable justification for why suffering exists alongside a supposedly 'good' God. Ehrman's examination of the issue of suffering and the existence of a personal, good God goes a long way in showing that we either don't really know what we're talking about when we talk about God, or that suffering co-existing with the goodness of God are undeniably problematic, even contradictory.

Like: Religion is a natural phenomenon arising out of pre-scientific needs to explain events and realities we do not understand (e.g., death). Our gradual gains in understanding are met with an ever-developing mythology about divinity, the afterlife, and seeming miracles, until, at some point, our common notions of ancestor-worship blended into tribal gods, and finally the monotheistic religions. Continuing to hold to outdated, pre-scientific notions of divinity should be met with evidence-based dialogue that emphasizes naturalistic explanations for the world we occupy.

Daniel Dennet is given to wandering prose. He is often not very succinct, and seems to want to lull people into agreeance with him by presenting the options available for discussion and then sharply cutting off the options he doesn't wish to discuss. Despite this, however, he is sincere and not as inclined to cudgel the religious as, say, Dawkins.

His tone is grandfatherly and comfortable, and he is a wealth of interesting ideas that synthesize evolutionary notions with religious inclinations. This is not to say that he advocates a blending of naturalism with religion, but that he can envision plausible ways in which the evolution of the human species necessitated the development of religion, and how our continuing evolution as a species might mean that we now need to purge ourselves of religion. Of all the skeptical literature I've read this past while, I will likely re-read Dennet's book, if only for its conversational rather than adversarial tone.

Like It Not: The universe appears just as we should expect it would if there were not God. The physical sciences demonstrate that a deity governing the universe is a failed idea; the supernatural is in absentia. Classic theological argumentation fails the tests of science, and the incredible claims of religion are not supportable by any measure of evidence.

Victor Stenger is a notable physicist, and a half-decent writer. He is succinct, forward, and uncompromising. But as much as these qualities are strengths of his, they are also his weaknesses. As in all scientific dealings with the divine, there is a missing middle ground between examining the physical evidences and then concluding that because of those evidences of the material world, there must therefore be no non-material existence. This is Stenger's tact, and he expresses it well. Unfortunately, the strength of his convictions, measurements, and writings is betrayed by the fact that his scientific positivism cannot account for itself: there is simply no logical reason to agree that only physical data is valid because there is no physical data to support such a proposition (a proposition is inherently non-physical). Thus, from the outset, Stenger's hypothesis (scientific positivism) fails to show that God is a failed hypothesis.

To be continued in P. 2...

Armstrong vs. Harris

Karen Armstrong, a self-described freelance theist, and Sam Harris, a neuroscientist and ardent atheist disagree with each other quite sharply.

Armstrong contends (here) that human beings are meaning-seeking creatures and instinctively religious. She denounces the notion that religion is aback of all human woes, and encourages a sympathetic rendering of religion as essentially a message of compassion.

Harris, unconvinced (here) that human beings are instinctively religious, glides on updrafts of sarcasm, cynicism, and sharp observations that Armstrong may be glossing over the lived-out realities of religious fervour.

'Compassion', it seems, is a term used too freely if it means one religion can compassionately obliterate the lives of others, all the while claiming it was necessary to shine forth the kindly character of whatever god happens to be attending the blood-bath that day. Yahweh was keen on this tactic, as the Old Testament stories depict. He was wont to scourge the dirty unbelievers (i.e., those that don't fancy Yahweh) from the earth by means of fire, famine, war, rape, natural disasters, etc. At the same time, Yahweh desired mercy, not sacrifice (Hosea 6:6); and commissioned the doing of justice, mercy, and humility (Micah 6:8). How splendid to act in contradiction to the expectations held out for your followers! Compassion cannot be granted in the face of such brazen contradiction, can it?

In any case, read the debate yourself. I'm interested in knowing where you stand when you come to the end of the feud.

IQ, Education, Scepticism and Religion

Skewing statistics is easy: choose a sample group, survey them, determine percentages, and then use those percentages to state a universal about the population at large. In logic it's known as a hasty generalization. In statistics, it's common practice. Its purpose? To connote the goings-on of our surrounding culture(s).

Unfortunately, those kinds of inductions are, generally speaking, far from accurate. For example, it is not uncommon for some sceptics to argue they have superior IQs to the religious-minded. Ad hominem aside, belief in the relevance of IQ is certainly a topic of increasing interest.

Which brings us to the next plausible progression in the intellectual culture wars between atheism and religiosity: what is the correlation between faith/disbelief and education? This article suggests there is no direct link between atheism and education. I'm inclined to agree; you?

I wonder if Richard Dawkins has any 'cranes' to help elevate our understanding of this issue? Was that harsh? Good. It was meant to be.