The God Delusion

UPDATE: Today (09/28), Al Mohler wrote a review of the book, and dedicated his daily radio show to the topic.

Richard Dawkins, evolutionary apologist, has a new book out entitled The God Delusion.  Though I have not read it yet, one of our commenters provided a link to an interview with Dawkins on News Night Book Club.  The interviewer asked some great questions that we should demand answers to from both ourselves and our ideological opponents, and Dawkins' answers were equally interesting.  I've listed the questions below.

However, one of my favorite reviews of his book (Dawkins the Dogmatist) makes the polemicist in me happy:

Incurious and rambling, Richard Dawkins's diatribe against religion doesn't come close to explaining how faith has survived the assault of Darwinism

1. Why are we wound up about faith and society?
2. When you hear [religious people] talking about our lives having purpose, what do you think?
3. God almost certainly does not exist.  Is there a possibility that he does exist?
4. Is your ambition that people abandon any belief in a deity?
5. Have you never stood on the top of a mountain, and been stunned by what you see, and had some religious sensation?
6. What is the bible?
7. What is the New Testament?
8. Accounts of the miracles in the NT are nonsense?
9. Would you at least accept that religions gives people a sense of comfort, and a moral code?
10. Where is the evidence that a rational society is any more moral or a better place to live than a religiously based society?
11. Do you think that political leaders are worse or more dangerous if they have a religious persuasion?
12. Do you think that all religiously inclined scientists are bad scientists?
13. Do you understand how religious people can rationalize holding both religious and scientific convictions?
14. What do you hope to achieve through your argumentation on the subject of religion and science?
15. What gets you through the difficulties of life?

Comments

[Cineaste]

I really liked Dawkins answers to these questions except 12 and 13. I felt he should have said what he believed and responded something like, "In the areas where the scientific method conflicts with their religion like paleontology; yes, I believe they ARE bad scientists. They compromise the very principles of science by letting themeselves be biased by their religious faith." I think he got stumped by question 13 (the best question in the interview IMHO) though I think this is understandable from a naturalist perspective. I don't understand it myself though I am trying.

[Louis]

The God Delusion in action:

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/09/26/anti-gay-summit/

http://www.frcaction.org/index.cfm?i=WX06C06

Attendees at this conference:
Tony Snow, Attorney General Gonzales, Senator George Allen, Governor Mike Huckabee, Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity.

This is the strategy of the religion right and their servants in the Republican Party: take over the country, and use gays as scapegoats in their quest for power. No wonder I hate and despise xianism.

[yoshi]

I would like to address this comment:
"Incurious and rambling, Richard Dawkins's diatribe against religion doesn't come close to explaining how faith has survived the assault of Darwinism"

While not agreeing with all of them I enjoyed Dawkin's answers as it comes from a person who actually thinks through things and not from someone who just read a 2000 year old book and takes it as gospel (pardon the pun).

Why has "faith" survived "darwinism"? I'll use my parents as an example of why church's and "faith" more or less survive. My parents attend a catholic church and have for some 70 years. It has less to do with "faith" but with community and tradition. Ask them if they believe in the many so called miracles in the bible or that we just appeared on earth one day by the whim of some old guy and they will (a have) just shake their heads and say no.

However - when leaders of a church or "faith" start telling their followers that another group is evil and should be denied rights - that's when we run into issues as the one that Louis describes above. My parents are smart enough to see through those issues but many people aren't (mostly out of a sign of pure lazyness or lack of interest in anything "different" then themselves)

[Cineaste]

It has less to do with "faith" but with community and tradition.

This is an excellent point. Yoshi, have you read the short story, "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson?

[Aaron]

Yoshi, cool name by the way, it is clear that you don't have a clear understanding about what faith means or even what it means to be a Christian - or at least a thinking one.

Are many Christians anti-intellectual and lazy? Unfortunately, that is the case.

Are many Christians like your parents and enjoy the community, but have little real regard for doctrine? Sure, I know many people who hold to that view.

But there are also many Christians who have thought through issues and who find Christianity the best explanation for everything - the metanarrative.

Many people come to faith in Christ after trying to disprove it or spending much of their lives as atheists or agnostics: CS Lewis, Josh McDowell, Lee Strobel, Alister McGrath, J. Budziszewski, Simon Greenleaf.

None of that really "proves" anything but if you research the writings of these people, you will find individuals who believe the Bible, but who do so partly because of the rational and logical support for their beliefs. They have tried and found that Christianity is the most logical belief system. It is Truth.

Cineatse, by the way I really enjoy The Lottery. It is very well written.

[Cineaste]

Cineatse, by the way I really enjoy The Lottery. It is very well written.

Did you get the point of "The Lottery" though? That the weight of tradition within society aquires a self sustaining momentum. This is Yoshi's answer and it pertains to all tradition and not any specific religion, like Christianity. Christianity is beside the point. "The Lottery" fully answers the question, "Why has "faith" survived "darwinism?"

[seeker]

Actually, while The Lottery may have a point, it's the cynics point of view. It's tradition gone bad. But tradition, as powerful as it is, is bucked all of the time. Think of Luther and the Reformation. Think of the Pentecostal and Emergent movements.

Another possible reason religion persists is that man by nature seeks for union with God and with others. And yet another reason is that those who are in touch with their own discontent with tradition and pat answers seek to know the truth of reality, and if God is real, then this part of reality will continue to break through for those who seek.

[Cineaste]

I disagree. I think Christianity, and to a greater extent Islam, is tradition gone bad, like an ancient black box with a death sentence held within. The people in the village think that there needs to be a human sacrifice to appease a supernatural force which is responsible for a good harvest, even though there is no evidence for such a force. Yet, the tradition of stoning someone every June 27th continues, needlessly. If the villagers were naturalists instead of traditionalists/conservatives/faith holders, the needless killing would have stopped long ago. But yet they persist in clinging to tradition.

Now, to your point about Luther and the Reformation and Pentecostal and Emergent movements, these are analogous to building a brand new black box. It does nothing to address the problem itself which is the persistant belief in the supernatural, just because of the weight of tradition.

Another possible reason religion persists is that man by nature seeks for union with God and with others.

I agree that man by nature seeks for a union with others for we are social beings. Regarding a union with God, not really because man wants to "know" things he can't explain. Louis called it "the mystery." Man wants to know the unexplainable so we call the unexplainable God. What one must ask though is, "should we continue a tradition and belief solely on faith and momentum; without evidence?" This ignorance is lethal.

[Cineaste]

Check this out...

Richard Dawkins seven milestones in the continuum of beliefs regarding God

excerpt...

In this poll, you are asked to predict the outcome of another poll that will be held tomorrow. Tomorrow's poll will have seven items, based on Richard Dawkins seven milestones in the continuum of beliefs regarding God:

1. Strong theist. 100 per cent probability of God. In the words of C.G. Jung, "I do not believe, I know.
2. Very high probability but short of 100 per cent. De facto theist. "I cannot know for certain, but I strongly believe in God and live my life on the assumption that he is there."
3. Higher than 50 per cent but not very high. Technically agnostic but leaning towards theism. "I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God."
4. Exactly 50 per cent. Completely impartial agnostic. "God's existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable."
5. Lower than 50 per cent but not very low. Technically agnostic but leaning towards atheism. "I don't know whether God exits but I'm inclined to be skeptical."
6. Very low probability, but short of zero. De facto atheist. "I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there."
7. Strong atheist. "I know there is no God, with the same conviction as Jung "knows" there is one."

I would rate myself a 5 though sometimes I feel like a 4 and sometimes I feel like a 6 :) If God is specifically defined as the Christian or Muslim God, then I am a 7. Seeker and Aaron I am sure are 1. I think Richard Dawkins would be a 6.99.

[Aaron]

Dawkins is as close to a 7 as possible. I am a 1 and I don't think you would be a 7 if you actual knew who the "Christian God" was. I hate that we as His representatives do such a poor job of showing who He is.

I would ask you to try to read "I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist" by Norman Geisler and Frank Turek. They present the logical, reasoned side of Christianity very well. They come from a philosophical, logical and scientific standpoint, illustrating that it is possible to belief in all of the core tenets of Christianity based purely on logic and reason alone. Of course this alone will not make one a Christian, there is that step of faith toward Christ as Savior, but the book shows the logical nature behind our faith.

As to The Lottery, tradition for tradition's sake should not be held up as unchangeable. That is not the point of Christianity. But should tradition be abandoned just for the sake of the new? I don't think that's the answer either.

The Lottery could be applied to atheistic government worshippers as much as any other faith based system. The reverse could also be true. The new could bring in the ritual killing. It is simplistic, at best, deceitful, at worst, to imply that only religions or tradition provoke irrational behavior and violence.

[Louis]

The greatness of "The Lottery" lies in its mysteriousness. Many explanations can be forwarded, but none can penetrate it totally. However, it is a very powerful piece of writing, and hits at the very heart of humanity. That fact that it's a horror story speaks volumes.

[Aaron]

Louis, sometimes you nail it right on the head for me and this is one of those times. So much can be read into that from our own perspectives, but it leaves so much out. The story is about humanity, who we are and the mystery involved in our lives.

[seeker]

I've added some new material at the top of this post.

[Louis]

Aaron: surprise! I got my degree in English Literature. I know how to read a text.

[Cineaste]

Bah! Louis your evaluation of "The Lottery" is too broad.

[Louis]

Bah, yourself. It's an antidote to the narrow and self-serving comments we've seen so-far.

[Aaron]

Louis, you continue to surprise me. Not that I didn't except you have a degree like that or that you could read a text, but it surprises me at what we have in common past all of our differences.

My degree is in Journalism, but I took every Literature class we had (we didn't have a English or Lit degree at the time) and I am considering going into teaching and I would love to do Literature.

So you've given up on being a minister?