religion – Page 6 – Good Reason

Category: religion (page 6 of 36)

Global Atheist Con: Eugenie Scott

24 May 2012 / Daniel Midgley / Comments Off

Eugenie Scott is the Executive Director of the National Centre for Science Education. Her talk was “Reason and Creationism”.

I’ve disagreed with Scott and the NCSE over the years because of the stand she’s taken on the ‘accommodationist’ side of the science and atheism divide. It’s not because of her reluctance to fly the ‘atheist’ flag; I’m happy for the NCSE to appeal to a larger audience of possibly religious folks who would otherwise be put off by the ‘atheist’ label (see also Neil deGrasse Tyson). I also understand that the NCSE is in the business of teaching about evolution, not atheism. And so Scott has avoided the conflict. That would be okay, if she didn’t set herself against the New Atheists who want to take creationists down to the mat. New Atheists want to force the conflict between creationism and reality because they know it’s a debate they can win; accommodationists would be happy if they could fool creationists into thinking that there is no conflict between evolution and faith long enough for biology teachers could get on with their work.

The accommodationist view has always struck me as weak and disingenuous. When Scott says that she does not see a “dichotomy between science and religion or evolution and religion,” well, that’s just wrong, at least for Abrahamic religions that take their doctrine seriously. They make claims about the origin of the world, claims which many of their members take seriously, and those members reject evolution because of those claims. And every time she says that science is somehow powerless to evaluate supernatural claims, I scream. Science tells us exactly what to do with supernatural claims; bin them until they’re supported by evidence. Oh, they can’t be, because they’re not verifiable? Then that’s a problem for the believers to sort out. They need to do the work of defining what they mean by ‘god’ and backing up their claims, but they never seem to get around to it because they’re too busy preaching the word, brother.

Simply getting religious people to sign off on evolution is not the ultimate goal — the goal is getting people to reason without superstition. Non-acceptance of evolution is just a part of this larger problem, and if we don’t work on this, irrationality will pop up in other ways (e.g. climate change denialism, which the NCSE is now also fighting). And trying to do this by claiming that there’s no conflict is just fooling people, and I don’t think that even the religious will be fooled by it.

Gnu Atheists want to tell the truth. And they’re arguing from an advantageous position; when you have the facts on your side, why not argue from facts?

Well, this is an old argument, and once I get to this part, I usually regain some perspective, and remember that Scott and the NCSE aren’t the bad guys. They’re out there teaching the facts about evolution, and climate change. In fact, the NCSE news feed looks to be a good resource for evolution news. The NCSE deserve some love, even if their approach bugs the shit out of me, and even if Scott undermines her own work by saying wrong things.

To the talk.

Scott started not with biology, but with geology. There are two principles that help geologists figure out the age of a rock formation.

The principle of horizontality states that layers are layed down horizontally.
The principle of superposition tells us that lower layers are older.

But this makes life hard for a Young Earth Creationist because the earth as we see it takes longer than the 6,000 years they posit from their reading of some book or other. They allege that there hasn’t been enough time to lay all that rock down, and so they say silly things, like the Grand Canyon was laid down in a year. The geology of Coconino County, Arizona poses a special challenge for YECs because they have alternating wind-lain and water-lain layers, and that’s hard to do in a short period of time. But they take up the challenge, and try to get their work past geology editors.

Scott says that creationists see themselves as the good guys in a culture war. They reject the idea that you can be good without a god, (says Scott: “I don’t know about you, but I haven’t killed anyone in weeks!”) and see the world as a struggle between their god and materialism. But this is a linguist trick, explains Scott. Materialism has two senses that creationists conflate:

Methodological materialism refers to the practice of using natural explanations for the phenomena we observe, and
Philosophical materialism is the view that matter is all there is.

(I suppose we should add to these the idea of acquisitive materialism, concerned with getting and having the latest, which really can be destructive, IMO.)

Fighting materialism, says Scott, is a strong motivator for their attacks on science, as they try to pave the way for Christian theism. Scott has no doubt that creationists believe their schtick, but their typical modus operandi is to bypass the process of communicating with the scientific community and take their arguments directly to an undiscerning public, as in high schools and even very young children. That’s because their fight is a political and cultural one, not a scientific one.

Pre-debate interview: “Where Do I Come From?”

2 May 2012 / Daniel Midgley / Comments Off

Before the big fight, there’s always a session where the fighters get together and talk some trash. Well, that’s what we did today on RTRfm — it was me and Rory Shiner talking about the upcoming debate at Wesley Uniting Church in Perth. Except there wasn’t any trash talk, and we didn’t smash (very many) chairs over each other. I did, however, make a pointy point. Here’s the interview.

Where Do I Come From?

The point I made was this: Christianity says that it’s good at answering the question of “Why are we here?” But it isn’t! Their answer for the purpose of life is terrible, and it makes no sense.

If you can make it, do. This was between me and a Christian; throw the Hindu guy into the mix and I don’t know what will happen. There may be twice as much babbling, which means I’ll have to try and make twice as much sense.

Debate: “Where Do I Come From?”

1 May 2012 / Daniel Midgley / 2 Comments

This is exciting for Perth people: I’ve been invited to be Teh Atheist in a debate entitled “Where Do I Come From?” Also appearing will be Christian pastor Rory Shiner, and Kanaga Dharmananda for the Hindu team.

It’s going to be at Wesley Uniting Church, on the corner of William and Hay St, this Thursday afternoon (3 May 2012) at 12:30. I have to say: some religious people aren’t too keen on atheists — these guys invite me to their church to speak. That says something, I think.

That Hindu cosmology — I bet you could make that stuff sound pretty close to the scientific view, even if it is a series of guesses. I wonder what the Christian guy will say to that.

It seems a number of Perth Atheists are coming. Come and join the atheist cheering section! (Are you allowed to cheer in church?)

Science vs ‘continuing revelation’

24 April 2012 / Daniel Midgley / 12 Comments

In a recent thread, I was wondering how people can have confidence in a religious leader who gets it obviously wrong. In a comment, brettandkatie asks (ask?) a really good question that I’ve been thinking about:

So, how does this differ from “further light and knowledge”? The apostle know what they are given now, just like I know what I am given now. Further revelation may change this. I don’t think that God and science should be separated, for they work together.
I don’t discredit science, it has given us so so much. However, we are getting the best of what they “know” may change. How can you use the word “know” if it is a hypotheses? I’m just saying that having full confidence in everything current science is saying can be hard because, while much of it is fact, much is also an educated guess that will change in the future. So how is this different from what you claim the LDS church does?

In other words, scientists learn more, and their knowledge changes. Religious leaders learn more, and their knowledge changes. So how is science different from ‘continuing revelation’? Don’t they work the same? Am I being unfair to expect religion to work differently?

It’s a tempting comparison, but not all systems that advance incrementally are the same. Consider the cheating spouse who tells a little of the truth, and then comes out with more and more of it when confronted with more and more of their lies. Or what about L. Ron Hubbard, who made up more and more of his phony-baloney science fiction religion bit by bit? That’s incremental, but most people are able to see how that isn’t quite on a par with science.

Before getting to the meat of it, a couple of caveats. First up, I’m addressing this from a Mormon perspective, since I’m most familiar with it and because it’s in response to a Mormon commenting on a post about a Mormon apostle. I think this relates to other religions too, but if this criticism doesn’t seem apt, be grateful that your church doesn’t do this. (Or it does, and you just don’t realise.) Also, I don’t think I’m comparing ‘ideal science’ to ‘the worst of religion’; I think I’m comparing how they work most of the time. Again, take it for what it’s worth.

SCIENCE	RELIGION
With science, you start with the facts and move to conclusions.	With religion, you start with the conclusion and see what facts will get you there.

Still love this cartoon:

SCIENCE	RELIGION
In science, you start with the null hypothesis (assuming the hypothesis is not true), and you use evidence to build up a picture. An idea must be within a certain degree of confidence before you settle on it.	Religious people require that an idea be argued down to null before they’ll abandon or (more often) modify it. As long as there’s a sliver of hope, they’ll cling to it.
The evidence for a scientific idea must be publicly verifiable, and replicable. Scientists submit their evidence and conclusions for peer review.	So-called ‘spiritual evidence’ comes from emotions, experiences, and unusual-seeming happenstances, which cannot be examined directly by others, or replicated under controlled conditions.
The evidence for scientific ideas comes from the natural world.	The evidence for religious ideas comes from interpretations of holy books and authority figures.
Scientists change their views when the evidence requires.	Religions change their views when they become unpalatable.
Scientific hypotheses make testable predictions. If those predictions don’t come true, the hypothesis is rejected.	Religious leaders sometimes make a prophecy. If it doesn’t come true when expected, the prophecy is either kicked down the road for “sometime in the future”, or reinterpreted to apply on a “spiritual level”. They are not typically abandoned.
In science, you publish your results when they change.	With religion (particularly the Mormon sort), you quietly drop doctrines and hope no one will notice after 40 years. (The most recent exception I can think of happened in 1978.)

The main idea here is not just that science and religion are different in lots of ways, though they are — they actually function as opposite and incompatible methods. Science expands when it can; religion contracts when it must.

And finally, an observation: Science is a system created by humans.
Religions claim to get their answers from an all-knowing, all-powerful being.
Yet science has been much more successful at gaining knowledge, promoting longevity, and finding out about our universe. That ought to give believers some pause.

Let’s just say that brettandkatie is (are?) right, and science and religion are comparable systems. Why would a god even need to spread his knowledge by using the same system that humans invented? Wouldn’t we expect him to do better? An organisation led by a god would surely have more knowledge and would show more moral progress than a purely human one. Yet religions display less knowledge and poorer moral judgment than humans generally. So what are they for?

Some believers acknowledge this, but then say that god is ‘teaching his people line upon line’ or that ‘god chooses to work through fallible people’. Well, God would be awfully hamstrung if he could only teach to the level of his most advanced followers. Why would a god limit himself in this way, and not take the lead? We are meant to believe that this all-powerful being is stymied by human cognitive limitations and human intransigence. This makes no sense.

(p.s. You can tell I’m pretty gung-ho on science, but please don’t have full confidence in everything current science is saying. It’s going to change. That’s why it’s good.)

Global Atheist Con, Day 2: Daniel Dennett

23 April 2012 / Daniel Midgley / Comments Off

Daniel Dennett is a philosopher, and author of “Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon”.

His talk was “How to Tell If You’re an Atheist“.

Dennett started out with a discussion of anasognosia, also known as Anton’s Syndrome, or ‘blindness denial’. Sometimes people are struck blind, and they don’t know it. They know something’s wrong; they just don’t know what it is. In the same way, some people might be going through ‘atheism denial’ — being an atheist and not knowing it. I’m not sure it’s helpful to compare atheism and blindness, but it’s Dan Dennett here! so we’re going to cut him some slack.

Dennett is working on the Clergy Project, kind of a research project and support network for pastors who no longer believe. Even though they’ve relinquished their faith, some of these trained ministers may be reluctant to identify as atheists, either because atheism gets a bad rap, or because they’ve invested so much in their religion. It’s their career — and who’s going to hire a 55-year-old theologian? Dennett says these ex-believers are having a hard time finding each other for support, like gay people in the 50s without the gaydar. Dennett gives a clue to spot them, though. The ones who are active in their works are probably the non-believers; they’re trying to atone for their hypocrisy. The ones playing golf still believe.

Dennett explains some of the appeal of atheism: We’re a happy lot, in part because we don’t suffer under a burden of artificial guilt. We feel bad for our misdeeds, but we don’t call them sins. So you might be an atheist if you’re curious about atheists, and yet you’re a little worried about what you might find out about yourself.

Lots of Christians don’t believe that Jesus is the son of a god. In a recent UK poll (commissioned by the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science), the percentage of people describing themselves as Christian has dropped from 72 to 54%. Of those 54% percent, half hadn’t attended a church service in the previous year, 16 percent hadn’t attended in the past ten years, and a further 12 percent had never done so. And only 44% of that “54-percenter” group believed that Jesus is the son of a god. Asks Dennett: Do you believe that Jesus is the literal son of god? If not, you might be an atheist.

What about believing in something divine, like a benign force? Dennett was once asked by a radio host if, despite being an atheist, he didn’t believe in some kind of force that protects us. “Well, yes,” Dennett replied. “Gravity!” If you believe that God is a “concept” that enriches our spirits and enlightens them, then you’re definitely an atheist! Dennett remarked that even he believed that the “concept” of god exists… as a concept. He believes that thousands of concepts of gods exist — but that doesn’t make him a polytheist.

Science is disciplined. It relies on double-blind studies, accurate measurements, and peer review. There’s nothing like this in religion. In fact it’s just the opposite. Dennett cited the phrase “Fake it ’til you make it!” as typical of religion, and mentioned the case of Mother Teresa, who wrote of feeling like god wasn’t there. The fuzziness of religion enables its impenetrable creeds, and in fact relies on them for its survival; creeds that are simple don’t last long. Religion doesn’t survive too much probing, which is why believers think that talking about religion critically is rude — sort of like, “Don’t ask, don’t tell”. Dennett’s response: Don’t ask — Tell!

Technological advances will break down religions. Many of us owe our deconversion in some sense to the Internet, either by exposure to more information, or to the creation of new non-churchy social support networks. The elders of churches will either have to anticipate unwelcome questions from young people, or try and lock the kids away from the technology — and they probably won’t. Eventually, this may lead to religion becoming a semi-transparent myth in our culture, like Santa Claus. Asks Dennett: Wouldn’t it be great if the god myth were semi-transparent like this?

Science tells us ‘how’, and religion tells us ‘nothing’.

10 April 2012 / Daniel Midgley / Comments Off

This bit of the Dawkins/Pell “debate” touched on something I’ve been thinking about.

Pell trots out that old chestnut that religious people like to say about science: science tells us “how”, and religion tells us “why”. I’d like to challenge that.

Sometimes we’re touched by tragedy. We lose someone close to us, and sometimes it’s not in a “good way”, like when someone is very old and ready. Sometimes it’s someone young and someone who really needs to be here with us. Sickness and death in that kind of situation is horrible and pointless, and there’s no good reason for it to have happened. And then people who are left alive, trying to pick up the pieces, will say something like, “It sure is hard to understand why this is happening.”

It’s completely understandable to ask why. But wait — wasn’t religion supposed to answer why? It doesn’t do the job in these situations.

Science can answer why. The person died because our bodies do a pretty good job in most circumstances, but not all the time, and sometimes they can’t heal themselves of everything. Our cells reproduce the wrong way, or a virus gets us, or we have a stroke, and we die. That’s why.

But that’s not a satisfying answer because it doesn’t speak to that person’s expectations. What the person is saying is: I had a belief that a loving god was watching over me, and was going to answer my prayerful requests, perhaps if I did the right things and/or had enough faith. Given those beliefs, it sure is hard to understand why this is happening.

So drop the belief. Without the expectations caused by this belief, things become a lot easier to understand. That’s important, because understanding why (say) cancer happens can lead to a way to beat it. But relying on religion to provide ‘why’ answers is confusing and just makes us ask the wrong questions.

Should we encourage religious abstinence, or “safe religion”?

25 March 2012 / Daniel Midgley / 1 Comment

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32884806/ns/health-childrens_health/t/teen-birth-rates-highest-most-religious-states

Atheism and ethics — again.

14 March 2012 / Daniel Midgley / 3 Comments

This always seems to come up in discussions with Christians: What motivation do you have to be ethical if you’re an atheist? They never seem to realise that having a god telling you what to do doesn’t make you moral, especially not with that terrible Bible.

I got a nuanced response from this Christian — then his brain stopped. What a shame.

Slaves should be obedient to their masters.

Rape a girl, pay her father, and she’s your wife!

God used to like killing gay people.

(Conversation reported verbatim until the last panel, but yeah, that’s how it went.)

Public square

7 March 2012 / Daniel Midgley / Comments Off

There’s this phrase that I’m hearing that’s heading for my bin. Every time I hear it, the speaker is bullshitting. No, it’s not “states’ rights”. It’s “public square”. As in “religion has a role in the“.

‘Religion has a role in public square’, says Rick Santorum

Or “we’re being excluded from the”.

Backstory: Professional Christian and growing pain Kirk Cameron decided to air his opinion on gay people.

“I think that it’s… it’s… it’s unnatural. I think that it’s… it’s detrimental, and ultimately destructive to so many of the foundations of civilization.”

Okay, so he has the right to that opinion. And other people have the right to their opinion of his opinion.

In response to the comments by Cameron, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) issued the following statement:

“In this interview, Kirk Cameron sounds even more dated than his 1980s TV character. Cameron is out of step with a growing majority of Americans, particularly people of faith who believe that their gay and lesbian brothers and sisters should be loved and accepted based on their character and not condemned because of their sexual orientation.”

And:

Christopher Rice, novelist
“Kirk Cameron says marriage was defined by God in the Garden of Eden. No response from Cameron on why the world isn’t full of talking snakes.”

Roseanne Barr, actress-comedian
“Kirk or Kurt or whatever Cameron is an accomplice to murder with his hate speech. so is Rick Warren. Their peers r killing gays in Uganda.”

Josh Charles, actor
“I know Growing Pains was only a TV show, but I have to think both Alan Thicke & Joanna Kerns must feel they failed as parents tonight.”

Zach Braff, actor
“If Kirk Cameron hates gay people, why was he best friends with Boner?”

Jesse Tyler Ferguson, actor
“The only unnatural thing about me being gay is that I had a crush on Kirk Cameron until about 24 hours ago.”

Alan Thicke, actor
“I’m getting him some new books. The Old Testament simply can’t be expected to explain everything.”

Cameron, for his part, is appealing to his right to speak in the good old P.S..

“I should be able to express moral views on social issues,” he said, “especially those that have been the underpinning of Western civilization for 2,000 years — without being slandered, accused of hate speech, and told from those who preach ‘tolerance’ that I need to either bend my beliefs to their moral standards or be silent when I’m in the public square.”

What he means, of course, is that he should be able to say whatever he wants with no consequences. No one should be allowed to criticise his viewpoint. We’re silencing him because he’s frightened of our disapproval, poor petal.

He concluded, “I believe we need to learn how to debate these things with greater love and respect,”

Keep in mind, it was he who referred to people’s lives and relationships as “detrimental, and ultimately destructive”. Reminds me of this cartoon.

And now I’m trying to remember if I’ve ever heard the phrase “public square” by anyone other than a smarmy religionist who was trying to explain why their superstition and irrationality should be taken seriously in civic discourse. Nope, don’t think so.

Why are atheists so rude?

25 February 2012 / Daniel Midgley / 61 Comments

It was Orientation Day on campus. People can sign up for clubs (including the UWA Atheist and Skeptic Society), and there are always tons of church groups doing their schtick. So I like to see what’s out there.

Here’s a conversation I had. It went pretty much just like this.