Is Richard Dawkins' crusade against religion causing controversy in our society?

[ModernBaroque]

One of Dawkin's (and Sam Harris's) points is that religious ideas are statements about the world and should be subject to the same critical scrutiny as any other proposed idea.

That is not what Dawkins is saying. Religious ideas are statements about the world, but they have been subject to critical scrutiny by billions of people through thousands of years. The historical record as well as the present situation clearly show that the majority of people have validated and accepted the claims of religion.

What Dawkins is really saying is that religious ideas are statements about the world, and as such should be subject to critical scrutiny by people who scrutinize things from the premise that religion is false. In other words, as a philosopher Dawkins is not particularly bright.

 

[arildno]

. Religious ideas are statements about the world, but they have been subject to critical scrutiny by billions of people through thousands of years. The historical record as well as the present situation clearly show that the majority of people have validated and accepted the claims of religion.

This is sheer insanity. You have just shown yourself to be incapable of rational discourse.

 

[siddharth]

Religious ideas are statements about the world, but they have been subject to critical scrutiny by billions of people through thousands of years. The historical record as well as the present situation clearly show that the majority of people have validated and accepted the claims of religion.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-tradition.html
and a nice http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-belief.html

 

[ModernBaroque]

This is sheer insanity. You have just shown yourself to be incapable of rational discourse.

I'm confused. What's wrong with what I said? I think it's a fact that people have scrutinized religion for thousands of years. I do it myself and so does everyone here, it seems. Some reject it, most accept it.

What did I say that prompts the charge of insanity?

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-tradition.html

Good, I see you took Philosophy 101 and are already familiar with the jargon. Can you do some thinking now?

I didn't say even say religion is right, I just said its claims are accepted by most people. Do you want to deny that?

I think Dawkins is not particularly bright on the subject of religion, and he provides plenty of evidence for it. For instance, someone quoted him saying that he thought religion was harmless but changed his mind after 9/11. Where is this guy from? Had he never heard of the Spanish Inquisition?

 

[arildno]

arildno, All you know, all you say, all your opinions are your beliefs. Do you agree. Therefore, i say you are your belief. You are what you think. What you think is your belief. What you just wrote is your belief. You cannot get out of it.

The moment you take respect for a belief out of the equation tell me what is left? What is there when respect is gone?

and please let me know your opinion on:]
Soverentity of a being is not diminished by respect of something. If i do not need to respect your belief, on the same note i do not have to respect your race, your color, sex, rights,property...you get the idea.

You see, mistake is made by dawkin the not agreeing is the same is not respecting. Humanity was trying to learn for centuries to respect another belief through religious wars and etc.(well almost when ppl had it, and even put it in constitution) Now, some person tries to say we don't need it as long as we BELIEF in no god. (hope you see the keyword).

Do you see that it has been long recognized by ppl that to respect another's belief is to respect the being?
Can you respect me if you do not respect my belief? (And i do not mean disagree with an belief, i mean to not respect an belief. That is a world of difference).

Doc Al made an excellent post on how you conflate issues.
Wherever have you gotten the strange notion that "statements of the world", "expressions of your mental states", "judgments of what is beautiful", "statements on what makes me happy/unhappy", "definitions&deductions within a logical system" should be lumped together as "belief", and furthermore, that it is meaningful to have a single, unvarying attitude to each of the elements within this sack of yours??

 

[arildno]

Religious ideas are statements about the world, but they have been subject to critical scrutiny by billions of people through thousands of years. The historical record as well as the present situation clearly show that the majority of people have validated and accepted the claims of religion..

I'm confused. What's wrong with what I said? I think it's a fact that people have scrutinized religion for thousands of years. I do it myself and so does everyone here, it seems. Some reject it, most accept it.

What did I say that prompts the charge of insanity?

You have twisted, beyond recognition, the meaning of "critical scrutiny".
That is, you have made up a "private meaning", inaccessible to others and totally at odds with standard usage, and it happens to be highly symptomatic of schizophreniacs, for example, that they develop new and secret meanings to just about every word they utter.

 

[ModernBaroque]

You have twisted, beyond recognition, the meaning of "critical scrutiny".
That is, you have made up a "private meaning", inaccessible to others and totally at odds with standard usage, and it happens to be highly symptomatic of schizophreniacs, for example, that they develop new and secret meanings to just about every word they utter.

So, in other words, you're a troll?

 

[siddharth]

Good, I see you took Philosophy 101 and are already familiar with the jargon. Can you do some thinking now?

I didn't say even say religion is right, I just said its claims are accepted by most people. Do you want to deny that?

My post was in response to

Religious ideas are statements about the world, but they have been subject to critical scrutiny by billions of people through thousands of years. The historical record as well as the present situation clearly show that the majority of people have validated and accepted the claims of religion.

I wanted to point out that the majority of the people "validate" religion like

Sure I believe in God. People have believed in God for thousands of years so it seems clear that God must exist. After all, why else would the belief last so long?

God must exist. After all, I just saw a poll that says 85% of all Americans believe in God.

This thread is rapidly going downhill with all the personal attacks. I wouldn't be surprised if it's locked soon.

 

[arildno]

This thread is rapidly going downhill with all the personal attacks. I wouldn't be surprised if it's locked soon.

Well, anyone who chooses, as ModernBaroque does, to "discuss" things by twisting all words into his own private meanings rather than those of standard usage, shows through that so little respect for others that he ought to be banned.

 

[ModernBaroque]

My post was in response to

I wanted to point out that the majority of the people "validate" religion like

Sure I believe in God. People have believed in God for thousands of years so it seems clear that God must exist. After all, why else would the belief last so long?

In this case you are right, this would definitely be an argument from authority if the poster were arguing for the existence of God. I didn't read the original post, but he seems to be simply saying that he accepts religion on the basis of authority. Honestly, I see nothing wrong with that. If we had to question every single piece of knowledge we are exposed to, we would end up in total skepticism.

I don't know about you, but I don't have a particle accelerator and a telescope array in my backyard. I have to accept modern physics strictly on the basis of my respect for the authority of physicists.

Many people claim to have accepted religion as a result of critical scrutiny. It's their scrutiny and their claim, I have no say on the matter. It just seems irrational to dismiss them out of hand. But the majority of people accept religion on the basis of authority, because they respect the people who teach them about religion: their parents.

This thread is rapidly going downhill with all the personal attacks. I wouldn't be surprised if it's locked soon.

We can still try and rescue it. It's an interesting discussion.

 

[arildno]

That is not what Dawkins is saying. Religious ideas are statements about the world, but they have been subject to critical scrutiny by BILLIONS of people through thousands of years. The historical record as well as the present situation clearly show that the majority of people have validated and accepted the claims of religion..

. But the MAJORITY of people accept religion on the basis of authority, because they respect the people who teach them about religion: their parents.

This is a flat contradiction.

 

[ModernBaroque]

This is a flat contradiction.

It does look like it. My apologies for the sloppy writing. I'd be happy to clarify in case someone cares (I doubt it)

 

[arildno]

But your response to Doc Al was that BILLIONS of humans had performed a critical scrutiny of religion, and that HENCE, Doc Al's premise for what type of beliefs was worty of respect was, in fact, fulfilled in the case of religion.

What is your position now, I wonder?

 

[ModernBaroque]

But your response to Doc Al was that BILLIONS of humans had performed a critical scrutiny of religion, and that HENCE, Doc Al's premise for what type of beliefs was worty of respect was, in fact, fulfilled in the case of religion.

Look, you accuse me of keeping private meanings to concepts, but what exactly do you mean by "respect"? My understanding is that you can respect people, and you do so by acting and talking to them in manners conventionally accepted as respectable. But, ideas? How do you "respect" an idea?

Now because, contrary to what you believe, everyone does speak a private language, I'm forced to guess what each person means by every word they say. I conclude that respect for an idea means considering the possibility that it is a valid idea, an idea worth thinking and talking about. But that notion is so far from my notion of "respect" as to make any argument meaningless.

(I suspect "respect" in the case of ideas should really be replaced with "interesting". Dawkins would make more sense if he said "religion is not an interesting idea" meaning "an idea not worth thinking about". But that would expose the fact that what he is presenting as a rational argument is really no more than his personal opinion)

Why can't we concentrate on the fact that it is disrespectful, in any reasonable sense of the word, to disparage people as intellectually inferior for holding certain beliefs?

What is your position now, I wonder?

My position regarding what?

 

[arildno]

Look, you accuse me of keeping private meanings to concepts, but what exactly do you mean by "respect"? My understanding is that you can respect people, and you do so by acting and talking to them in manners conventionally accepted as respectable.

Fine by me. You use "respect" here in one of its standard meanings, namely restricted to persons.

But, ideas? How do you "respect" an idea?

Well, evidently, if "respect" is restricted to a personal sense, then it is meaningless to "respect" an idea.
However, you can still form judgments as to whether a particular idea is "silly", "well thought out", "rests on evidence or not"

Now because, contrary to what you believe,

What do you know of what I believe?

everyone does speak a private language,

To some measure. That is one of the reasons why it is extremely difficult to build up a science within the humanities; the natural sciences DO have a couple of tools to get around this problem, most importantly experiments and mathematics.
.

Why can't we concentrate on the fact that it is disrespectful, in any reasonable sense of the word, to disparage people as intellectually inferior for holding certain beliefs?

Wherever does it follow that holding ONE silly opinion makes a person silly?
That amounts to saying that because one number is negative, then summing that number with other numbers necessarily gives a negative result?

However, and this is important, negative numbers do "exist" (in maths, at least), and so does silly opinions.
Nor should it be regarded as preposterous to point at some opinion held by a person as being silly.

As for your position on what:
It should be evident:
Have BILLIONS of people performed a CRITICAL SCRUTINY of religion, or not?

 

[ModernBaroque]

Well, evidently, if "respect" is restricted to a personal sense, then it is meaningless to "respect" an idea. However, you can still form judgments as to whether a particular idea is "silly", "well thought out", "rests on evidence or not"

Certainly, but before you reach judgement you have to make sure you understand the idea. In the case of religion, you can't dismiss the idea based on what you stereotypes notions of it, both pro and against. There are a lot of religious fools and a lot of people who take their notions of religion from those fools.

How would you feel if someone only visited crackpot sites on the internet and concluded science is nonsense?

What do you know of what I believe?

I actually meant "what you seem to believe". I thought it was rather strange that you accused me of schizophrenic behaviour for assigning private meanings for words. I assumed you were ignorant of the problem of conveying precise meaning through ambiguous words. Apparently I was wrong, but I still don't understand your earlier posts.

That is one of the reasons why it is extremely difficult to build up a science within the humanities; the natural sciences DO have a couple of tools to get around this problem, most importantly experiments and mathematics.

I'm not sure I agree here. Most people don't have labs at home and are not particularly proficient in mathematics. Whatever the reason is that most people agree that the Earth orbits the sun, it seems to have little to do with experiments and mathematics, and far more to do with authority. I for one have never owned a telescope and cannot verify that observation for myself.

Wherever does it follow that holding ONE silly opinion makes a person silly?

So how many silly opinions does it take before we can say someone is silly? Three? Fifteen? Come on, don't be silly.

Nor should it be regarded as preposterous to point at some opinion held by a person as being silly.

It can be preposterous if you have one silly person pointing the silliness of another.

Have BILLIONS of people performed a CRITICAL SCRUTINY of religion, or not?

In my calculations, throughout history the number of believers in one form of religion or another is in the range of billions. So let's stop fussing about the number. Now have those people critically scrutinized their religion? That really depends on your own idiosyncratic notion of what constitutes critical scrutiny. And I fear that your notion implies that critical scrutiny of religion necessarily leads to its rejection. In which case you are right, but only in a tautological way.

Now it's quite silly to argue against a tautology. The sensible thing to do is dismiss it as meaningless.

 

[arildno]

So, your position seems to be:
Billions of persons have critically scrutinized religion, AND the MAJORITY of persons have accepted religion on basis of authority?

 

[sneez]

This thread proves that education is nothing without thinking. To aldrino, you choose to turn your brain on and off accordance with your prconceived ideas and beliefs. You know very well what i made an issue about. You turn off your brain and produce blunt such that I am for all relative belief.

I would recoomend a deep introspection on your internal modes motives why you belief what you belief. Trust not many ppl have done it. You seem one of them.

TO doc, you know very well what i meant. To turn off your brain and be dumb is your choice.

I know I am gonne get all that define this and that, and relativity of this and that. But that's for philosophy, not such a serious issue like this.

 

[ModernBaroque]

So, your position seems to be:
Billions of persons have critically scrutinized religion, AND the MAJORITY of persons have accepted religion on basis of authority?

Yes. They don't have to be mutually exclusive. Let me turn the question around: do you reject religion because you have critically scrutinized it, or because you don't trust the authority of the church?

It's clear to me you can't, or shouldn't, accept an idea if it's not backed by a trustworthy authority. That is what crackpots do. All the same, you can't accept an idea if it doesn't withstand scrutiny. I fail to see why it has to be an either/or issue.

 

[arildno]

Hmm..do you have to eat the whole egg to discover whether it is rotten, ModernBaroque?

 

[Evo]

Yes. They don't have to be mutually exclusive. Let me turn the question around: do you reject religion because you have critically scrutinized it, or because you don't trust the authority of the church?

You forgot "do you reject religion because it's based on a mythical entity and superstition?"

It's clear to me you can't, or shouldn't, accept an idea if it's not backed by a trustworthy authority.

An authority on something that's basically "make believe"? Don't get me wrong, if you want to believe in supernatural dieties, as long as you don't try to push your belief on me and your belief doesn't affect how I live my life, I don't care. It's when people start trying to push their made up rules on others that it becomes wrong.

 

[arildno]

Yes. They don't have to be mutually exclusive. Let me turn the question around: do you reject religion because you have critically scrutinized it

Yes, I haven't seen, felt, smelt or heard God, for example.
Nor has he appeared as a solution of a differential equation.
Among other reasons, that is.

It's clear to me you can't, or shouldn't, accept an idea if it's not backed by a trustworthy authority.

Well, the only trustworthy authority I know of that can help me to decide whether or not accept the statement "I like oranges", happens to be myself.

That is what crackpots do. All the same, you can't accept an idea if it doesn't withstand scrutiny.

Sure you can. Religious people do that all the time. By avoiding to perform a scrutiny.

 

[ModernBaroque]

arildno, Evo, I'd like to ask a question: how do you manage to discuss religion on this forum, in clear violation of its rules?

If the topic goes back to Dawkins, I will rejoin. But I don't care for this "why I believe/why I'm skeptical" thing, it's soooo boring.

 

[Evo]

arildno, Evo, I'd like to ask a question: how do you manage to discuss religion on this forum, in clear violation of its rules?

It's not, you can't compare one religion to another (stating one religion is better than another) or discuss specific beliefs of religions.

 

[Hurkyl]

You are making the same fallacy as muslim fanatics when you say that your beliefs are what you are. They're not.
For example, I have a body, and have wishes that no one is to intrude upon my body space unless I want it myself.
This is not a "belief", and if you haven't any respect for my set of beliefs (and being entitled to that), it does not follow that you are entitled to intrude upon my body space.

The muslim fanatic, however, thinks that he is entitled to murder,maim and burn any bodies belonging to persons disrespectful of his beliefs.

Why bring up Islam? Violent extremism is not the exclusive property of Islam, or even of religon in general. Given the context, this sounds like you intend a fallacious guilt by association.

 

[SF]

The whole point of fighting for imposing your POV was denounced by Howard Bloom as primitive tribalism.

 

[arildno]

Why bring up Islam? Violent extremism is not the exclusive property of Islam, or even of religon in general. Given the context, this sounds like you intend a fallacious guilt by association.

St. Cyrus and his mob of Christian fanatics that killed Hypatia (NOT our PF member!) have been dead for quite a while.
So has the Crusaders.
Jews have stopped persecuting Samaritans.

While there exists some Jewish and Christian fringe groups also today who espouse violent extremism (for example Fred Phelps&co), they do not have the same extent as their Islamic counterparts.

As for non-religious violent extremist group (typically Marxist/Maoist), like Rote Armee Fraktion, Illuminated Path (?, Peruvian group), most of these are also defunct today.

 

[loseyourname]

Personally, I'm going to have to side with Dawkins to at least this extent: I could care less what anyone person believes metaphysically and morally so long as these beliefs do not cause them to behave in a manner that might harm others, but I have never seen any rational justification for holding to the doctrines of any religion I've ever heard of. If you think the preponderance of evidence is in favor of some organizing principle or intelligence being responsible for the arising of our universe, whatever. I don't really see much evidence either way. I don't believe that myself, but there may very well be decent enough reasons to lead a rational person to such a belief from different suppositions about the way the world works than I personally hold to.

There can, however, be no rational basis for believing that the human incarnation of the universe's creator willingly allowed himself to be killed two thousand years ago, his body subsequently rising from the grave three days later before being lifted into the sky. There can be no rational basis for believing that Joe Smith was visited by an angel with golden scrolls and that the size of a man's family will dictate the size of his heaven. There can be no rational basis for holding the belief that how one behaves while alive will determine the circumstances for a future incarnation of the same person into another body. Really, there is no rational reason to believe any culturally specific sacred narrative on its own merits, nor based on the fact that it has traditionally been believed by the propagators of the culture in question. Every single one of these religions answers the questions that empirical, naturalistic investigations cannot answer equally well; whatever reasons one has to choose one religion over the other may or may not be good reasons, but they are certainly not rational. Even amongst the best of religious philosophers, the arguments for Christian particularism are flat-out ridiculous, and I'm not sure the apologists of other religions even bother trying.

 

[0TheSwerve0]

Seems the world's response to rationalist arguments is "So what?"

Good arguments by Dawkins, but what's the point? Is he trying to effect some change or critique religion/culture/humans? Dawkins is bright and contributes a lot to philosophical and scientific thought, but it seems pretty arrogant and ethnocentric to assert superiority of one way of life over another. Criticism is very useful and essential, but he seems to go beyond this.

The physicist Lawrence M. Krauss, writing in Nature, says that although a "fan" of Dawkins, "I wish that Dawkins ... had continued to play to his strengths". Krauss suggests that an unrelenting attack upon people's beliefs might be less productive than "positively demonstrating how the wonders of nature can suggest a world without God that is nevertheless both complete and wonderful." Krauss remarks, "Perhaps there can be no higher praise than to say that I am certain I will remember and borrow many examples from this book in my own future discussions."

ohn Cornwell states in The Sunday Times "there is hardly a serious work of philosophy of religion cited in his extensive bibliography, save for Richard Swinburne – himself an oddity among orthodox theologians". He also complains that: "Dawkins sees no point in discussing the critical borders where religion morphs from benign phenomenon into malefic basket case. This is a pity, since his entire thesis becomes a counsel of despair rather than a quest for solutions."

Alister McGrath, a Christian theologian, describes The God Delusion as "his weakest book to date, marred by its excessive reliance on bold assertion and rhetorical flourish, where the issues so clearly demand careful reflection and painstaking analysis, based on the best evidence available". He suggests that "All ideals – divine, transcendent, human, or invented – are capable of being abused. That’s just the way human nature is. And knowing this, we need to work out what to do about it, rather than lashing out uncritically at religion."

 

[Hurkyl]

Seems the world's response to rationalist arguments is "So what?"

Yes, "so what?" is, more or less, the point I'm trying to convey. (though maybe not in the sense you intended) AFAIK, pure rationalism has been rejected for centuries, at least in this particular community if not philosophers in general. So I find it very curious to see scientifically minded people argue so vehemently against religion on the basis that it's not pure reason, since their argument applies equally well to their own beliefs.

 

[0TheSwerve0]

Seems to be a culture war. I notice it's not too often that aboriginal, or even popular beliefs such as Buddhism and Hinduism, are directly implicated or addressed. Seems they aren't culturally salient enough to be used in these arguments.

 

[SF]

Probably because there are no buddhist/aboriginal fundies with their finger over the "NUKE" button :)

 

[0TheSwerve0]

Probably because there are no buddhist/aboriginal fundies with their finger over the "NUKE" button :)

There's always some "Other" in one's culture that threatens to one's way of life.

 

[Astronuc]

There's always some "Other" in one's culture that threatens to one's way of life.

I wonder how much of that, 'the fear of the unfamiliar and different', which motivates the behavior of many cultures. Fundamentalists seem unable to comfortably accept a different view of the world.

Take away religion, and one still has xenophobia, or ethnophobia, or some other aversion to those who one sees as being 'different'.

I grew up with people from many different nations, societies, religions, cultures visiting our home. My father, a minister, worked for the World Council of Churches, and he had spent some time traveling through SE Asia. I thought it rather natural to meet people of different backrounds, and I was intrigued by the variety of experiences.

I was troubled when I arrived in the US and found the segregation by race and ethnicity. Of course, I have subsequently learned that such segregation is rather common Australia and England, and many other countries.

 

[0TheSwerve0]

I wonder how much of that, 'the fear of the unfamiliar and different', which motivates the behavior of many cultures. Fundamentalists seem unable to comfortably accept a different view of the world.

I've heard fundamentalism described as a restorative movement that claims the authority of tradition while ironically developing out of a “vortex of radical modernization.” Essentially, people overcompensating for change.

Take away religion, and one still has xenophobia, or ethnophobia, or some other aversion to those who one sees as being 'different'.

Quite often they create difference just to have an "Other." Makes sense if you think about the fact that the ultimate cause for most violence is competition over resources - land, food, mates. Which is why most violence occurs with people pretty similar to each other occupying the same space/niche (which nowadays isn't just physical space). E.G. The Irish/British fights, Eastern European countries fighting amongst themselves, Europe in general, the castes in India, warring native tribes/chiefdoms...you've got to create a feeling of difference, dehumanization really, to be ok with killing someone.

I grew up with people from many different nations, societies, religions, cultures visiting our home. My father, a minister, worked for the World Council of Churches, and he had spent some time traveling through SE Asia. I thought it rather natural to meet people of different backrounds, and I was intrigued by the variety of experiences.

Sounds like a great experience. Do you think the progress we've made in the U.S. is pretty good or just ok?