Notes on "The God Delusion"

[ciphergoth]

ergotia and lilithmagna got me Richard Dawkins's "The God Delusion" as a present - thanks! Here's some bullet points on my reactions to it:

• Those who know my views well won't be surprised to learn that Dawkins isn't atheistic enough for me. Dawkins considers the existence of God to be a hypothesis that can be scientifically examined. As an ignostic I can't see that the word "God" refers to any concept meaningful enough to be put to the test.
• The book claims that one of its aims is converting the faithful. I don't believe him; certainly a book with so strident a tone could never succeed in that department. Instead, its primary goal is to rouse nonbelievers to stand up and be counted, for which purpose the tone will help some and hurt some.
• Critics of the book often write that he only engages with fundamentalists, and simply pretends that they characterize all religious people. That just isn't so; he has anticipated that criticism and is explicit about avoiding that error all the way through the book. However, I'd like to have seen a more direct attack on moderate religion than simply saying "well it isn't true and it opens the door to fundamentalism" - or at least more space devoted to the latter charge.
• The most useful service the book performs may be that of naming and attacking "NOMA" - the idea that science can rule in its domain but should refer to religion for what is religions domain. This is a theme I could develop further :-)
• You can't calculate the probability of God. Setting aside my ignostic objections (or possibly just casting them in a different light) in order to apply Bayes theorem as he does, you need the "a priori" probability of God, and there's no good way to choose that value. Certainly the reasoning suggested by several people that he quotes, that since we don't know either way we should assign a 50/50 a priori probability, is no way to go about things.
• Jesus got off far too lightly in the discussion about morality.

Comments

[miss-glitch.livejournal.com]

It's a wonderful book :)

[aster13.livejournal.com]

Hmm, interesting.
I've not come across the concept of ignosticism, but it makes perfect sense. I think i always had the vague feeling that the definitions around belief always seemed to centre on belief or the abscence thereof, rather than from the perspective of there being no need to believe or not as there is nothing to believe in. If that makes sense. Not being very eloquent here.

Not having read the book, what does he have to say about Jesus?

[djm4]

I'm so going to hate this book if I read it, aren't I?

Pity. Dawkins's Royal Institution Christmas Lectures are among the best things ever, and you have to stand up and salute the guy who coined the word 'meme'. But I've found very little he's written on the subject of religion to be in the least bit worthwhile (although I admit I'm hardly his target audience), and these days he seems to write about little else.

[some-fox.livejournal.com]

I got it for babysimon too. I'll have to borrow it off one of you at some point :-)

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

since we don't know either way we should assign a 50/50 a priori probability

Stephen Unwin's Bayesian approach to calculating the probability of the existence of God is very, very funny on lots of levels. I must confess I took it for a very clever spoof at first. But I think he really believes it, which is a bit sad.

[jhg.livejournal.com]

#
# The most useful service the book performs may be that of naming and attacking "NOMA" - the idea that science can rule in its domain but should refer to religion for what is religions domain. This is a theme I could develop further :-)

What does NOMA stand for?

Of course, IMO this is the kind of concession that atheists make to theists in order to avoid getting the crap beaten out of them / stoned / burnt / drowned / their country invaded.


J

[xquiq.livejournal.com]

The main thing I appreciated about the book was that Dawkins is quite upfront in saying that religious ideas are not necessarily more worthy of reverence than any other type of idea. The idea that religion trumps logic in terms of the respect afforded to a viewpoint is one that has irritated me in the past.

I was slightly uncomfortable at first with his strident tone, but I think in part this is because I've been whispering about my own atheism for fear of causing offense, while accepting that the religious can shout about the correctness of their belief from the rooftops if they so desire. 'The God Delusion' encouraged me to think about that attitude in a bit more depth and do some more reading. I am happy to report that I have now moved on from that position ;)

[ditzy-pole.livejournal.com]

I haven't actually read the book yet so this comment is going to be completely off topic. I just wanted to say it was very nice meeting and chatting to you about all things suspension related (and then some) at the NYE party. Hope you don't mind me adding you. Karolina

[lizw.livejournal.com]

This is a theme I could develop further

I'd be interested to read that :-)

[henry_the_cow]

I recently listened to a discussion about science and religion in which a panelist made the point that militant atheism is not going to persuade many fundamentalists; only moderate believers are likely to achieve that. Of course, the speaker was a moderate believers and was at the time criticising militant atheists, but actually this might be a good point. That is assuming that anything at all can persuade a fundamentalist. Unfortunately I don't see many moderate believers leading the charge - perhaps they're all being too nice and reasonable about everything, or perhaps they still see atheism as a bigger enemy than their own extremists.

(FWIW, the discussion happened during the panel session of the University of Edinburgh's Enlightenment Lecture - see http://henry-the-cow.livejournal.com/22783.html).

[kaet.livejournal.com]

Just posting my entry which mentioned my Pantheism reminded me of this one of yours.

I am essentially pantheist, but I also agree with Schopenhauer that "The chief objection I have to pantheism is that it says nothing. To call the world God is not to explain it; it is only to enrich our language with a superfluous synonym for the word "world".".

That means I'm also very close to ignostic. I tend to talk about religion so little for this reason that people think me atheist.

On the other hand "god" and "world" have different direct connotations in English, and I would rather connote god than world in most circumstances.