I owe you a proper article on this, but here's the condensed version.
Myth is not a naive theory intending to explain the universe. It is a brilliantly successful technology for changing it. Myth functions within the human brain, where the experience and interpretation of the world takes place, and modifies it. Myth is a psychoactive technology, like wine.
Like most other memes in the human mind, myth is both symbiotic and parasitic. The people who host it actively (and defensibly) wish to retain it for its positive psychological effects. It's also parasitic, and open to abuse like a drug, leading to self-destructive or aggressive behaviour. That is why, typically people who don't host myths, or host them in a safe compartmentalized way, whish to eradicate them from others.
One who assumes that myth is a delusion is presumptuous and biased. Sure, some lesser superstitions may be true errors of reasoning, but the big ones, like religion or ideology, are psychoactive devices deliberately hosted by a person. Wanting to remove them is an imposition, such as wanting to make a drinker or smoker quit. Attempting to debunk myth is a form of harassment, such as reaching out and spoiling someone's drink or smoke. It just isn't the way to make people quit.
In my opinion, the important battle is to establish tolerance between the myth-users and non-users. It has to be couched in those terms and there's good evidence that myth-users would cooperate, such as many examples of rational physicists, businesspeople, etc. who are also religious. Ground rules are needed to curb the desire of myth-users to impose the myth as universal, as well as the tendency of non-users to banish it. Myth should be a private freedom to indulge in responsibly, like any drug.
Beyond that, to the extent that non-users believe that myth-users would be better off rid of their myths, the process of conversion should be memetic and the goal of conversion should be psychological welfare. In other words, non-users should understand the network of memes that myth-users host and offer alternative memes in an order that they might be accepted and gradually replace the mythical memes, hopefully resulting in a happier mind. This process is (and should be) similar to the conversion process used by bona-fide myth-users.
Of the four horsemen, although Dawkins and Hitchens are eloquent and sometimes entertaining, it should be clear from the above that I find their approach wholly misguided and ineffective. In the case of Dawkins, given his previous intellectual achievement I'd simply call his recent work "dumb", and Hitchens strikes me as somewhat irresponsible. Dennet is much more productive in his approach, although sadly he's not as engaging a speaker or writer. I'm closest to Dennet's thinking as far as I know, but haven't read the field very widely.
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Myth is not a naive theory intending to explain the universe. It is a brilliantly successful technology for changing it. Myth functions within the human brain, where the experience and interpretation of the world takes place, and modifies it. Myth is a psychoactive technology, like wine.
Like most other memes in the human mind, myth is both symbiotic and parasitic. The people who host it actively (and defensibly) wish to retain it for its positive psychological effects. It's also parasitic, and open to abuse like a drug, leading to self-destructive or aggressive behaviour. That is why, typically people who don't host myths, or host them in a safe compartmentalized way, whish to eradicate them from others.
One who assumes that myth is a delusion is presumptuous and biased. Sure, some lesser superstitions may be true errors of reasoning, but the big ones, like religion or ideology, are psychoactive devices deliberately hosted by a person. Wanting to remove them is an imposition, such as wanting to make a drinker or smoker quit. Attempting to debunk myth is a form of harassment, such as reaching out and spoiling someone's drink or smoke. It just isn't the way to make people quit.
In my opinion, the important battle is to establish tolerance between the myth-users and non-users. It has to be couched in those terms and there's good evidence that myth-users would cooperate, such as many examples of rational physicists, businesspeople, etc. who are also religious. Ground rules are needed to curb the desire of myth-users to impose the myth as universal, as well as the tendency of non-users to banish it. Myth should be a private freedom to indulge in responsibly, like any drug.
Beyond that, to the extent that non-users believe that myth-users would be better off rid of their myths, the process of conversion should be memetic and the goal of conversion should be psychological welfare. In other words, non-users should understand the network of memes that myth-users host and offer alternative memes in an order that they might be accepted and gradually replace the mythical memes, hopefully resulting in a happier mind. This process is (and should be) similar to the conversion process used by bona-fide myth-users.
Of the four horsemen, although Dawkins and Hitchens are eloquent and sometimes entertaining, it should be clear from the above that I find their approach wholly misguided and ineffective. In the case of Dawkins, given his previous intellectual achievement I'd simply call his recent work "dumb", and Hitchens strikes me as somewhat irresponsible. Dennet is much more productive in his approach, although sadly he's not as engaging a speaker or writer. I'm closest to Dennet's thinking as far as I know, but haven't read the field very widely.