Hard Questions?

Here a very silly person lists 20 questions he thinks atheists are incapable of answering.

Some of them are just question-begging, such as "What caused the universe to exist?". Ignoring the fact that causality is not very well-defined, how do we even know for certain that the universe was caused? And if atheists cannot answer this question, it's not like the theist answer ("God created it") provides any more insight.

Other questions are downright strange, such as "Why did cities suddenly appear all over the world between 3,000 and 1,000BC?" What this has to do with theism or atheism is beyond me. Mesopotamia had cities even earlier, in 4000-3500 B.C.E. In any event, probably the development of agriculture led to the formation of cities, and once this innovation occurred, it would have spread through trade.

Question 10 asks, "How do we account for self-awareness?" This has a relatively easy answer. Through natural selection, organisms come to model their environment. Sometimes this modelling is reflected in their geometric structure: a camel has a very different body profile than a shark. But organisms also sense the natural world and react to it. Having a better model -- one that allows an organism to predict future events in the world -- clearly would contribute to better survival and reproductive success. As the model becomes more sophisticated, eventually it will have to encompass the organism itself. Self-awareness is just when your model of the world becomes so detailed that it has to include yourself.

I won't spend any more time on this silly list, but readers should feel free to chime in with their own answers.

Priest: It's Fun to Annoy Secularists

In the National Post, we have yet another example of a theist who thinks that actions that annoy secularists have some intrinsic virtue.

Father Raymond J. de Souza says, "I cheer for Tebow in part because his success annoys grumpy people who think Christians should require special permission to participate in public life."

Father de Souza seems to have no qualms violating the Catholic 8th commandment, since of course there is no one who thinks "Christians should require special permission" to do anything at all compared to non-Christians. And it's hardly grumpy to think that Tebow's repeated ostentatious public display of faith is a little over the top. After all, doesn't Matthew 6:6 say something relevant? Or is pointing that out considered "grumpy"? Of course, if Tebow were a Jew or a Muslim, I bet Father de Souza would have something else to say.

Father de Souza says nothing at all about Tebow's support of Focus on the Family. I guess supporting anti-gay bigots is the Christian thing to do.

De Souza's pleasure in annoying secularists is hardly unique to him; it's a commonplace among conservative Christians. Annoy an atheist, annoy a liberal, annoy a gay person: these are all examples of virtuous conduct to be extolled. That's what Jesus would say. I reckon he would, I dunno.

Addendum: Father de Souza's website here. No surprise - he doesn't allow comments or post his e-mail address.

Bob Enyart: Foolish and Smugly So

I hadn't heard about convicted criminal Bob Enyart before, but based on yesterday's posting, I haven't missed much.

He gives a list of what he calls "typical atheist clichés" and then refutes them in a single line. Unfortunately, most of his "clichés" are straw men -- arguments that I've never heard, or rarely heard, anyone put forward, let alone atheists.

Let's take #1: "There is no truth!" Who ever said that, and what is it even supposed to mean?

Other of his "clichés" make sense, but only if you interpret them in a reasonable way. For example, #2 is "Truth is unknowable!" But the only sensible interpretations of that statement are (for example) that some truths are unknowable (which we know to be true from Gödel), and that other statements that we believe we know with certainty (such as our own birthdate) are, in fact, only held with justifiable and strong certainty, not irrefutable knowledge. Enyart's proposed rebuttal "How do you know?" is just nonsensical.

Enyart says "If your worldview can be dismantled within eight seconds, then get a better one." I'd say, if you think you have dismantled someone else's worldview in 8 seconds, you're just fooling yourself.

Silence from the National Post

I wrote to Gordon Fisher, President of the National Post; Douglas Kelly, the Publisher; Jonathan Harris, VP of Digital Media; Stephen Meurice, the Editor-in-Chief; and Jonathan Kay, Managing Editor, Comment.

I asked them all the same thing: if it would not be acceptable for someone at the National Post to write a piece entitled "Dear Jews: Most of us don't care what you think", why is it acceptable for Charles Lewis to do so with "Jews" replaced by "atheists"?

Not a single person at the National Post was courageous enough to reply.

It speaks volumes, doesn't it, about the double standard that allows atheists to be criticized in the most vituperative and bigoted ways, with no uproar?

Addendum: (December 20). Stephen Meurice responded to me on December 17. Here is my response.

Dear Charles Lewis: You're a Dishonest Bigot

If you can stomach it, read this appalling piece of dreck by Charles Lewis, religion writer for the National Post.

It's hard to know what to make of it, other than that Lewis is terribly, terribly threatened by the rising popularity of atheism and atheist writers. He doesn't seem to know a damn thing about atheists, but believes they are all horrible, boring utopians.

As evidence of this, he trots out Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins, and labels them "dreary". Hitchens, dreary? Lewis must be living in some bizarro universe where dreary means "vastly entertaining".

If I had to name a single famous person I'd love to have dinner with, it would be Hitchens, who knows much more about politics and history than I do, and is witty to boot. Dawkins would be a close second. Come to think of it, having them both for dinner would be perfect: Hitchens can talk about art, history, and politics, and Dawkins can talk about science.

I understand perfectly well why Lewis feels threatened by Hitchens. It was Hitchens who wrote The Missionary Position, exposing Mother Teresa as a pious fraud who loved poverty and suffering for everyone except herself. Lewis, who himself wrote on Mother Teresa, can't accept that characterization. But it is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding it.

Lewis claims "most atheists do not have a clue what religion is about". Like most bigots, though, he doesn't present a shred of evidence for this claim. If he bothered to look at the evidence, though, he'd conclude just the opposite: atheists know more about religion than Protestants and Catholics.

Lewis gives North Korea as an example of a "godless society". But he doesn't dare mention the European social democracies, such as Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, all of which are good examples of peaceful, prosperous societies with significantly lower levels of religious belief than either Canada or the US. Nor does Lewis mention the behavior of officially religious societies, such as Afghanistan. That's simple dishonesty. Perhaps Lewis should review the Ten Commandments -- as I recall, there was this prohibition against "bear[ing] false witness".

Lewis claims "Atheists are under the ridiculous illusion that religious people think that all they have to do is call out to God and help will be on the way". Well, no. Atheists know that there is a huge variety of religious belief, and we also know that many Christians do believe exactly what Lewis says they don't. Pretending that this is not a large strain of North American religious belief is, simply, dishonest.

Lewis says "Faith is not up for debate". Well, I've got news for you, Chuck: you're wrong. In a free society, you don't get a pass because you call your beliefs "faith" and pronounce them off limits. Can't justify them? Fine with me. Just don't expect me, or anyone else to take you seriously.

I can just imagine the reaction if Lewis wrote a column entitled "Dear Jews: most of us don't care what you think". No doubt he'd be fired in a minute. But criticizing atheists is just fine.

Why on earth is the National Post employing this ignorant bigot?

Atheism - The Energy-Efficient Worldview

Spotted on a bus in Boston yesterday:



I guess that makes atheism the energy-efficient worldview. Go green!

Loftus vs. Wood: An Atheist-Theist Debate

Here's a link to a debate entitled "Does God Exist?", featuring David Wood (theist) versus John Loftus (atheist).

I wasn't impressed at all with Wood's argument, which went roughly as follows:

1. He claimed that "Atheists have held that the Universe is eternal ... Much to the horror of atheists, research in the 20th century showed that the Universe is expanding, and we can therefore trace its development back to a beginning."

I think this misrepresents the case. Some physicists supported a steady-state universe (and some few still do), and some opposed it. But I see no evidence that atheists came down overwhelmingly on one side or the other. And I see no evidence today that atheists regard the Big Bang theory with "horror". Why should we? The Big Bang doesn't imply a magical creator.

2. He claimed that "Either the Universe began to exist as the result of some cause, or the Universe sprang into existence uncaused. The second alternative is obviously absurd - out of nothing, nothing comes."

Not much of an argument. First, we see apparently uncaused events all the time in radioactive decay. When a particular Americium atom decays in your smoke detector, what causes that one to decay rather than some other one? Nothing that we know. Second, even in a vacuum, virtual particles come into existence all the time and are measurable. So appealing to naive folk wisdom like "out of nothing, nothing comes" when modern physics contradicts this --- it's not intellectually honest.

3. He gave an argument about fine tuning. "These numbers [constants of physics] could have had a wide range of values, and yet the values they actually have fall into the extremely narrow range that makes biological life possible."

How does Wood know that the constants of physics "could have had a wide range of values"? Answer: he doesn't - it's just an assertion. Maybe because of something about physics we don't know, only a narrow range of constants is possible.

How does Wood know that tweaking the constants would usually result in an unlivable universe? Answer: he doesn't. Vic Stenger has modeled universes where the constants can change, and found that a relatively wide range of constants still allowed interesting physics.

How does Wood know that tweaking the constants couldn't result in some other completely different form of life? Answer: he doesn't.

4. He argued that the complexity of biology implies a Designer: "Where did Earth's diverse biological complexity come from? The most obvious explanation is design."

Yes, that may have been true before 1859, back in the day when our ideas about biology were so primitive that many physicians rejected the germ theory of disease. But a lot has happened since then, much of it due to another D-word: Darwin. We now have a strongly-supported theory that can account for biological complexity -- the theory of evolution -- so to pretend that we must stick with the "obvious explanation" 150 years later is dishonest.

5. He claimed that consciousness requires a "soul". "I can have a thought about a grilled cheese sandwich - I can't have a pattern of molecules about a grilled cheese sandwich".

Why not? I see no logical or physical problem in maintaining that I can have a thought about a grilled cheese sandwich and that this thought ultimately reduces to matter and energy in my brain. Much of Wood's argument seemed like this: pure assertion.

"If a scientist examines my brain he might learn all kind of things about my brain that I don't know, but he'll never learn more about my mind than I know."

Why not? What logical or scientific principle would prevent us, for example, from being able to access the subconscious through a physical examination of the brain, resulting in knowledge of (say) a repressed memory that you don't "know" consciously?

6. "We know scientifically that the mind can function even when the brain stops working. There are numerous cases in medical journals of people who are clinically dead, showing no brain activity at all, being brought back to life and reporting that they had conscious experiences while they were dead."

Near-death experiences typically occur during medical crises, when (for example) the brain might be starved of oxygen. If we don't consider the testimony of drunk people reliable, why should we consider the testimony of oxygen-starved brains as reliable? Claims about near-death experiences have been exaggerated and research has been plagued by poor experiment design; see the chapter by Hövelmann in the Skeptic's Handbook of Parapsychology.

7. Naturalism must be able to account for the coherence of human reason: "According to John, our ability to reason is the product of natural selection acting on random mutation ... Does this give us any basis for trusting our reasoning ability when it comes to questions of theology or philosophy or science?"

Here he's stealing - without attribution - C. S. Lewis's argument against naturalism, which has also been argued by Plantinga and others. I find this argument one of the dumbest around. Study after study shows that humans are not always good reasoners: we routinely mishandle basic probability, we make snap judgments based on appearances, and we have unconscious biases. But there's also good empirical evidence (like the existence of spaceships and toasters) that we somehow manage to muddle along and figure things out much of the time. We're simply stuck with the reasoning ability we have, and the heuristics -- known as science -- we've deduced over thousands of years to make sure that our conclusions are correct. It's not like religion comes up with conclusions that we can have confidence in. Which would give you more confidence in a plane never flown in the air before: calculations and simulations by trained engineers, or the blessing of a priest?

8. "Our reasoning is governed by certain logical truths ... we are presupposing that there are logical absolutes - rules of reasoning that cannot be violated... A statement cannot be both true and false at the same time. But what are logical laws? They are not material objects. We don't learn about them through the senses... Logical laws don't depend on human minds. The law of non-contradiction was true before there were any human beings, and if all human beings died tomorrow they would still be true. In fact, the laws of logic would be true in any universe, not just ours. So the laws of logic transcend time, space, matter, and all human minds - they're invariant, unchanging, and eternal."

Spoken by someone who has clearly never heard of multi-valued logic. And is the axiom of choice true or false? When Wood says "the laws of logic would be true in any universe, not just ours", how does he know this? Does he have intimate knowledge of other universes?

In the clever words of philosopher Tim Kenyon, there aren't laws of thought. It's more like "municipal by-laws" of thought.

I might add that Wood gave us no reason to believe that there aren't multiple gods, or even infinitely many.

Unfortunately, Loftus' performance was not very impressive either. Although he made a lot of good points, he read his opening presentation from notes, mumbled too much, stumbled over pronunciations (like "plate tectonics"), made too many joking asides that weren't funny and chuckled at them, sounded a bit patronizing, didn't really connect with the audience, and didn't consistently offer strong rebuttals to Wood's points.

William Lobdell - Losing My Religion

William Lobdell is an American journalist. He rediscovered religion at age 29, became a "fully developed Christian", and got a job covering religion for the Los Angeles Times. As a reporter, he was exposed to the many misdeeds of organized religion, and in covering the religion beat, he eventually lost his religion - and wrote a book about it, called Losing My Religion (HarperCollins, 2009).

I wanted to like the book - but I didn't. Here's why.

1. The writing is clunky. Just because you're a journalist doesn't mean you can write a full-length book; the two crafts are very different. Reporters tend to write short, punchy sentences, and most don't have the time, inclination, or mandate to get deep into details. And reporters are always writing about other people, which means that when it comes time for self-reflection, they're often at a loss. The result is often self-indulgent (think of Anna Quindlen).

Here's an example:

So I began to pray. I asked God for a religion-writing job at the Los Angeles Times. I prayed for it in the morning, at night, and in between. On my weekly runs, I asked again. So did Hugh. We prayed and prayed and ran and ran -- and nothing happened. The prayers continued for four years. But my faith remained strong, and I didn't think about giving up.

And for a book by a reporter, there are surprising lapses. A Muslim football team is described on page 80 as being called the "Infitada". Where was the editor there?

2. Lobdell comes off as gullible and not particularly bright. I never got the impression that he thought deeply about his conversion -- or his deconversion. He calls C. S. Lewis "one of the great Christian minds of the 20th century", which doesn't convince me of Lobdell's acuity. And he actually liked The Screwtape Letters, one of the dreckiest books ever written. Lobdell writes that he was "moved" by the story of Charles Colson, former Watergate criminal who now spends part of his time lying about evolution and homosexuality.

He "eagerly read[s]" Lee Strobel's The Case for Christ, a book whose entire premise is so clearly dishonest that any reporter should immediately be tipped off. Lobdell writes that Strobel's book "chronicles the author's spiritual journey from skeptic to devout evangelical as he investigates the scientific and historical evidence for Christianity". But this is a very misleading description of what Strobel does. In his books, Strobel typically doesn't present evidence on both sides of the questions he considers -- we get just one side, the evangelical Christian side. This dishonest presentation doesn't escape skeptical reviewers, but it seems to have entirely escaped Lobdell.

Lobdell's conversion seemed more emotional than rational, more about how religion and the church made him feel. And his deconversion (see below) was largely along the same lines.

3. Lobdell seems impressed by the argument from authority. For example, he writes "I needed to hear Christians more intelligent than I who had the utmost confidence -- and evidence to back it up -- in what the Bible said, even those uncomfortable passages that most believers skip or ignore." But why didn't he make any effort to seek out people who didn't have that confidence, and also had evidence to back it up?

4. Lobdell doesn't seem to understand the role of a reporter. The job of a journalist is to "print the truth and raise hell", to "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable". But not, it seems when reporting about religion. He writes, It's drilled into journalists that "if your mother tells you she loves you, better check it out." But such journalistic standards can't be applied to much of faith reporting. But it's precisely this mistaken belief that explains why so much religion reporting consists of little more than taking dictation from believers, instead of challenging them on their claims.

Here's an example: Lobdell writes, The worst a cynic could say about them [Billy Graham and Rick Warren] is that they encourage belief in things that might not be true. Really? That is the worst that a cynic could say about them?

Hardly. How about calling Rick Warren a clueless hypocrite who encourages his followers to vote against gay rights? Or that Warren's highly-publicized crusade against AIDS actually involves sidekicks who advocate burning condoms and arresting homosexuals?

5. His deconversion, when it comes, comes for the wrong reasons. He didn't give up Christianity because its claims are false or not supported by the evidence, but largely because of the wrongdoing of many Christians (especially Catholic priests). It wasn't an intellectual decision, but an emotional reaction to the wrongdoing by Michael Harris, Michael Pecharich, John Geoghan, and other priests. While we agree that the Catholic child abuse scandals are symptomatic of a unredeemably corrupt institution, I don't agree that these scandals are a particularly good reason for giving up Christianity. There are so many better reasons!

To be fair, there are also some things about the book that I liked. Lobdell appears to have done some genuinely good investigative work on Catholic child abuse scandals, and he wasn't scared off by the hostile reaction of many Catholics. He also broke the story on Paul Crouch's attempt to buy the silence of an employee about their sexual encounter. But in the end, I found the book unsatisfying. I hope that wherever his future career takes him, William Lobdell makes more of an effort to investigate claims skeptically, and to rely more on reason and less on emotion.

Poll Confirms It: The More Religious You Are, The More Immoral You Are

Here's a link to a fascinating poll conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

According to the results, 62% of white evangelical Protestants say torture against suspected terrorists can "often" or "sometimes" be justified. But only 40% of the "unaffiliated" agreed with that.

Among those who attend religious services at least weekly, 54% agreed that torture can "often" or "sometimes" be justified. But only 42% of those who "seldom" attend religious services agreed with that.

In other words, the more you are drenched with God-talk, the more you are likely to okay the abhorrent practice of torture.

The next time some theist rails about the immorality of atheists, point them to this poll.

Calgary Bishop is Very Confused

It seems that Calgary bishop Fred Henry is rather confused about the point of the atheist bus ad campaign.

Henry is quoted as saying, "I don't know what the norms Calgary Transit uses to accept advertising, but if the benchmark is that it should be non-offensive, I'm offended."

Well, tough luck. If some narrow-minded religionist can't stand to hear that other people believe differently, that's no reason to censor the ads. The goal of the ads is not to offend believers, but to tell non-believers that they're not alone. But for some overly-sensitive theists, even the idea that someone believes differently is something they can't handle.

Then again, this kind of behavior is typical for Henry, who in the past has claimed that homosexuality "undermine[s] the foundations of the family, the basis of society"; yet has hired Catholic priests who are convicted sex offenders.

They're So Predictable

When you read a theist's denunciation of atheism, one thing is certain: you are not likely to find any original criticisms. Instead you'll find the usual nonsense:

• Atheists are "dogmatic" and their criticisms are "shrill".
  
• Deep down, atheists really believe in a god.
  
• Atheists have mental problems.
  
• Atheists are hateful.
  
• Atheists have no moral code.
  

etc., etc. For more along these lines, see my account of Tim Kenyon's talk last January.

Now look at this silly opinion piece by Dow Marmur, a "rabbi emeritus" at Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto. How many of the atheism myths can you find?

The wonder is that the Toronto Star found this drivel suitable for publication. At least the letters published in response, including one from Larry Moran, uniformly disagree with the good rabbi emeritus.

Hat tip: Ed Barsalou.

I Won't Be Attending Graduation at the University of Alberta Any Time Soon

...and here's why.

A publicly-funded university shouldn't be instructing its students to do something "for the glory of God".

You can write the President of the University of Alberta, Indira V. Samarasekera, to express your displeasure with her university's actions.

Little League's Not For Atheists

When I was a kid, I desperately wanted to play in Little League baseball. I never did, although exactly why is lost in time. Was it because there was no Little League where I lived, or because I wasn't good enough, or some other reason? I can't remember. But maybe it was all for the best, because the Little League thinks that atheists can't be good baseball players.

Want proof? Look at the Little League Pledge, which is


I trust in God
I love my country
And will respect its laws
I will play fair
And strive to win
But win or lose
I will always do my best


Despite protests, Little League refuses to change or modify its pledge. When criticized, LL hides behind the claim that "it is not, and has never been, required to be recited by any person involved with Little League Baseball or Softball". But you can be damn sure if the Pledge said, "I trust in Allah", they'd be really quick to change it.

I don't understand why belief in magical beings has anything to do with playing baseball, and it's too bad that Little League does.

Update: Jerry K. reminds me about this column by my colleague Josh Benaloh.

World Religious Leaders Praise Saudi King's Anti-Atheist Bigotry

Saudi King Abdullah spoke at a Madrid conference sponsored by the Muslim World League, and spoke against religious extremism. Good, as far as it goes.

Unfortunately, he whitewashed the role of religion in the world's problems. According to King Abdullah, religion (especially his) is blameless, claiming that "Islam is a religion of moderation and tolerance". Ironically, the conference apparently took place in Spain instead of Saudi Arabia, because Saudi Arabia is "the only Arab Muslim country to ban all non-Islamic religious practices on its soil, even though it has a large community of expatriates professing other faiths."

Instead, he chose to blame the world's problems on "secularism" and atheists: "If we wish this historic meeting to succeed, we must focus on the common denominators that unite us, namely, deep faith in God, noble principles, and lofty moral values, which constitute the essence of religion" and that the world's problems are "a consequence of the spiritual void from which people suffer when they forget God, and God causes them to forget themselves." Despite blaming the world's problems on atheists, he also denied their existence, claiming that "we all believe in one God, who sent messengers for the good of humanity in this world and the hereafter".

Did any of the 200 religious and political leaders present speak against this anti-atheist bigotry? Nope. Instead, they fell over themselves to praise King Abdulalh. Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, "said the conference was a 'significant and timely development.'" Catholic Cardinal Tauran called it "an act of great courage". Jesse Jackson apparently called the speech "a distinguished one in its contents and noble message" (may not be an exact quote). Abdullah Tariq said, "It is a great beginning of a valuable call from a generous King."

I'm really sick of hypocritical religious leaders telling me that not accepting their wild and unsupported claims about their deities is some sort of moral failing. It's religion that is to blame for Saudi Arabia's medieval treatment of women. It's religion that is to largely blame for the Saudi hijackers who crashed planes into the World Trade towers on September 11. It's religion that is largely to blame for overpopulation and our worsening ecological crisis. Let's have some religious leaders forthrightly admit this, and then we can have some dialogue.

The Best That Theists Can Provide?

Here's a attack on skepticism and atheism by Edward Tingley, a professor at Augustine College in Ottawa. It's not very good.

Tingley seems to concede that there's no evidence for the Christian god. But that doesn't mean his god doesn't exist. Oh no! We must seek his god with our "heart". But what is the "heart"? Tingley says it isn't "feelings". But he doesn't say clearly what it is.

Tingley says the atheist can't distinguish between a god that doesn't exist and a god that does exist, but hides. But the theist can't distinguish between these alternatives, either. And a god that hides might just as well be no god at all, for how could we possibly know what that god did or what he/she wants? Maybe god really wants us all to be atheists, and salvation is reserved for those who don't believe.

The easiest way to see how Tingley's argument fails is to take his essay, and every time "God" appears, substitute "Odin":


"If we do not know that Odin even exists, we hardly know how he behaves. So we cannot begin this ascent with any dogmatic presumption about his behavior. Maybe, if he exists, Odin would show himself directly to our senses. But maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he would hide from us..."

"What reason do I have to subordinate the possibility of Odin's existence to the powers of my senses?"

"All of the people who say that they are “atheists through skepticism, because they see no evidence that Odin exists,” are patently unthinking people, since by virtue of turning skeptic, no one has ever done anything—employed any logic, gathered any evidence, found any way forward—to reach a conclusion about whether Odin exists. So these atheists have not reached a conclusion; they have made a commitment."


If TIngley tried to use these kind of arguments to convince people that belief in Odin was justifiable, most would just laugh. And yet they are supposed to be good arguments against atheism and for his theism. Go figure.

Addendum: Does anyone else see the irony in someone insulting skepticism while teaching at an institution that demands the following statement of faith:


We subscribe without cavil to each of the clauses in the earliest general confession of the Church known as the Apostles' Creed:

I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. On the third day He rose again. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. From thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic* Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.

* "universal"


Yup, that sure sounds like someone who is committed to an impartial search for truth!

Do Books on Atheism Belong in the Science Section?

Here's a picture of the science section at a bookstore in Trudeau airport in Montreal:



Among the books prominently displayed are

• Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion
  
  
• Christopher Hitchens, The Portable Atheist
  
  
• Michael Onfray, In Defense of Atheism
  
  

I don't understand why these books aren't in the religion or philosophy section.

Myths About Atheism

Tim Kenyon, a philosophy professor at the University of Waterloo, gave an enjoyable talk Monday entitled "Myths About Atheism". Prof. Kenyon is a clear and entertaining speaker. The talk was reasonably well-attended, and there was time for an hour's worth of Q & A at the conclusion.

Here are the 10 myths that Prof. Kenyon discussed:

1. Atheists are angry at [insert favorite god here].
   
   
2. Atheists are faking being atheists.
   
   
3. Atheists are immoral.
   
   
4. Atheism is Darwinism.
   
   
5. Atheists think they can explain everything.
   
   
6. Atheists hold that life has no meaning.
   
   
7. Atheism = communism/fascism/etc.
   
   
8. Atheism is faith-based.
   
   
9. Atheism is a religion.
   
   
10. Atheism dominates the media.
    

I think this is just the beginning of a much longer list. Here are a few that come to mind:

11. Atheists are dogmatic.

12. Atheists are militant.

13. Atheists choose atheism to avoid moral responsibility for their actions.

Can you think of any other common myths?

By Jove, I Think He Doesn't Get It: A Night with Professor Higgins

Michael Higgins is a Catholic religious scholar, author, and local legend who is currently President of St. Thomas University in Fredericton, New Brunswick. Last night he delivered the inaugural Michael Higgins Lecture at St. Jerome's University, a church college affiliated with my own university, the University of Waterloo. The title was, "It's Tough Being God These Days", and the main theme was the new atheism.

A night with Prof. Higgins is always entertaining, as he is a witty and erudite speaker. At one point, speaking of atheists, he said, "We used to burn them", which got a good laugh. Despite his wit and erudition, I have always found Higgins' talks unsatisfying. To me, a Higgins talk is best likened to eating at an overrated Parisian restaurant. You are taken with the setting and the opulence and the view of Notre Dame. But then the food comes, and you are disappointed to discover that most of the effort has been expended on the surroundings, and little on the meal itself.

Last night was no exception. There was a bit of chest-pounding against atheism and the usual suspects of Dawkins, Hitchens, and Dennett, a rather dispirited defense of religion and an acknowledgment of some religious sins, a brief theological analysis concluding that "God is big", and a limp finish that consisted of quoting some of his favorite religious writers. I left hoping for more.

Unlike some Catholic commentators, Higgins takes the current wave of atheism seriously. He views it as a significant trend, labeling it a "virulent and subcompetent atheism" that is "seismic in its implications". However, he thinks the arguments are nothing new: "everything originated in the 18th and 19th centuries". He denigrates the "industry" of atheist writers such as Dawkins, Hitchens, and Dennett, arguing that their books are "aggressive and vituperative". Their hubris is "stunning". They ridicule "without fear that it is indecorous or unjust".

Higgins is very impressed by John Cornwell, who wrote a reply to Dawkins. He quoted Cornwell as saying that in the past, atheists were content to dispute the arguments of believers, but the current wave of atheists likes to ridicule the believers themselves. (But listen to this interview with Cornwell and Dawkins, where Cornwell is caught blatantly misrepresenting what Dawkins had to say.)

To his credit, Higgins says that religion is partly to blame. The new wave of antipathy is, he admits, "religion's own fault". He cites religion's "capacity for terror" and cites as an example "honor killings". "Religion's capacity to divide is considerable," Higgins concedes.

But it's too easy, Higgins says, to blame the excesses of religion on religion. Honor killlings do not represent religion, but terror. "No holy man" could ever claim terrorist acts as "a life-giving force". The issue, Higgins argued, is not to eliminate religion, but to eliminate the caricature of religion, to delegitimize those who speak on behalf of religion but do so inauthentically.

Atheists have the spotlight now, Higgins says, and so the media interprets religious stories in that light. The recent revelations about Mother Teresa were not interpreted according to the "theology of God's absence", but rather that she was a hypocrite or worse.

Luckily, he observed, theists outreproduce atheists, so there is little danger. The answer to the new atheism is not in "noble silence". "God is bigger than our systems" and "Once we recognize God's bigness we recognize our own fanaticism". There must be "respect between people of faith" and "Catholicism can lead".

Now, my analysis. Higgins claimed that those who attack religion are ignorant of it. He even went so far as to suggest, in answer to a question, that Hitchens was mentally unbalanced. I have a two-word answer: courtier's reply.

Higgins says that the new atheism engages in a "caricature" of genuine religion. My reply: look around you. We have a local Catholic school board actually debating whether to give the HPV vaccine to girls, not because of the cost or the unproven nature of the vaccine, but because it might encourage them to engage in sexual activity. We have Muslims rioting and killing in Pakistan because of a rumor that a Christian had desecrated the Koran, all the while insisting that Islam is a peaceful religion. We have Mother Teresa working with poor and sick people, while refusing to endorse the birth control that might genuinely help them. We have Jerry Falwell blaming 9/11 on "pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians". It's not possible to caricature religion because, these days, religion caricatures itself.

I'm sure that Higgins would reply with a version of the "No True Scotsman" fallacy, because that's what he did in his talk. These kinds of actions, Higgins would say, are not genuine religion. I say, they represent genuine religion for millions of believers, and they find their justification in the holy texts themselves. Look at Kirk Durston, a local religious leader who excuses genocide in the Bible when God does it. Look at Muslims who draw their inspiration for violence from passages in the Koran such as “Believers, make war on the infidels who dwell around you. Deal harshly with them.”

I'm not saying all religious believers are of this stripe; far from it. But religion has been treated with kid gloves far too long. Higgins decried the treatment of religion in the media, calling it shallow. But when did you ever see a believer quizzed in the pages of your local newspaper about whether their beliefs are supported by evidence? Or if their beliefs are genuinely beneficial to society? In my local newspaper, faith is always treated as a positive aspect to one's personality. I see skepticism, not faith, as more worthy of respect. "There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me, than in half the creeds."

There was time for a few questions, and here's the one I asked. I asked why is it, when theists want to attack atheism or science, they often use religious language to do so? As examples I cited this article by a theist who suggested that evolutionary biologists answer criticism of evolution with "Darwin said it, I believe it, and that settles it," which is evidently a reference to the famous bumper sticker with "Jesus" replacing "Darwin". I pointed out that Prof. Higgins himself used this language, when he favorably cited another writer as referring to "evangelical atheists". In reply, Higgins first took exception to my use of the word "theist". (Hey, I was just trying to be inclusive; what word woud he have me use?) Then he denied that this tactic was frequently used. I find it hard to take his answer seriously, as there are many more examples. To cite just one, fellow Catholic writer Denyse O'Leary refers to the new atheism as an "anti-God crusade". Not only do theists use this religious language in attacking atheists, they use religious language that recalls the worst aspects of religion.

In the end, I don't think that Professor Higgins gets it. The new atheists have been emboldened by religion's excesses, but they don't base their arguments on that alone. Fundamentally, the new atheists are simply not convinced by religion's claims. When we hear Higgins assert that "God is bigger than our systems", we want to know, where's the evidence that what you are talking about even exists? We don't see God-talk as helpful in resolving issues; when God-talk is introduced, it moves us away, rather than towards, a solution based on rational consideration of the issues. Higgins wants to appropriate human values, such as compassion and tolerance, to religion's domain, but these values are subscribed to by theist and non-theist alike. In the end, religion doesn't have as many virtues as Higgins claims, nor does the new atheism have as many faults as he would have us believe.

Why Are Atheists Always Described as Militant?

Gustave Flaubert wrote a lovely book, Dictionnaire des idées reçues, published posthumously in 1913. (The title roughly translates as "Dictionary of Platitudes".) In it, he poked fun at, among other things, nouns that are nearly always accompanied by certain adjectives. Germans, he noted, are always described as "blond", a professor is always "learned", and jealousy is always "unbridled".

In a similar vein, the comedian Robert Klein once noted that President Garfield is nearly always described as "shot by a disappointed office-seeker". Klein went on to claim that if you look up Garfield in the dictionary, it says "See office-seeker, disappointed".

The intelligent design crowd plays the same game with "Darwinists". They never refer to their ideological opponents as scientists or biologists; they are nearly always "Darwinists", or, as Wesley Elsberry has pointed out, "dogmatic Darwinists".

Now look at this otherwise unnoteworthy article by Associate Press religion reporter Rachel Zoll, about the reaction to recent books by atheists Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens. Notice anything, well, trite about the title? Yes, it's the "militant atheist" platitude. Atheists must never be described as intelligent, thoughtful, friendly, questioning, or thought-provoking. Instead, they must be described as "militant".

From the meaning of "militant", you might expect that Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens are burning down churches, or at least leading protests, stirring up crowds with their fiery rhetoric. You would be disappointed, of course. What Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens have done is write books. Hitchens is more of a curmudgeon than a militant, and Dawkins and Harris are both rather mild-mannered. Nobody is leaving their public events carrying torches and singing the atheist analogue of the Horst Wessel song.

I'm not sure when the juxtaposition of "militant" and "atheist" became a cliché. The earliest citation I've been able to find so far is a 1928 book review of Edward Lucas White's book Why Rome Fell by Elmer Davis. Davis wrote, "Militant atheists ought not to read it; they will be too likely to swallow it all uncritically."

Whatever the origins, the term "militant atheist" eventually became a description to be used whenever the writer wanted to express disapproval about nonbelievers. Madalyn Murray O'Hair was often so described; a 1970 article in Time sneered at her attempt to found a new church. True, O'Hair was, by all accounts, a nasty person. However, when she was killed in 1995, obituaries routinely referred to her as "militant". Her murderer, however, was not so categorized.

When Jerry Falwell died recently, newspaper obituaries rarely described him as "militant", even though the adjective fit him much better than mild-mannered atheists like Harris. Ironically, however, the Associated Press obituary by Sue Lindsey, referred to Falwell's father and grandfather as "militant atheists".

Flaubert would have appreciated the "militant atheist" cliché. In Dictionnaire des idées reçues, he reported the following platitude about atheists: "A nation of atheists could not survive." Sadly, that cliché is still prevalent today among the morons of the Religious Right.

Added June 6 2007: over at Pharyngula, commenter Jurjen S., whose command of history is evidently better than mine, tells me about the League of Militant Atheists, an anti-religious group in the Soviet Union from 1925-1947. Probably this is the source of the term "militant atheist"; indeed, many of the 1920's citations for this phrase discuss actions in the Soviet Union.

Added January 4 2011
Google's n-gram viewer

http://ngrams.googlelabs.com/graph?content=militant+theist%2Cmilitant+atheist&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=0&smoothing=3

has now revealed some earlier uses of the term: the earliest I have found is from Progress: a monthly magazine of advanced thought, Volume 6 edited by George William Foote, in 1886. On page 466 he writes "He was not only an Atheist, but a militant Atheist..." Perhaps this is the earliest usage of the term. But as the google n-gram viewer indicates, the term really took off in the 1920's, with the rise of the "League of Militant Atheists" in the former Soviet Union.

Oddly enough, the term "militant theist" gets no citations at all.