George H Smith, "Atheism: The Case Against God"

[ciphergoth]

I've read all four of the recent books by the "four horsemen", and for the most part none have made me feel "yes, this is the book I want to press into the hands of believers". I would like there to be at least one book that I might be able to recommend, and having heard good things about this 1974 book, I ordered it from Amazon on a whim.

It certainly comes a *lot* closer than any of those four. It has a very dry style; there are no witty personal stories, few anecdotes, and only a smattering of historical background. But all four of the horsemen books seem somewhat scattershot in their approach, except perhaps Dennett, whose book seems like not so much an attack on religion as a hastily-repurposed discussion of religion originally intended for an atheist audience. This book is much more bulldozer than scattershot, and methodically dismantles the "sophisticated" defences of religion I actually hear from believers.

Its bulldozer-like nature may be seen in its chapter structure; first, clarify what atheism is and establish that the burden of proof lies with the theist; then tear down obfuscation as a means to confound rational discussion of the issue; demolish the idea that faith and revelation can supplement reason as guides to the truth (discussing and destroying a variety of attempts to defend the idea of faith). Only then are the traditional arguments for the existence of God, such as the cosmological argument, painstakingly taken apart; and only after that are the negative moral consequences of religion discussed.

There are a few problems. Smith is (or at least was) an Objectivist, and this leads to some sad errors; his defence of the idea of moral facts in Chapter 11 Section 2, for example, is just embarrassing. And it seems a shame to discuss the argument from design without even mentioning evolution; I can see that as a philosopher you want to show that the argument is *inherently* flawed, and of course it is, but it's evolution that robs it of its emotional impact. I still find myself thinking that I may have to write my ultimate book on the subject, but I have quite a few other books I'd have to read first to know if there was a gap in the market, and I can't afford quite that many whims :-)

No argument, no matter how good, can turn the head of someone who is prepared to say in terms that they intend to cling to an idea no matter how much they have to embrace irrationality in order to do so, as many sophisticated believers openly say. But still, when I read the four horsemen books, I felt I knew how believers were going to evade the conclusions they were pushing for, and I would love to know how a serious, philosophically knowledgable believer would go about avoiding the conclusions of this book.



Update: as usual, anonymous comments should be signed to be unscreened.

Comments

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

I'm familiar with that line of argument, but it doesn't convince me, and I certainly wouldn't expect it to convince an atheist. I know, but you're not trying to convince me - I'm trying to convince you :-)

such as "other minds exist" and "external objects exist" interesting! Neither of those are foundational problems to me - I think solipsism and belief in zombies are both meaningless stances.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

No, we ended up talking about the unjustifiability of induction because I thought your position depended on it!

I think my position probably depends on induction being justifiable, along with other beliefs that are equally foundational!

your beliefs about God are not just a conclusion you've reached after examining the evidence available to you, and therefore subject to reasonable debate like any other evidential conclusion, but (I think) it's evidence you cite in response to the GP objection. What am I getting wrong here?

I think you're probably misremembering my responses to the GP objection. I can recall making two in different discussions. One is that it (and FSM, invisible unicorn and other similar objections) rely on a metaphor which wrongly predisposes people to think of "God" as referring to an entity in space and time and therefore leads to a category error when considering what counts as justification for the belief in God's existence. The other is along the lines of "show me someone who genuinely has the existence of the FSM/GP/invisible unicorn as their most fundamental perception, and I'll probably concede that they are justified in believing in it", which is obviously more flippant because I doubt that such people exist, but still probably true.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

I know, but you're not trying to convince me - I'm trying to convince you :-)

Of course I'm trying to convince you - not that God exists, but that I'm justified in believing that he does, which is not the same proposition.

Neither of those are foundational problems to me - I think solipsism and belief in zombies are both meaningless stances.

"A is not a foundational belief" does not follow from "not-A is meaningless"; in fact, I think there may be a good argument that "not-A is meaningless" is practically a sufficient condition for "A is a foundational belief", at least for certain values of A.

[djm4]

such as "other minds exist"

It may or may not be relevant, but when we were discussing this offline the other day, you made a convincing case for those being a different type of axiom problem from the principle of induction. The principle of induction (as I think we all in fact agree) is inherently self-referential and any attempt to justify it assumes that it's true. (Whether or not that makes it inherently unjustifiable depends on one's definition of 'justifable', but that it, I think, a separate issue).

That's not true of the others, so I suspect that ciphergoth may not have the same problem with them.

[djm4]

*sees thread above*

Ah. Ignore me, I see you're both ahead of me on this one.

[zwol.livejournal.com]

What philosophical stance do you take toward that experience?

[babysimon]

That the brain plays tricks on you.

[djm4]

In my case, I find it hard to conceive of a 'supernatural' experience that I would explain as anything other than my having gone a bit (or a lot) mad. I make no such claims for other people, though.

[zwol.livejournal.com]

Certainly that's a valid stance. I think I may have left a bit out of the "hurl book with great force" assertion -- that was meant to characterise the response of readers with priors inclined to belief, ones who aren't comfortable writing such experiences off as down to wonky brain chemistry or whatever. It matters because if you're writing to persuade, you need to avoid that kind of reaction especially from people with priors that don't match your own.

[zwol.livejournal.com]

Feel free not to respond, but I feel like taking a whack at the implicit question.

There are lots of things that I (wearing my randomly-selected-individual hat) don't understand in full detail, may even understand in a self-inconsistent manner, yet am quite comfortable discussing at length, even teaching. Just about every neuroscience discussion section I've ever led, for instance, involved at least a few "this is what we think is going on here but we could be totally wrong" caveats.

The Taoist stance is that the nature of the Tao is just another of those things. It is a necessary rather than a contingent truth that we don't fully understand it, but that doesn't stop us trying to understand it as best we can, and talking about it in order to do so.

[pavlos.livejournal.com]

That came as a surprise, as I haven't met other people though friends who identify with a mainstream party as a good representative of their political beliefs.

Do you also identify with a major branch of the Christian Church, including their questionable policies on e.g. gender relations, or are you an eclectic or radical when it comes to religious beliefs?

[lizw.livejournal.com]

I'm an Anglo-Catholic and worship in my local C of E parish. Of the organised branches of Anglicanism, I'm probably most in sympathy with Inclusive Church and Affirming Catholicism. The C of E does not require its laity to assent or conform to its official teachings, and in some respects I do not, particularly as regards sexuality.

[pavlos.livejournal.com]

OK, I'm not sure how we ended up discussing your personal beliefs, so feel free to stop if it annoys you, or to continue.

What I understand so far is that you have liberal but not radical political beliefs and you've taken one of the main faiths that were on offer in your country (you didn't become Buddhist, for instance) but you identify with a "nice" branch of that church that rejects certain negative practices of the church, and you personally reject some other practices or teaching on your moral grounds.

The argument that I was putting forward, against Paul, is that religion is not simply delusion but it is a mixture of willful fantasy and politics. As far as the fantasy goes, I'm in favor of everyone enjoying their favorite fantasies so long as we all get along without imposing our fantasies on each other. I play fantasy games, you go to church. Fine. It makes us happy, and we can still have perfectly rational discussions about prices, internal combustion engines, etc.

One reason that an Atheist might actually care to convert a Believer, and the opposite for that matter, is the politics. Take for example the concept of creation. It seems clear to me that Christians who believe in a more or less direct creation (as opposed to the New Age concept of God as uber-geek playing with cellular automata on her computer) follow this line of thought:

God created us -> He is our father -> We must follow his morals -> We must follow the morals of our fathers -> Authority and order is good -> Oppression and exploitation is justified.

And they are afraid that Atheists are taking this line of thought:

Nobody created us -> Our existence and life has no external meaning -> Morality is an illusion -> Authority and order is bad -> Individual transgression and recklessness is acceptable.

For what it's worth I think Believers and Atheists do think that way, except for the final inference. Only a minority take that last inference and cause harm, but humans tend to fear that the other party is less moral and will go that far, so a cycle of distrust results.

So what I want to say here is do you see political positions like that embedded in your faith? Or is faith for you just a lens for perceiving the world through, and no more impinging on your conduct than that?

[lizw.livejournal.com]

I don't think either of those phrasings quite captures the link as it appears to me. The second one is probably closest, but through the lens of faith I believe I'm in a close relationship with a real, living entity, and that influences my political beliefs like all close relationships do. But it's a far more subtle influence than a top-down "do it this way because this is what God says" sort of attitude. In the theology I inherited from the Catholic tradition, God is not able to make things right or wrong just by saying so; they are right or wrong independently of him.

[pavlos.livejournal.com]

Interesting. That's what I as an Atheist see as a sound and defensible moral foundation from a Believer. In fact I think that our moral foundations are pretty much identical, and that both are faith-based. We disagree only on what is called fact or fantasy. Let me explain.

I understand that the true teaching of at least Christianity (and probably the other two Yahweh religions, but I'm no scholar) is that moral is absolute and witnessed by God. This is famously perverted by the clergy from time to time into the teaching of morality by divine decree, resulting in such aberrations as indulgences or fatwas.

What is that absolute moral then? I hold that for both you and me it is an illusion. By that I mean it's a naive (as in direct, not stupid) theory to account for an experience. It's naive because a better theory is available. Let me summarize some examples of that sort of thing:

Colors:
A. Objects in the world have colors such as green, orange, yellow, etc. Color pigments can be mixed according to some simple rules such as blue+yellow=green.
B. Our eyes are have three response curves to electromagnetic radiation around the 500nm wavelength. Energy detected by each of these is perceived as red, green, blue.

Matter:
A. Doors are solid and impenetrable, and so are our foreheads. Solid objects cannot occupy the same space, and so we cannot walk through doors.
B. Solid objects are mostly empty space, punctuated by nuclei and electrons. Electromagnetic forces between the electrons usually stop them from going through each other.

Morals:
A. When it comes to moral questions, we are aware of a conscience that witnesses the moral question with us and can pass judgement. It feels like a higher being, such as a god.
B. When evaluating matters of human welfare, we model in our individual mind the response that a society of humans is likely to have on the issue. This is an obvious evolutionary adaptation.

So, of course I think the B theories are better than the A theories in each case. But it also doesn't matter for the majority of circumstances. For going about our everyday lives, either the A or the B theories will do just fine, and the A theory is simpler. Only occasionally will the B theory (in my opinion) be more productive.

When it comes to morals then, we both feel this "voice of conscience" experience and we both decide to take seriously what it says. You say that it's a relationship with a deity, I say it's a feature of the mind, and this different interpretation doesn't matter. Presumably you think that God is in my mind too, and I think you share my mental illusion of morality, so we expect each other to act moral. This is key.

We must also recognize that both stances are faith-based, since we both feel it's best to follow that voice of conscience without either of us being able to determine rationally that doing so maximizes our survival, offspring, happiness, etc. Being selfish and nasty might well make us happier, but we decide by faith to be moral.

Why argue then? I can find no disagreement with you, but your stance is rare in the experience of Atheists arguing with Believers. The "problem" as seen by Atheists, is that Believers often have a less well-reasoned and defensible moral foundation, and that causes conflict. The four classic areas of conflict from the point of view of Atheists are:

- Believers feel that God is essential to maintain morals, and so impose God on Atheists.
- Believers expect Atheists to lack morals, and prejudice begets discrimination.
- Believers are prone to be taken in and manipulated by people who claim to represent gods.
- Believers in specific religions are prone to value their faithful above other human beings.

I'm sure there's a converse list of issues that Believers find worrying or hurtful when arguing with Atheists, but I don't feel able to guess it.

That is where the "God debate" lies. It is political and it's a contest between imperfect secular and imperfect religious moralities, and their mutual fears and prejudices.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

I agree with this. I'm not going to try to guess what worries some believers so much about arguing with atheists, either, since by and large I've found it quite an enjoyable experience myself :-)