The Closed Mind of Richard Dawkins (2014)
newrepublic.com
newrepublic.com
His argument appears to be the following. First, when the universe began there was no God (this is the assumption.) So God would have had to come into existence by random chance, sometime after the creation of the universe, which we all can agree is absurd. Therefore, no God. Booyah. In your face Intelligent Design.
I read this a couple times to make sure that I was understanding it correctly. But it still seems to me that this is about as blatant an example of question-begging that you can find.
He's an entertaining author, sure.
I think Dawkins was too early. In more recent years, we have identified biological pathways for how humans generate spiritual thoughts/feelings, and we have economic models for how religious beliefs exploit trust and counterfactuals (that is, if you wanted to invent a lie and make it as widespread believed as Christianity, you would do marketing tricks that look exactly like Evangelism and Cults, and then L Ron Hubbard provided empiric proof with Scientology. (which maybe is what you meant by "probability").
You're suggesting half of the Bayesian argument: Given a universe without God, it is quite probable that religions exist. But what I would like to see is the other half: Given a universe in which (some) God exists, the current universe is nearly impossible.
I think ultimately he has the same problem of first causes that the argument for God does. In both arguments you have to draw a box around the universe/timespan/laws you will consider and then make an assumption about the initial state. In Christianity, the box is drawn outside the universe itself by considering God to exist outside of time and space and predating the universe itself. Dawkins just draws a slightly smaller box, but neither argument is without assumptions.
Besides, these arguments all sort of start on shaky ground anyway because the nature of faith is that it's not based totally on things that are empirically provable. By it's nature it isn't something that claims to be rooted in empiricism. No matter what side of the argument you fall on, at a certain point after weighing all the evidence there is a chasm you have to cross between what is actually provable, and what you believe to be true.
Intelligent design is just one hypothesis among many to explain the complexity (the apparent "design") of the universe. But it posits the existence of an even more complex entity. If we really need intelligent design to explain where eyeballs and bird wings came from, why don't we also need an explanation of the omnipotent designer?
There's a few too many straw-men running around here. I'm attempting to summarize my view of an argument, and asking if that's correct.
Now, you could contest the Big Bang, but from the moment you assume it happened then I don't see nothing absurd in the sentence: "First, when the universe began there was no God"
Because unlike you put it, this is NOT an assumption. If the Universe did had a beginning (and all measurement indicate it did) then this (nothing existed before, not even God) follows directly from the laws of physics.
In fact Dawkins greatest problem when trying to explain people this, is exactly the one I feel when trying to explain other parts to believers. They are ignorant about certain parts of science that make what they are saying impossible, and since it's fairly advanced science, they just refuse to believe it and trying to understand it.
I would welcome to discuss religion with another person from my area (astrophysics) but I've never met an astrophysicist that was religious... I guess because it would be really hard to mix both things.
The implicit argument here is limited to the type of things that make up the universe we can see and observe. It would be most accurate to say that the things that make up the universe could not have existed before the universe started. Philosophically speaking we can't preclude the existence of things that could be of a different type, or exist outside our own universe. It's the same problem explored in Plato's cave.
This is exactly the issue that I was pointing. People discussing these themes don't have enough knowledge to discuss them and they enter in easy - but totally incorrect - getaways like the one you just did. And when trying to explain them the science behind it, they realize it jeopardizes their faith and refuse to learn it.
1 - I'm not claiming that the standard model is the ultimate mode. I'm just claiming that following the assumption of the Big Bang which is part of the standard model, then the existence of a God before the creation of the universe is a de facto impossibility.
2 - Something that may or may not exist outside our universe, can't have any influence or even be able to observe our universe. This, is not a theory, it's the definition of Universe. Thereby, the most your could say from the Plato's cave allegory, was that a God created the cave, but that the rest of the world where that God was must have existed before he himself came to exit.
I don't see how this follows or doesn't follow from physics. Certainly, according to physics, God is not necessary. But to most believers God is not something that cares about physics, because God exists outside physics. Physics can only comment on what is governed by physics. Telling people they are ignorant does not refute this basic objection.
I'll put in another way. Perhaps we can say everything we want about the closed (let's just say 10-dimensional) manifold on which we live. We can pinpoint exactly where the negative signature of the metric degenerates, we can solve Cauchy problem for all time, or whatever. How does that tell us any information about a larger ambient manifold, or any disconnected components of the manifold? After all, Nash's Embedding Theorem holds for all signatures.
I think you didn't understand the premise here.
The premise is: "The Universe started in the Big Bang.", now, following from that premise it's impossible to have a God before the Big Bang.
You can contest the Big Bang theory and with it find a loophole for the existence of God, but the OP was finding it "amusing" and nonsensical what actually follows directly from accepting the Big Bang theory: God couldn't exist before the beginning of the Universe.
Again, the issue here lies in your understanding of the Big Bang theory.
You should visit the IAS in Princeton sometime.
The first part looked interesting. I wanted to see exactly what he is attacking, and it seems to be specifically the idea of the supernatural. He notes that Einstein has been misrepesented as a believer (didn't know that - so I learned something already!).
However, I would expect a physicist, engaged in deep study of the physical world - to deny the existence of the supernatural. Doesn't accepting that kinda ruin the whole basis of their life's work? Dawkins mentioning Einstein didn't believe proves nothing. Einstein not believing something doesn't make it false.
Ultimately, what it comes down to, at least for me is - we know little about the origins of the universe, not to much about even our own minds, and nothing outside of our consciousness.
Not for Newton, Pascal, Maxwell, Planck, Heisenberg, John Lucas, John Eccles, or John Stewart Bell -- all religious.
There is also a group who aren't religious but see reason to believe in a universal consciousness, e.g. Bohm, Schroedinger, and Penrose.
Biologists seem to be more prone to deny the supernatural, presumably due to the culture wars surrounding the teaching of evolution.
Of course, because that interpretation is hand-waving nonsense: replacing the actual words with something else that you wish the words really said (at the moment), with no justification.
If the interpretation is valid, why don't they replace the scriptures with properly interpreted version which pin down the real meaning, once and for all? Macroexpand all the symbolism into its concrete terms, say that "this is it", and let's discuss that.
Until then, the serpent in Eden was really a snake, the apple was really an apple and so on.
Good question, which is thoroughly discussed and answered in various religious writings.
But I could ask you the opposite question: why would you assume that a text -- let alone an ancient one -- is anything but allegorical? Why would you assume that a text, by default, is literal until proven otherwise? Throughout history, there have been periods when it's been assumed that most written (let alone canonical and holy) texts are allegorical. It is your assumption that a text is literal unless proven otherwise which is recent and anachronistic.
In any case, whatever your views on human texts and their default literary genre, if you believe that a god wrote your scriptures, your interpretation of them would be based on the nature of your god and his preferred writing style, no?
For a broad introduction to the subject, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_hermeneutics
I found this external overview of allegorical interpretation of the bible: http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/1256-allegorical-...
For a more internal view, see the writings of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avivah_Gottlieb_Zornberg
The text is of finite length and has been studied for centuries.
When can we expect the, "okay, here is what it all actually means" report, signed off by all parties?
[1]: I am not saying religions do a good job at it, only that that is their goal.
That is simply not true, and I suspect most biblical theists would brand you a heretic. The Bible is a very specific text with a specific content. It simply does not permit an infinite succession of creative interpretations: not for the purposes of believing those interpretations to be the meaning, let alone to be true.
doesn't have the same goals as science at all
It absolutely has some goals aligned with those of science: providing an explanation of the world (where it all came from). In fact, religion is basically an outdated form of science.
Science doesn't have the goal of dictating how you should live (morals aren't facts), and doesn't provide hopes regarding anything beyond death (life after death conjectures have never been verified).
neither would help the discipline
Publishing results is what distinguishes a discipline.
One of the greatest modern Jewish orthodox philosopher, Y Leibowitz[2] (who was a scientist, too; a professor of biochemistry, organic chemistry and neurophysiology), believed that the Jewish god is not even necessarily personal (in the sense that he possesses a persona). He said that all questions about the nature of god are meaningless and idolatrous. He believed that the only relevant question about god is whether it is an entity worthy of worship. I.e. God is "that which should be worshiped". He also believed that the relationship between God and man is completely one sided and consists solely of man worshiping god, which in Judaism means to observing Halakha. So to him, religion was definitely not an explanation of anything, but an obligation -- a discipline -- one chooses to take upon oneself (and the observance of that obligation = belief in God).
Leibowitz believed that his views simply mirrored those of Maimonides', who called them (in the 12th cetury) "negative theology". Simply put, Maimonides said that there can be no contradiction between the truths which God has revealed and the findings of the human mind in science and philosophy (simply because the two involve different realms) [3]. He even said that one cannot say that God exists, but only that God is not non-existent (which echoes modern intuitionistic logic, which lacks the axiom of excluded middle).
[1]: http://hartman.org.il/Blogs_View.asp?Article_Id=33
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeshayahu_Leibowitz#Religious_...
[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maimonides#Negative_theology
The topic is Dawkins, and his focus has been Christianity. In the submitted page, he's accused of closed-mindedness in that context.
A big part of Christianity is flatly believing things which are written in the Holy Bible, and so if we critically examine Christianity, that's going to be a big part of the argument. It's not an attack on the Bible as such, but its use by a group.
It may be that Judaism doesn't have this same "attack surface" due to its different treatment of scriptures. Scripture or not, followers of Judaism surely must have some common beliefs which can be articulated and examined.
Articulated -- definitely. Examined? I don't see how. How do you examine the belief that one should not light a fire on the Sabbath or that one should eat matzo on the first day of Passover? Jewish "belief" is simply accepting the obligation to follow a long set of rules. Prominent Jewish philosophers explicitly say that those rules have no purpose or consequence (though others disagree).
Nope! My assumption is that the text is allegorical, and so please decide what the allegories are about and commit to an interpretation. Or else stop claiming that any of it is true, or the word of god, etc. You can't say, "these words are from god and they are true, and their meaning is [insert my subjective interpretation out of thin air]". I mean, if it were the were the word of god, how dare you even substitute your paraphrase? Oh right, you have divine inspiration---pardon me! God appeared to you one night and said, "here is what I really meant behind this paragraph".
Secondly, Christians literally believe the bulk of the New Testament: that Jesus really lived, was really the result of a virgin birth with God as the father, that he walked on water and so on. If you don't believe that material literally, you're a heretic. The latitude for allegoric interpretation is confined to the Old Testament. Literal belief in a large section of the Bible is not anachronistic at all; it is perfectly current.
That is a very Christian understanding of religion. I know a bit more about Judaism, and Judaism says that once the scriptures were given, they are open to interpretation and reinterpretation, and practical matters are decided by a majority (in accordance with the some framework around scripture -- which is viewed like a constitution -- and based on some deductive rules). There's even a famous (allegorical!) story in the Talmud where one rabbi is arguing with a group, and at one point God intervenes and says that the single rabbi is right, and the rest of the rabbis tell God that his opinion doesn't count anymore once Torah was handed to mankind[1].
Of course, polytheistic religions (like Shinto and some forms of Hinduism) are quite different, and others (like Buddhism and some forms of Hinduism) are not even theistic at all (and even in Judaism the concept of God is radically different from Christianity).
In short, when Dawkins says "religion", he really means "Christianity", because it doesn't seem like he has a clue about any other religion.
> Literal belief in a large section of the Bible is not anachronistic at all; it is perfectly current.
That is not what I meant by anachronistic (anachronism means placing an assumption, idea or object taken from one time period in another). I meant that today we assume most normative texts to be literal, but that was not the prevailing assumption when the bible was written.
[1]: http://jhom.com/topics/voice/bat_kol_bab.htm + Discussion: http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.co.il/2010/07/furnace-of-akhn...
http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2014/10/richard-dawkins-...
(Or if that's not the definition of "closed mind", then what is?)
He's just opposed to the classification of fiction as non-fiction.
Don't get me wrong, I love science and the many wonderful things it has brought into my life, but I view it as a tool to further our understanding, rather than an absolute truth. I don't see a difference between Dawkins' faith in science (his apparent belief that science is infallible and absolute) and the religious beliefs he likes to argue against. Both require a leap of faith, don't they?
> a systematic enterprise that creates, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
The key word being "testable". The fallibility (or falsifiability) of scientific hypotheses is the great strength of science: We can improve, or prove wrong, our understanding.
Dawkins writing celebrates this, and I think it's unfair to characterize his passionate (OK, sometimes strident) advocacy as "unquestioning" fanaticism.
If it's a "leap of faith" to accept the axiom that we can refine/invalidate knowledge through experimentation, then "a leap of faith" isn't a very profound deed.
What I said is that Dawkins injects a large degree of faith into his opinions on science vs. religion. Do you deny that? Dawkins himself admits that he (and science) don't know everything about the beginning of the universe, life, evolution, etc. I agree with him there. I also agree with him when he questions why we would inject God into our attempts to observe and understand natural phenomena, thus complicating our research with an attribute that cannot be observed. However, he still does use his imperfect knowledge on many scientific subjects to reach a conclusion that makes him "6.9 out of 7" sure that God doesn't exist. Whether you like to admit it or not, that is faith.
Dictionary.com: Belief that is not based on proof; e.g. "He had faith that the hypothesis would be substantiated by fact."
TheFreeDictionary.com: Confident or unquestioning belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.
MerriamWebster.com: Strong belief or trust in someone or something.
So, since science is admittedly fallible, since we don't know everything, and since we often times don't have proof, wouldn't you say that our leaping to conclusions based on incomplete information, regardless of how strong or accurate that partial information is, is faith, according to the definition of the word?
The scientific method is a tool for discovery and obtaining knowledge, and it often times isn't a very good tool due to our limitations. Faith is another tool, and we use it every day. We get up in the morning and go to jobs we don't like because we have faith that, come Friday, we'll get a paycheck. We spend a lot of time and money going to college because we have faith it will result in more knowledge, a better job, etc. We employ the scientific method because we have faith that it will increase our understanding of the world around us. Faith is a principle of action. Too many people mock faith as being a passive, religious concept and mistakenly define it as you have, and then go on to hypocritically embrace faith under the guise of science, I think.