A legal defense of marriage

Here’s an example of a legal right, and a justification for its existence:

Society needs someone appointed to make decisions on everyone’s behalf, because we can’t get anything done if we need to consult the whole population about every decision. Since this person is making decisions for everyone, everyone should have a say in choosing who this person is. Therefore, everyone should have a right to vote.

We start with a societal need, and the rights endowed upon citizens are based on that need.

Here’s another societal need:

Society needs good future citizens. Thus, society needs children, and needs to promote the best upbringing for those children. Children require a mother and father. The best care for children is usually given by their parents, and this care will take many years and require huge investment. Thus the people involved need to feel secure as they invest time, effort and money into creating a family in which children can grow up. Thus, we create a legal framework where any man and woman (the most basic and universal requirement for parents) may enter into a legal contract that encourages them to invest in creating a potential home for children. Thus, any pair of one man and one woman may choose to get married.

From the state’s perspective, that’s pretty much it. That’s the legal justification for the existence of a marriage contract. The state needs kids, and kids need parents, and parents need legal protection as they invest in the kids.

Of course, there are plenty of ancillary benefits to marriage. But those are not relevant to the legal existence of marriage.

There’s also nothing in that description about love. Or attraction. Or sexual orientation. Because in terms of marriage as a legal institution, those things are also meaningless. There is no legal basis for a “celebration of love”, but there is a legal basis for providing a framework in which children can be created and raised.

Having a right does not mean that you have to execute that right, just that you have the option. Anyone also has the option not to get married.

Note: As this post discusses the legal justification for marriage, I am of course referring solely to the legal aspects of civil marriage. Religious justifications for marriage are better discussed independently of secular legal questions.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Some thoughts on the redefinition of marriage

.

Some thoughts on the redefinition of marriage

Several countries are currently discussing (or are already in the process of) redefining marriage. With that in mind, there’s a new paper by Ryan T. Anderson entitled: Marriage: What It Is, Why It Matters, and the Consequences of Redefining It. Although there are obvious religious considerations to this issue, Anderson isn’t actually discussing those issues in any detail in this paper.

The abstract expands:

Marriage is based on the truth that men and women are complementary, the biological fact that reproduction depends on a man and a woman, and the reality that children need a mother and a father. Redefining marriage does not simply expand the existing understanding of marriage; it rejects these truths. Marriage is society’s least restrictive means of ensuring the well-being of children. By encouraging the norms of marriage—monogamy, sexual exclusivity, and permanence—the state strengthens civil society and reduces its own role. The future of this country depends on the future of marriage. The future of marriage depends on citizens understanding what it is and why it matters and demanding that government policies support, not undermine, true marriage.

There are a few key points that come up throughout the paper. The first is that redefining marriage does not simply expand the existing understanding of marriage. It would actually contradict the traditional concept of marriage. Raising kids – and thus sustaining society – happens best in a stable home with both parents present. Marriage as an institution is primarily about bringing up the children that are produced by the husband and wife. As Anderson wrote in another paper on the same topic:

In recent decades, marriage has been weakened by a revisionist view that it is more about adults’ desires than children’s needs. This view reduces marriage primarily to intense emotional bonds.

If marriage were just intense emotional regard, marital norms would make no sense as a principled matter. There is no reason of principle that requires an emotional union to be permanent. Or limited to two persons. Or sexual, much less sexually exclusive (as opposed to “open”). Or inherently oriented to family life and shaped by its demands.

Redefining marriage would further distance marriage from the needs of children and deny the importance of mothers and fathers. It would deny, as a matter of policy, the ideal that children need a mother and a father.

Redefining marriage would also diminish the social pressures and incentives for husbands to remain with their wives and their biological children and for men and women to marry before having children. It would be very difficult for the law to send a message that fathers matter once it had redefined marriage to make fathers optional.

The traditional definition of marriage (one man, one woman, monogamous) does not restrict consenting adults from forming whatever other relationships they like.

The paper is presented in three sections. Here’s an outline of the major points:

.

I. What Is Marriage?

1. Marriage exists to bring a man and a woman together as husband and wife to be father and mother to any children their union produces.
2. Marriage is based on the anthropological truth that men and women are complementary, the biological fact that reproduction depends on a man and a woman, and the social reality that children need a mother and a father.
3. Marriage as the union of man and woman is true across cultures, religions, and time. The government recognizes but does not create marriage.
4. Marriage has been weakened by a revisionist view of marriage that is more about adults’ desires than children’s needs.

II. Why Marriage Matters for Policy

1. Government recognizes marriage because it is an institution that benefits society in a way that no other relationship does.
2. Marriage is society’s least restrictive means of ensuring the well-being of children. Marital breakdown weakens civil society and limited government.
3. Marital breakdown costs taxpayers.
4. Government can treat people equally—and leave them free to live and love as they choose—without redefining marriage.
5. We reap the civil society benefits of marriage only if policy gets marriage right.

III. The Consequences for Redefining Marriage

1. Redefining marriage would further distance marriage from the needs of children and deny the importance of mothers and fathers.
2. Redefining marriage would put into the law the new principle that marriage is whatever emotional bond the government says it is.
3. Redefining marriage would weaken monogamy, exclusivity, and permanency—the norms through which marriage benefits society.
4. Redefining marriage threatens religious liberty.

Check out the whole paper here.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

A legal defense of marriage

.

.

Thomas Nagel: a heretic amongst heretics?

There’s a fantastic article at The Weekly Standard about Thomas Nagel. Nagel may not be as much of a household name as Dawkins, but he is probably America’s most prominent philosopher and a serious intellectual heavyweight. But his latest book, Mind and Cosmos: Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature Is Almost Certainly False, was roundly attacked by the self-proclaimed “brights” of atheism. In short, Nagel thinks that the worldview of philosophical materialism is wrong, despite being a very useful presupposition of science. For voicing these thoughts, Nagel has been branded a heretic by his fellow atheists.

The most interesting aspect of this drama is that Nagel is actually just voicing what every one of those critics believes. Or at least, he’s voicing the line of thought that is revealed by their actions. Because nobody actually lives as if materialism were true (unless they are certifiably insane). As the article puts it:

As a philosophy of everything [materialism] is an undeniable drag. As a way of life it would be even worse. Fortunately, materialism is never translated into life as it’s lived. As colleagues and friends, husbands and mothers, wives and fathers, sons and daughters, materialists never put their money where their mouth is. Nobody thinks his daughter is just molecules in motion and nothing but; nobody thinks the Holocaust was evil, but only in a relative, provisional sense. A materialist who lived his life according to his professed convictions—understanding himself to have no moral agency at all, seeing his friends and enemies and family as genetically determined robots—wouldn’t just be a materialist: He’d be a psychopath.

Applied beyond its own usefulness as a scientific methodology, materialism is, as Nagel suggests, self-evidently absurd. Mind and Cosmos can be read as an extended paraphrase of Orwell’s famous insult: “One has to belong to the intelligentsia to believe things like that: no ordinary man could be such a fool.” Materialism can only be taken seriously as a philosophy through a heroic feat of cognitive dissonance; pretending, in our abstract, intellectual life, that values like truth and goodness have no objective content even as, in our private life, we try to learn what’s really true and behave in a way we know to be good. Nagel has sealed his ostracism from the intelligentsia by idly speculating why his fellow intellectuals would undertake such a feat. 

“The priority given to evolutionary naturalism in the face of its implausible conclusions,” he writes, “is due, I think, to the secular consensus that this is the only form of external understanding of ourselves that provides an alternative to theism.”

Apparently, the acceptance by “freethinkers” is contingent on your committment to the idea that thinking freely is impossible.

.

P.S. – For anyone wanting a more in-depth review of Nagel’s work and the criticisms it has attracted, check out the posts by Edward Feser on the subject.

.

Questions to Nature

Scientific research can be thought of as a process of asking questions of Nature. Perhaps it’s worth exploring that concept in a little more detail.

It is true that many scientific advances have started with a question. And the process of research can be considered a way of asking Nature questions. But the kind of questions that we can ask Nature are very specific.

First, the obvious: Nature doesn’t have a voice. Interviews are out. So we need to look for evidence instead.

The language that I’m using resembles a criminal investigation, and that’s deliberate. Scientific research is in fact very much like forensic work. We look for evidence, we analyse things that we observe, we try to find patterns and unravel processes. Forensics is all about mechanisms: how the crime was perpetrated.  However, there’s usually an accompanying part of a criminal investigation, and that is the literal question-and-answer stuff. By interviewing a suspect, the investigator can try to unravel the question of motive. Forensics, for all its strengths, is powerless to address “why” questions. This, again, is like science.

.

Sea Storm in Pacifica, by Brocken Inaglory

.

There are many kinds of questions that we can ask another person, but the questions that science can ask Nature are far more limited. It’s not just the “why” stuff, we also can’t ask general or open-ended questions. We can’t say, for instance, “What causes the tides?” That’s too vague. The things that we can ask Nature are more like the game of “20 Questions” – she can only answer “yes” or “no”. (Actually, this is not strictly true, she usually answers with “possibly” or “probably not”, but that’s a minor point).

So we can ask, as Galileo did, “Does the rotation of the Earth cause the oceans to slosh around like a bathtub, and thus cause the tides?”

…and Nature says, “No”.

Or we can ask, as Newton did, “Does the moon pull the water around with its gravitational attraction?”

…and Nature says, “Yes.”

“Cool,” we reply. “Does that allow us to predict the tides?”

…and Nature says, “No, but you’re getting warmer.”

Lord Kelvin said, “What if we take Laplace’s differential equations and add in bathymetry and coastal boundaries?”

…and Nature said, “…even warmer…”

And so on, until George Darwin finally asked just the right questions, and tides could be predicted.

Now, this is a fine little historical excursion, but the important point is to note the form of the questions: they’re all phrased in terms of “yes/no” alternatives. (The more science-y term for asking a yes/no question of Nature is hypothesis testing). This allows for a rigorous, disciplined procedure, but it has a vital limitation:

.

You can only ask a question of Nature if you’ve already thought of the answer.

.

That’s how hypothesis testing works: you start with the way you think that stuff works, and you test it to see if you’re right.

There are two steps here. First, need to think up the mechanism, and then you need to think up a way of demonstrating the your idea is right. But your test must also, in as far as possible, rule out other possibilities. Necessarily, it can only rule out possibilities that you’ve also already thought of. And when you test it, you also try to think of all the ways that your test results could be misleading you. Hypotheses and theories can be confirmed, but that does not mean that they are true. It means that they have passed all the tests that we can think to put to them. As the mathematician John Lennox has observed, “Even observations tend to be theory-laden; we cannot take a temperature without having an underlying theory of heat.”

There are ways to control for some of these problems. The whole idea of a laboratory is that you can do an experiment in some degree of isolation, so you reduce the potential complicating factors. But lab results can have their own problems. In my field of marine biology, if I want to know how fast a fish can swim, I can take it to the lab, put it in a tank, and observe. I can even try to entice it to swim at a high speed, perhaps by controlling a current through the tank. But this doesn’t actually tell me how fast the fish does swim in the wild, it just tells me how fast it can be made to swim in a lab. The answers to these two questions are related, but they are not the same..

If only I could just ask the fish!

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Reading the story of Nature

Maths, science and abstractions

On Spherical Cows and the Search for Truth

.

Science as ideology

A couple of good discussion pieces by Chris Mulherin that were published recently:

Christianity, science and rumours of divorce talks about the misunderstandings that lead to the perceived “conflict” between science and the Christian faith. In particular, he emphasises the distinction that Christianity is a worldview, whereas science is a methodology.

The second article, Science as ideology betrays its purpose, discusses the hazards which arise from conflating the methodology of science with the worldview of Naturalism.

Both articles can be downloaded from the ISCAST website.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Grainge Clarke on the assumptions of science

Where God meets physics

.

.

Intelligent Design: dodgy science, worse theology

Electron micrograph of H. pylori bacterium, with flagella clearly visible. Image by Yutaka Tsutsumi.

.

First, some clarification. We’ll start with what Intelligent Design is not:

Christian doctrine teaches that the universe, life, and human beings are created by God. That is, Creation was a deliberate act. Also, God is omniscient and omnipotent, and chose to exercise creation in a particular way. This is not the definition of Intelligent Design.

The teleological argument refers to a philosophical argument for the existence of God based on apparent design and purpose in the world around us. The universe and our place in it appear to be purposeful, and a purposeful creation suggests a purposeful Creator. Variations on this line of thinking can be traced back to before Plato, and it also features in the work of St Thomas Aquinas as one of his rational arguments for God’s existence. This is also not the definition of Intelligent Design.

So what is it?

Intelligent Design (or ID) maintains that “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection. Through the study and analysis of a system’s components, a design theorist is able to determine whether various natural structures are the product of chance, natural law, intelligent design, or some combination thereof.” (from intelligentdesign.org). In short, ID proponents claim that scientific inquiry can identify the intervention of intelligence in the evolutionary process.

The major feature of ID theory is the concept of “irreducible complexity”, specifically the idea that there exist structures and systems in nature that are so irreducibly complex that they could not have evolved step-wise via evolutionary theory.

.

In general, if we talk about trying to discern God’s influence in the universe scientifically, we have two major problems:

• There is no control group. Because God is omnipresent and not subject to human will, he can’t be excluded from part of an experiment to try and see what would happen “without” God’s intervention.
• More generally, science lacks the tools for investigating the supernatural. If we are suggesting that this “Intelligent Designer” is in fact God (and thus supernatural), then it is not clear that his influence could be discerned by scientific inquiry. If we’re thinking of aliens (or anything else non-supernatural), then I am not sure that “intelligence” would be the most easily identifiable evidence.

There are major theological issues with ID because it argues that God’s involvement in the universe is only necessary for stuff that we can’t explain by natural law. This is a classic “god of the gaps” argument, and it is lousy theology. Christianity teaches that God is involved everywhere. That God is the author and sustainer of the natural laws. ID suggests that God mostly lets the universe tick along by itself, but every now and then he steps in to design a bacterial flagellum, or whatever the latest example of irreducible complexity is.

Philosophically, the entire premise of ID seems doubtful. The central claim of ID is that the intelligence of the “designer” can be discovered scientifically. But if the designer used normal physical processes in any way, it is not clear that the influence of “intelligence” could be discerned.

Let us consider: I put a kettle on the stove and the water boils. By studying the stove and the kettle and the water (or steam if you wait too long), you can discover exactly how the chain of events unfolded. But it is not clear that the intelligent involvement and motivation could ever be discoveredin this way. Did I want a cup of tea? Was I acting on instruction from someone else (in which case my actions involve no intelligence of my own)? Even if we look at the all physical actions that I undertook to make the kettle boil, it is not clear that the “intelligence” involved could ever be identified scientifically.

.

A note on irreducible complexity:

As a side note, I believe that irreducible complexity itself is an important avenue of study. But it is an avenue of study that involves evolutionary theory, not Intelligent Design. It is a challenge to see if there are limits to current understanding of evolution, and whether there are aspects of biological development that seem to argue against it. In the same way that dark matter and dark energy have forced us to reconsider a lot of what we thought about cosmology and gravity, it is possible that there could emerge a parallel biological paradigm which works in concert with evolutionary pressure to guide the development of life. But that is something for biological science to explore.

An argument against one theory is not an argument for another. So we have a theory (such as gravity), and we can make observations and conduct experiments that support or refute it. But refuting that theory does not support another: the two processes are independent.

The problem with ID is that it tries to argue against evolutionary theory, but gets a bit fuzzy on the details of what it is arguing for. ID proponents try to identify things in nature that can’t be explained by evolution, and then use such things to argue for ID. But what exactly is the unifying theory of ID?

“Sometimes, intelligence is involved rather than pure selective pressure based on reproductive fitness and survival. Other times, evolution just does its thing.”

But why was “intellegent design” applied in the case of a bacterial flagellum, and not elsewhere? For any explanatory power, a motivation for ID influence to appear in a particular biological feature would have to be clear prior to the knowledge that the specific feature appears to be irreducibly complex. This lack of a clear alternative theory means that, at most, irreducibly complex biological features can be seen as a challenge to current evolutionary theory. They cannot possibly be a positive argument for ID.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

“Creation Science” isn’t.

Hypothetically speaking

Two evolutionists walk into a bar…

.

Faith and rationality: a comic and a quote

Science requires faith.

I realise that statement will upset people, but those are the facts. The comic above, from the excellent xkcd, presents the issue particularly well. To do science at all, we must at the very least have faith in our rationality and the ability of our brains to discover truth. Faith in the regularity of the universe helps, too.

Philosopher Alvin Plantinga published a book last year entitled Where the Conflict Really Lies: Science, Religion, and Naturalism, which was reviewed by Thomas Nagel in the New York Review of Books. The excerpt below comes from that review:

[Plantinga] holds, first, that the theistic conception of the relation between God, the natural world, and ourselves makes it reasonable for us to regard our perceptual and rational faculties as reliable. It is therefore reasonable to believe that the scientific theories they allow us to create do describe reality. He holds, second, that the naturalistic conception of the world, and of ourselves as products of unguided Darwinian evolution, makes it unreasonable for us to believe that our cognitive faculties are reliable, and therefore unreasonable to believe any theories they may lead us to form, including the theory of evolution. In other words, belief in naturalism combined with belief in evolution is self-defeating. However, Plantinga thinks we can reasonably believe that we are the products of evolution provided that we also believe, contrary to naturalism, that the process was in some way guided by God.

Put another way, if we believe that evolutionary pressures select purely for reproductive fitness and survival, why would we believe that our mental faculties have been evolutionarily selected to reliably discern truth?

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Maths, science, and abstractions

Faith: reflecting on evidence

Believing and understanding

.

Grainge Clarke on the assumptions of science

There’s an excellent article by W. Grainge Clarke on the philosophy of science and how it relates to the Christian worldview.

On the topic of the underlying assumptions of the scientific method, he writes:

“These presuppositions are, by their nature unprovable, and some philosophers would consider them unacceptable. Behind the acceptance of these presuppositions lies the fact that modern science developed when the dominant worldview in Europe was Christian. If the Christian worldview is accepted they all make reasonable sense. However, on the atheistic worldview, that all is the product of matter-energy, time and chance, then none of these presuppositions are justifiable. To consider just one case: ‘The human mind is capable of rational thought’. If the human mind has been developed solely by non rational forces then there is no reason to believe that it can be rational and certainly it is not to be relied upon. Consider two computers one of which was designed and assembled by the IT staff at the local university and the other by the local kindergarten. Which is most likely to function well? Yet the kindergarten children have much more intelligence than blind chance.”

You can find the whole article here:

“Wrong fight, wrong concepts, wrong everything” by Grainge Clarke

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Hypothetically speaking

Maths, science and abstractions

Where God meets physics

.

Children of God: the awkward teenage years

Just a quick update – I recently published an article on the journal Christian Perspectives on Science and Technology, entitled “Children of God: The awkward teenage years“. The abstract below will give you something of the flavour:

In this essay I explore some of the manifestations of ‘teenage rebellion’ in matters of faith and society: how disillusionment with God can manifest and impact our lives. As we grow from infancy to adulthood, an early childish optimism towards our idealised vision of life often gives way to dissatisfaction, cynicism and disillusionment in our teenage years. This is a natural by-product of a youthful idealism based on unrealistic notions, and hopefully as we continue to mature to adulthood we understand life more deeply and regain our satisfaction, enthusiasm and sense of wonder with all that this life and universe have to offer. In general, I believe that this disillusionment is rooted in our early failure of understanding. The core of the Christian faith is a personal relationship with God through the person of Jesus. A person who believes in God but does not have a relationship with him may find that this level of faith is insufficient to withstand the additional pressures, responsibilities and difficulties that adulthood requires. On a broader perspective, I also look briefly at disillusionment with science from the Enlightenment to the present day.

Get the whole article here:

http://www.iscast.org/Smith_M_2012-04_Children_of_God

Music for the soul

Music, and indeed any art form, involves striving to express that which is recognised but cannot be fully put into words, that which is unknowable and yet known more deeply than anything else. It is this striving for expression that produces great art, it is the acknowledgement – without complete understanding – of the intangible Other that drives creative work.

This is not unique to Christian cultures, it is a universal feature of art. We do not express artistically what we could simply describe succinctly and fully, in a sentence. The intangible natures of love, of the soul, of our deeply felt and yet deeply fractured relationship with God, these are the things which give flight to the mad impulses of the artist.

Of course, the passionate exploration of a question does not necessarily result in finding an answer. Rock music, for one, would scarcely exist without eschatological and spiritual angst (although a vapid and commercially-manufactured boy-band could probably get along just fine…). Whether expressed explicitly via a specific religious framework in such bands as U2 and Live (Christianity and Hinduism respectively), or raging against unresolved religious issues (Meatloaf, Guns ‘n Roses, The Rolling Stones, Nirvana), these are the yearnings that push musicians to greatness.

In Christianity, music is often an integral part of the act of worship. We acknowledge God’s glory and majesty, but are unable to express it in ordinary words – hence the Psalms, in which the poetic construction allows us to come closer to true expression of our feelings.

Attempting to deny this extraordinary wellspring of inspiration would be monstrous. The passionate yearning for the inexpressible Divine and the artistic expression of it is an essential part of what constitutes the human experience.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Psalm 30

Improving Graces

.

The Heathen Manifesto – a quick review

Over in the Guardian‘s website, prominent atheist Julian Baggini has written a Heathen Manifesto in which he calls for atheists everywhere to stop insisting on a polarised society and try to listen a little more to what he calls the “moderate middle”, those who lack religious belief but are also turned off by the froth and vitriol of Dawkins et al.

As Baggini puts it in his introduction:

“This manifesto is an attempt to point towards the next phase of atheism’s involvement in public discourse. It is not a list of doctrines that people are asked to sign up to but a set of suggestions to provide a focus for debate and discussion. Nor is it an attempt to accurately describe what all atheists have in common. Rather it is an attempt to prescribe what the best form of atheism should be like.”

I rather like Baggini. More than many other atheist writers he is willing to conduct a reasoned dialogue rather than simply engaging in posturing and rhetoric. And I was very interested in his manifesto, so let’s go through it briefly. I’ve kept his headings to give this some sort of structure, and inserted my own comments at various junctures. Baggini’s manifesto is in italics, my own insertions are in normal typeface. Some sections have been trimmed for brevity.

.

1 Why we are heathens

It has long been recognised that the term “atheist” has unhelpful connotations. It has too many dark associations and also defines itself negatively, against what it opposes, not what it stands for … “humanists” are a subset of atheists who have a formal organisation and set of beliefs many atheists do not share … “rationalist” and “bright” both suffer from sounding too self-satisfied, too confident, implying that others are irrationalists or dim.

…We need a name that shows that we do not think too highly of ourselves. This is no trivial point: atheism faces the human condition with honesty, and that requires acknowledging our absurdity, weakness and stupidity, not just our capacity for creativity, intelligence, love and compassion. “Heathen” fulfils this ambition. We are heathens because we have not been saved by God and because in the absence of divine revelation, we are in so many ways deeply unenlightened. The main difference between us and the religious is that we know this to be true of all of us, but they believe it is not true of them.

I accept that there are many unhelpful associations that the “New Atheist” publicity has brought to the term, but I’m not sure that it is quite time to ditch it. Baggini writes that heathens lack divine revelation, and deny the existence of any supernatural deity (see point 2), but this would imply that “atheist” is the most accurately descriptive term. Traditionally, “heathen” has denoted someone who holds to beliefs outside of Christianity, and as such is a positive claim. I’m not sure that Baggini quite navigates this distinction, and this is a theme that emerges a few times in the Manifesto.

.

2 Heathens are naturalists

Heathens are not merely unbelievers: we believe many things too. Most importantly, we believe in naturalism: the natural world is all there is and there is no purposive, conscious agency that created or guides it. This natural world may contain many mysteries and even unseen dimensions, but we have no reason to believe that they are anything like the heavens, spirit worlds and deities that have characterised supernatural religious beliefs over history. Many religious believers deny the “supernatural” label, but unless they are willing to disavow such beliefs as in the reality of a divine person, miracles, resurrections or life after death, they are not naturalists.

One of the reasons that I like Baggini’s writing is that he is eager to define his terms clearly to avoid confusion. I am also impressed by his willingness to embrace naturalism as a belief, as a positive truth-claim about the world. As a Christian, I completely disagree with his belief but I respect him for stating it clearly and in a way that allows discussion.

.

3 Our first commitment is to the truth

Although we believe many things about what does and does not exist, these are the conclusions we come to, not the basis of our worldview. That basis is a commitment to see the world as truthfully as we can, using our rational faculties as best we can, based on the best evidence we have … Hence we are prepared to accept the possibility that we are wrong. It also means that we respect and have much in common with people who come to very different conclusions but have an equal respect for truth, reason and evidence. A heathen has more in common with a sincere, rational, religious truth-seeker than an atheist whose lack of belief is unquestioned, or has become unquestionable.

I embrace this commitment wholeheartedly.

.

4 We respect science, not scientism

Heathens place science in high regard, being the most successful means humans have devised to come to a true understanding of the real nature of the world on the basis of reason and evidence. If a belief conflicts with science, then no matter how much we cherish it, science should prevail. That is why the religious beliefs we most oppose are those that defy scientific knowledge, such as young earth creationism.

Nonetheless, this does not make us scientistic. Scientism is the belief that science provides the only means of gaining true knowledge of the world, and that everything has to be understood through the lens of science or not at all. There are scientistic atheists but heathens are not among them. Science is limited in what it can contribute to our understanding of who we are and how we should live because many of the most important facts of human life only emerge at a level of description on which science remains silent. History, for example, may ultimately depend on nothing more than the movements of atoms, but you cannot understand the battle of Hastings by examining interactions of fermions and bosons. Love may depend on nothing more than the physical firing of neurons, but anyone who tries to understand it solely in those terms just does not know what love means.

This one is a little tricky for me. The recognition of science vs scientism is important, and it is very valuable to have this stated clearly. What I’m less clear on is how Baggini can reconcile this with point 2, which very clearly claims that the natural world is all that there is. But if the natural world is all that there is, and science is the best means of discovering truth about the natural world, then surely the true meaning of the battle of Hastings is ultimately a purely scientific pursuit?

I’m glad that he recognises that there is more to the world and human experience than scientific analysis can deduce, but I’m not sure that he’s left any space in his worldview for that “more”.

.

5 We value reason as precious but fragile

Heathens have a commitment to reason that fully acknowledges the limits of reason. Reason is itself a multi-faceted thing that cannot be reduced to pure logic. We use reason whenever we try to form true beliefs on the basis of the clearest thinking, using the best evidence. But reason almost always leaves us short of certain knowledge and very often leaves us with a need to make a judgment in order to come to a conclusion. We also need to accept that human beings are very imperfect users of reason, susceptible to biases, distortions and prejudices that lead even the most intelligent astray. In short, if we understand what reason is and how it works, we have very good reason to doubt those who claim rationality solely for those who accept their worldview and who deny the rationality of those who disagree.

Great points, ties in well with his earlier objections to “brights” and “rationalists” as suitable labels. Recognising the limits of our own reason is all too rare in human discourse. I try to maintain the same level of respect for reason and awareness of its limitations.

.

6 We are convinced, not dogmatic

The heathen’s modesty about the power of reason and the certainty of her conclusions should not be mistaken for a shoulder-shrugging agnosticism. We have a very high degree of confidence in the truth of our naturalistic worldview. But we do not dogmatically assert it. Being open to being wrong and to changing our minds does not mean we lack conviction that we are right. Strength of belief is not the same as rigidity of dogma.

Again, a useful point. I have similar impatience with rigidly asserted dogma. I don’t share his high degree of confidence in the naturalistic worldview, but that’s a different matter.

.

7 We have no illusions about life as a heathen

… Ours is a universe without guarantees of redemption or salvation and sometimes people have terrible lives or do terrible things and thrive. On such occasions, we have no consolation. That is the dark side of accepting the truth, and we are prepared to acknowledge it. We are heathens because we value living in the truth. But that does not mean that we pretend that always makes life easy or us happy. If the evidence were to show that religious people are happier and healthier than us, we would not see that as any reason to give up our convictions.

This is a brave statement to make, and I applaud Baggini for having the courage of his convictions. I respect that he values the truth so highly.

Personally, I feel that he has missed the boat a little; he acknowledges that there is no comfort or consolation in atheism and that religious people may be happier and healthier, due to the hope that they feel. Again speaking as a Christian, I would suggest that the hope, happiness and health are due to the comfort and consolation that follows from a relationship with God. But that’s just my perspective.

.

8 We are secularists

We support a state that is neutral as regards people’s fundamental worldviews. It is not neutral when it comes to the shared values necessary for people of different conviction to live and thrive together. But it should not give any special privilege to any particular sect or group, or use their creeds as a basis for policy. Politics requires a coming together of people of different fundamental convictions to formulate and justify policy in terms that all understand, on the basis of principles that as many as possible can share.

This secularism does not require that religion is banished from public life or that people may not be open as to how their faiths, or lack of one, motivate their values. As long as the core of the business of state is neutral as regards to comprehensive worldviews, we can be relaxed about expressions of these commitments in society at large. We want to maintain the state’s neutrality on fundamental worldviews, not purge religion from society.

This is a bold vision, and I have no inherent issues with it, but honestly I don’t believe that humans are capable of actually achieving the society which he describes.

A major issue for me is that justice, morality and ethics are intractably bound up with the value system of the individual, which is overwhelmingly based on their religious convictions and worldview. I don’t see a practical way around this. So far, in the West, we have achieved largely secular states by taking Christian ethics and trying to strip the Christianity out of them to avoid offending anyone else. But the philosophical basis for those ethics is that very same Christianity, so I’m not sure this is a sustainable long-term option.

.

9 Heathens can be religious

There are a small minority of forms of religion that are entirely compatible with the heathen position. These are forms of religion that reject the real existence of supernatural entities and divinely authored texts, accept that science trumps dogma, and who see the essential core of religion in its values and practices. We have very little evidence that anything more than a small fraction of actual existent religion is like this, but when it does conform to this description, heathens have no reason to dismiss it as false.

Apart from Scientism (and perhaps secular humanism), I can’t think of a religion that meets these requirements. It’s a nice conciliatory gesture, but I don’t think that this is really a significant point. Baggini is basically saying that, “You can be religious, as long as your religion is ‘heathen’ as defined in this manifesto.”

.

10 Religion is often our friend

We believe in not being tone-deaf to religion and to understand it in the most charitable way possible. So we support religions when they work to promote values we share, including those of social justice and compassion. We are respectful and sympathetic to the religious when they arrive at their different conclusions on the basis of the same commitment to sincere, rational, undogmatic inquiry as us, without in any way denying that we believe them to be false and misguided. We are also sympathetic to religion when its effects are more benign than malign. We appreciate that commitment to truth is but one value and that a commitment to compassion and kindness to others is also of supreme importance. We are not prepared to insist that it is indubitably better to live guided by such values allied with false beliefs than it is to live without such values but also without false belief.

This is a more useful conciliatory gesture, but actually raises more issues than it addresses. Baggini acknowledges the value of religious values of social justice and compassion, and claims them as shared values, but doesn’t actually make it clear why those are important values from an atheist worldview. It is great to say that “commitment to truth is but one value and that a commitment to compassion and kindness to others is also of supreme importance”, and I can understand why all those things are important values in Christianity. What I can’t quite see is why compassion and kindness are important social values from a naturalistic atheist worldview.

.

11 We are critical of religion when necessary

Our willingness to accept what is good in religion is balanced by an equally honest commitment to be critical of it when necessary. We object when religion invokes mystery to avoid difficult questions or to obfuscate when clarity is needed. We do not like the way in which “people of faith” tend to huddle together in an unprincipled coalition of self-interest, even when that means liberals getting into bed with homophobes and misogynists. We think it is disingenuous for religious people to talk about the reasonableness of their beliefs and the importance of values and practice, while drawing a veil over their embrace of superstitious beliefs. In these and other areas, we assert the right and need to make civil but acute criticisms.

And although our general stance is not one of hostility towards religion, there are some occasions when this is exactly what is called for. When religions promote prejudice, division or discrimination, suppress truth or stand in the way of medical or social progress, a hostile response is an appropriate, principled one, just as it is when atheists are guilty of the same crimes.

I agree with some points here, but the same problems from point 10 are evident. Baggini objects to religions promoting prejudice, division or discrimination, but it may be difficult to rationally explain what’s wrong with those things from a  purely naturalistic worldview.

I think Baggini is mistaken when he talks of “huddling”, at least as regards Christianity. I think that the perception of a huddle collective Christianity is more a theme in secular media than in reality, it’s certainly not something that I have experienced in my three decades of church attendance on five continents. For instance, I’m a Christian but I have little time for Young Earth Creationism (see this earlier post, for instance), and I am similarly impatient with liberal theology.

I also think that his sentence about the dichotomy between reasonable faith and “superstitious beliefs” is off the mark. There is an important distinction between orthodox theology and personal spiritual experience, it is the distinction between Newton’s mathematical equations and the experience of feeling a brick landing on your foot. Christian theology is rational, philosophically robust and intellectually coherent; a personal experience of God may be indescribable. I don’t see anything disingenuous about being able to clearly explain the former but not the latter.

I do appreciate his clear stress on acute but civil criticisms, and I hope that I can do the same when I disagree with those of other faiths.

.

12 This manifesto is less concerned with distinguishing heathens from others than forging links between us and others

Our commitment to independent thought and the provisionality of belief means that few heathens are likely to agree completely with this manifesto. It is therefore almost a precondition of supporting it that you do not entirely support it. At the same time, although very few people of faith can be heathens, many will find themselves in agreement with much of what heathens belief. This is what provides the common ground to make fruitful dialogue possible: we need to accept what we share in order to accept with civility and understanding what we most certainly do not. This is what the heathen manifesto is really about.

Again, his stress on civil dialogue and open understanding of differences is laudable. I’m also delighted that Baggini has chosen such a time-honoured enumerated structure for his manifesto; 12 is a divine number…

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Lumpy atheism

Having the wrong conversation

.

On the relative efficacy of cathedral demolition strategies

.

I do not believe there is an atheist in the world who would bulldoze Mecca – or Chartres, York Minster or Notre Dame.

- Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion

.

.

.

.

.

Cathedrals are too high for bulldozers. In the Soviet Union under Stalin and the German Democratic Republic under Ulbricht they used explosives instead.

        – Richard Schröder, Professor of Philosophy in Berlin

.

.

.

.

.

Revisiting the Law

Recently, I’ve been reading through the Old Testament. I haven’t read the latter books of the Pentateuch for a while, so it was an interesting experience. The Pentateuch makes up the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, and also comprises the Jewish Torah. This collection is also referred to as the Books of the Law, which is what Jesus is talking about when he mentions “the Law and the Prophets” (e.g. Matt. 5:17, Matt. 7:12).

Genesis and the first half of Exodus are largely composed of narrative, but from that point on there are indeed large chunks of detailed instruction from God which dominate the books of Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. And when you hear people talking vaguely about “all those crazy rules and stuff in the Bible”, it’s generally the last three books of the Pentateuch that they have in mind. So as I worked my way through these books, I was expecting to find an endless list of obscure and arbitrary prohibitions.

In contrast, I was delighted at just how sensible all the laws are. But there are a few important things to bear in mind as you read them.

.

The Laws of Moses were given to a people who had been slaves in a foreign land for 400 years, and were now being moulded into a new nation. The Law is not there to restrict the Israelites’ freedom, it is God’s gift to them to help them live in harmony and build a successful society. Also, as God’s chosen people, they need special instruction on how to worship God. So most of the laws are focussed on teaching the nation how to interact with each other and with God.

But even with that proviso, there are a few laws which seem a little odd. There are two more things that we need to understand about the function of the Law:

.

Firstly, as God’s people, chosen to be set apart for Him, it was important that the Israelites did not become corrupted with the religious practices of other nations.

The principal concern in this regard was keeping them separate from the influences of Canaanite religion, which was rife in the country to which God was leading them. Canaanite religious practices centred around worship of Baal, the god of thunder and fertility, and the bringer of rain; and Asherah (also called Athirat), who was the mother – and also consort – of Baal. (Another of the regulars in the Canaanite pantheon was Anat, the virgin goddess of war and strife, who was both wife and sister of Baal). A large part of Canaanite religious practice involved trying to increase fertility by bringing together objects associated with Asherah and those which represented Baal, so that their “sympathetic magic” would simulate Baal having sex with Asherah and thus increase the harvest.

Kinky, I know. But the point of this whole deviant diversion is that the laws which seem most arbitrary to us are ones like “Don’t wear clothes made of wool and linen” (Deut. 22:11), or “Don’t boil a young goat in its mother’s milk” (Ex. 34:26). The modern response to those passages is, respectively, “Why not?”, or “Why on earth would anyone do that in the first place?”. In each case, the principle behind those sort of injunctions is all about avoiding the idolatrous Canaanite religious practices centred on Baal and Asherah.

.

Secondly, the laws are not like a modern penal code; they are not meant to be exhaustive. Instead, they function paradigmatically, by giving examples of the kind of behaviour that God wants from His people.

This is why the Israelites are instructed, for instance, to “Build a parapet around the roof of your house” (Deut. 22:8). The custom among the Near Eastern civilisations was for guests to sleep on the roof of the house (which was flat), and the instruction here is to make sure that they may do so safely without worrying about falling off if they roll over in their sleep. It is a paradigmatic example of the kind of concern for others that God wants us to show. Instructions about leaving gleanings in the field (Lev. 19:9-10) are an example of offering welfare and charity to the poor and destitute, but they also illustrate a principle of charity that is equally relevant even if we are not farmers.

.

For a more thorough treatment of reading the Law in context, I strongly recommend Chapter 9 of How To Read the Bible For All Its Worth, by Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

The power of narrative

Matters of interpretation

.

Doing a little mythbusting…

Hard to believe that in such an intellectually advanced age there are still some who cling tenaciously to the notion that “Jesus was not a real historical figure”, but apparently the light of education has still not penetrated all the deep corners.

Should be unfortunate enough to find yourself accosted by denialists, you may find this essay series by James Hannam useful. Hannam writes in his introduction:

.

“The thesis that Jesus never existed has hovered around the fringes of research into the New Testament for at least a century but it has never been accepted as a mainstream theory. This is for good reason. It is simply a bad hypothesis based on arguments from silence, special pleading, and an awful lot of wishful thinking. It is ironic that certain atheists will buy into this idea and leave all their pretensions of critical thinking behind…

In this four-part series, it is not my intention to study the minutiae of the various arguments. Instead, I will focus on three central contentions often advanced in discussions about Jesus. These are 1) the lack of secular references,  2) the alleged similarities to paganism, and 3) the silence of St. Paul.”

.

Hannam deals with each of these contentions in a highly readable and well-researched series of essays. Read the rest of Is Jesus Christ a Myth? here:

Part 1  |  Part 2  |  Part 3  |  Part 4

.

Hannam holds degrees in physics and history from Oxford and London universities, and his doctorate in the history of science from Cambridge University, and recently published God’s Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science, the first history of medieval science written for the layperson. (You can also read more from him at Quodlibeta).

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Faith: reflecting on evidence

A theoretical faith

.

There’s probably no Dawkins…

…now stop worrying and enjoy Oct 25th at the Sheldonian Theatre.

So read the signs on buses in the Oxford area at the moment, lamenting the sudden failure of courage from New Atheism’s leading apologist.

It seems that while Richard Dawkins is happy to have the occasional televised cup of tea with an English archbishop who is too polite to respond to his bombast, he is not quite so bold when it comes to debating religion with any serious Christian apologists. After lengthy prevarication, Dawkins has retreated securely into his shell and refused to debate William Lane Craig at the Sheldonian.

As the proposed debate was in his hometown, I don’t think travel costs were the issue. It’s really hard to see this as anything other than cowardice on Dawkins’ part.

Read more on the story here in The Guardian.

.

Scaling the Mountain of Truth

One of the many areas of overlap between science and Christianity is that they are both seeking the Truth.

The attainment of truth is often likened to climbing a mountain, and any hiker or climber can immediately understand why. Not only is it hard to do, but once you’re at the top you can suddenly see everything. What was previously obscured is now laid out clearly; what you saw in part from the plains you see in full from the heights. It’s a powerful metaphor, so let’s extend it a bit.

.

.

How exactly should we go about scaling a mountain? We know that we want to reach the top, but we have never climbed this mountain before and we can’t see a route to the top – or even the top itself – clearly from where we stand.

Well, one method could be to employ an algorithm. If we examine the ground at our feet , we will notice that it is inclined in a particular direction. If we head off in the direction of steepest incline for a little bit, we will have a different patch of ground higher up. Again, examine the ground, find the steepest incline, and go in that direction. Keep doing this and you should slowly tend towards the summit of the mountain.

.

.

In many ways, this is how Science seeks the truth.

We look at the known, the previous discoveries, we hypothesise, we test, we repeat. Slowly, incrementally, we rise.

There are a few potential problems, though. We may find that we reach a minor peak, or what mathematicians would call a “local maximum”, which is not truly the top of the mountain. The ground slopes down in all directions, but we aren’t yet at the true summit. We know this because there is still a part of the mountain higher than us: our current theory can explain much, but some things are still above us and beyond our understanding. By this we know that our theory is incomplete; it needs revision. At this point, we need to retrace our steps back down into a valley and try again.

Alternatively, we may run into an incline that is too great, an impassable cliff. Our algorithm points us up the rock face, but the limitations of observation, or of experimental possibility, or whatever, make it impossible to proceed in that direction.

So the scientific mountaineering method is useful, and allows us to build on previous experience, but it clearly has limits. It may take us to false peaks first, it may get stuck, but in theory it should bring us closer to the summit with every iteration.

.

Of course, as any mountaineer knows, this isn’t how we actually climb. So let’s think about some alternatives.

What about a path? Not every path is guaranteed to lead to the summit, but some might. What if there are signposts? What if we meet someone who says he has been to the top, and tells you which path he took? What if other people have gone before us, and drawn a map for those who follow?

Should we not investigate those alternative, indirect, less rigorously scientific methods of reaching the summit?

.

—————————————

Related posts:

On Spherical Cows and the Search for Truth

Maths, science and abstractions

Faith: reflecting on evidence

.

What is man, that thou art mindful of him?

Atheism as manifest in the West is an odd phenomenon – in many ways, it’s very much an off-shoot of Christianity. It’s essentially the result of taking Christ out of Christianity and trying to hang onto the rest if it. So we see widespread support for the “loving your neighbour as yourself” commandment, but a willful disregard for its other half (loving God with your all). There is plenty of acknowledgement of Jesus as a teacher, but not as Lord. “He said some good things, but he’s was just this guy, you know?”

The best description that I’ve heard for this condition is “cut-flower morality”. We think that we can remove the teachings and the wisdom from the divine root and still enjoy their beauty. We deny that humans are made by God, and still expect that humans have intrinsic value.

.

I’ve heard the phrase “lucky mud” used to describe humans – it’s a description born from a rigidly materialist mindset that sees us as the current phase of a random and unguided evolutionary process. But the “lucky” part still acknowledges that there is value in human life, and yet the materialist worldview has no place for such value. If we are arbitrary evolutionary byproducts then we are no more special than the coal that we use to heat our homes or the rocks that we crush to make roads. Being alive has no value in such a mindset: how can it? Life is just a temporary arrangement of some chemical elements which displays certain unusual properties.

To quote Dr Manhattan, “A live human body and a deceased human body have the same number of particles. Structurally there’s no difference.”

.

Of course, this causes conflict. To actually deny the value of human life is quite literally psychopathic, so instead we try to justify the value of human life from a materialist worldview. So we see silly ideas from people like Richard Dawkins (in The Selfish Gene, for instance), claiming that we have a moral imperative to fight against evolution, even though evolution is the only thing that Dawkins seems to hold sacred. Despite the fact that all of humanity (other than the truly psychopathic) accept the existence of good and evil, in a materialistic worldview these words are meaningless.

.

King David, writing in about 1000BC, asked:

“What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” (Ps. 8:4, NIV)

In a materialist worldview, there is no answer to the first question. But the missing piece is hinted at in the second part: in Jesus, God became man to reconcile us to Him. The title “Son of Man” was Jesus’ favourite way of referring to himself, and it strongly emphasises the unique place that we have in God’s creation.

There is value in an artistic work because it was created with purpose. We too were made purposefully, and our continual and universal acknowledgement of our worth bears a powerful testimony to our Creator’s handiwork.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

The timidity of New Atheists

Seeing the gardener

Non-moral nature

.

Censorship and bad Apples

The media lines are all humming with outrage about an iPhone app. Not the one that lets you avoid police checkpoints if you’re driving drunk, nor the one that gives detailed instructions on abusing illegal drugs – those are still readily available on the App Store.

No, the biggest story at the moment is about a self-help app from Exodus International. It provides information to assist people who want to make a lifestyle change.

That’s about it.

But that’s not how the media are reporting it:

CBS News: Church head: “Gay cure” iPhone app not offensive

ABC News: Apple Pulls ‘Anti-Gay’ App After Pressure

Huffington Post: Apple Pulls Controversial ‘Gay Cure’ App

Washington Post: …Apple complied with increasingly vocal requests to remove the “gay cure” app.

CNET News: Apple pulls ‘gay cure’ app following protests

Forbes.com: Apple Boots ‘Gay Cure’ App

.

The most alarming aspect of the coverage, I think, is the scare-quotes with which each media outlet is slavishly describing the app as a “gay cure” or “anti-gay” product. They’re all doing the same spin-job while pretending to report on the story. The Washington Post even admits in its article that the “Gay cure” nickname is inappropriate and nonsensical, but it’s in the headline nonetheless.

Jeff Buchanan, a senior director of Exodus International, said, “It’s being touted as a ‘gay cure’ app, and nothing could be further from the truth.” The organisation’s website clarifies their position further:

“Exodus does not claim to cure anyone.  That is not within our ability and certainly beyond the ability of our iPhone application, which simply provided mobile access to information available on our website. As complex human beings, sexual attractions develop for many known and unknown reasons and no one chooses those, but as sexual beings, we all make decisions about how to express ourselves. For those who consider the Bible to be life-giving truth, homosexual attractions and the desire to act on them are at odds with the desire to live a life that reflects the Christian faith and often results in moral tension.

… Exodus doesn’t believe there is a “cure” for homosexuality, adultery, arrogance, gossip or any other sin. There is, however, Jesus who paid the price for it all when He died on the cross. Then there is the daily, sometimes moment-by-moment, decision to live a life congruent with His teaching.

Our desire was simply to provide information to individuals exploring and looking for answers that are consistent with their own beliefs.  Apple already provides hundreds of apps specific to the GLBT community and has made the Gay Christian Network’s podcasts available on its iTunes store.  Our hope was to see equality represented on the same platform.”

Despite initially releasing the app with a +4 rating (i.e., “containing no objectionable material”), Apple did an abrupt about-turn in response to strong pressure from GLBT-activist group Change.org. An Apple spokesman today said that “[the app] violates our developer guidelines by being offensive to large groups of people.”

Alan Chambers, head of Exodus International, said recently in an interview: “I can understand people having an opinion about something. What I can’t understand is why they would find it offensive. The way it’s been touted and the scare tactics used by the other side – if that’s what it was all about, I would have signed (the petition) too.” Speaking to The Huffington Post, Chambers said, “I would hope in a perfect world that Apple would allow this diversity, that they would respect the diversity of their customers. It’s alarming to see that people who are opposed to free thought and diversity are attacking and causing this type of trouble for organizations like ours.”

For me, the question is one of free speech – will you let other people express their opinions even if you don’t agree with them? The developers of that app weren’t insisting that it come standard on every phone or that everyone in the world be forced to use it. They were expressing their opinion: that homosexuality is a choice, and that they believe it’s a bad choice.

Whether you or I agree with that opinion does not diminish their right to hold it. It’s an issue of free speech and the right to hold and express opinions. Are you so intolerant that you can’t abide anyone who disagrees with you?

The petition from Change.org condemns the app in pretty strong language: “No objectionable content? We beg to differ. Exodus’ message is hateful and bigoted.”

Fortunately for Change.org, they can “beg to differ” because they are allowed to express their opinions freely. It is very sad that they cannot seem to extend this courtesy to those who hold differing points of view.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

The relativist creed

Religion, sex and truth claims

.

King of Kings and Lord of the Rings

Frodo, Gandalf and Aragorn (all images copyright New Line Cinema).

.

I realise my posts have been sporadic of late, what with getting married and going on honeymoon and now slowly getting back into work. I’m gradually returning to writing – loads of ideas, but putting figurative pen to figurative paper has been pretty sporadic thus far. (Somehow ‘putting finger to keyboard’ just doesn’t have the same alliterative punch). In the meantime, I’ll give a shout out to a great piece of writing from Decent Films Guide, exploring the Christian philosophical backdrop of what I consider the greatest novel ever written, J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Lord of the Rings.

Tolkein, like his close friend and regular drinking buddy C. S. Lewis, was a Christian, but unlike Lewis he was skeptical of the use of allegory in narrative fiction. In contrast to The Chronicles of Narnia, Tolkein’s sagas of the Middle Earth do not contain any direct allegory of the Christian doctrine. However, the author’s own philosophy and worldview are very much apparent in the fabric of the stories.

For myself, I would further argue that the extraordinary power of Tolkein’s novel comes from its ability to convey fundamental truth about the world in which we live, so it’s no surprise to me that such resonance with the true state of the world has very close parallels with the truth of the Christian doctrine.

If you’re a fan of The Lord of the Rings, you should definitely check out the full article:

Faith and Fantasy: Tolkien the Catholic, The Lord of the Rings, and Peter Jackson’s Film Trilogy.

.

As a brief sample, consider the echoes of Christ in the three central heroes of the story:

Frodo, Gandalf, Aragorn: Priest, prophet, king

In fact, Frodo Baggins, Gandalf the Grey, and Aragorn each in a remote way embody one of the three aspects of Christ’s ministry as priest, prophet, and king. Each also undergoes a kind of sacrificial “death” and rebirth.

The priestly role belongs to Frodo, who bears a burden of terrible evil on behalf of the whole world, like Christ carrying his cross. Frodo’s via dolorosa or way of sorrows is at the very heart of Tolkien’s story, just as the crucifixion narratives are at the heart of the gospels accounts. As Christ descended into the grave, Frodo journeys into Mordor, the Land of Death, and there suffers a deathlike state in the lair of the giant spider Shelob before awakening to complete his task. And, as Christ ascended into heaven, Frodo’s life in Middle-earth comes to an end when he departs over the sea into the mythical West with the Elves, which is as much to say, into paradise.

Gandalf is the prophet, revealing hidden knowledge, working wonders, teaching others the way. Evoking the saving death and resurrection of Christ, Gandalf does battle with the powers of hell to save his friends, sacrificing himself and descending into the nether regions before being triumphantly reborn in greater power and glory as Gandalf the White. As with Frodo, Gandalf’s sojourn in Middle-earth ends with his final voyage over the sea into the West.

Finally, there is Aragorn, the crownless destined to be king. Besides being a messianic king of prophecy, Aragorn also dimly reflects the saving work of Christ by walking the Paths of the Dead and offering peace to the spirits there imprisoned, anticipating in a way the Harrowing of Hell. (The oath-breaking spirits Aragorn encounters on the Paths of the Dead, who cannot rest in peace until they expiate their treason, suggest a kind of purgatorial state.)

.

Anyway, that’s enough from me – go check out the article already.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Chesterton on Nature

.

It’s not the “what”, it’s the “why”

I’m currently reading “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay” by Michael Chabon. The book is set in New York during the late 1930s and ’40s – the Golden Age of comic books – and the titular heroes of the novel are budding comic book creators.

In an early scene they are discussing a potential hero for their own story: Should he fly? Should he be super-strong? Should he be invisible? (A little hard to draw that one, perhaps, but anyway…) Various combinations of superpowers are discussed, until Clay, the writer, has a sudden moment of revelation:

It’s not the what, it’s the why.

The character will not be interesting because of what crazy super-power that they give him, or even because of how he uses that remarkable talent. Readers will be far more interested in why he chooses to act in that way. Why does Batman not just lounge about in his luxurious mansion, but instead go out at night and battle against the criminal underworld? Those are the questions that drive the story and the readers’ interest in the character.

As with art, so too with life.

All people have the capacity for selfishness and for self-sacrifice, for nobility and for malice, for good and for evil. But why do we choose to act in one way or another?

I believe that all people are created in God’s image, and I therefore strive to love them as children of God. I often fail, but that’s the why. If I take care of someone who’s sick, if I feed someone who’s hungry, if I donate my time and energy to trying to show others some of God’s love in action, that’s why I do it. Because I want to be obedient to the God who created me and gave me life.

What’s your “why”?

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Living a good and/or Christian life

The timidity of New Atheists

A theoretical faith

.

Non-moral nature

I’m visiting some colleagues in Hobart at the moment, so I have a new route that I walk to work each day. It’s a tranquil and tree-lined avenue with some lovely gardens, especially now when all the spring flowers are in bloom.

Running alongside the path is a stream, and this morning, in that stream, were some ducks. Mostly they were doing normal duckish things – paddling about, quacking and nibbling the odd bit of water vegetation. But it’s spring, so they were also pretty frisky. In particular, there were two drakes which both seemed very keen on a female duck, which in turn was doing her best to paddle away from them. But the drakes were not to be discouraged. They held her head under the water and had their way with her despite all her struggling and flapping.

Just another day on the river. A light breeze, the delicate scent of flowers in the air and avian gang-rape in the water.

.

.

We often see grand claims to the effect that morality is just a by-product of evolution, but the reasoning is usually circular and the arguments poor. Dawkins, for example, while claiming that everything to do with anything can be explained by evolution, is predictably all over the place when he ventures into ethics. While he has said: “I don’t believe that there is hanging out there, anywhere, something called good and something called evil”, he also claims that our morality is seen when we rise above the selfishness of our genes:

“I am not advocating a morality based on evolution. I am saying how things have evolved. I am not saying how we humans morally ought to behave… Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to, because we may then at least have a chance to upset their designs, something that no other species has ever aspired to do.” (The Selfish Gene)

But this is just ridiculous: Evolution produced everything, including our sense of morality, but it is objectively “good” to act in a way that counteracts evolution. But the concept of “good” doesn’t actually exist objectively, it’s just an evolutionary product…

We can identify certain patterns of behaviour in the animal kingdom, and infer an evolved tendency towards particular behaviours. But we cannot ascribe moral value to actions based on evolutionary criteria. Stephen Jay Gould, in his 1982 essay “Nonmoral nature” (from which I shamelessly borrowed this title), wrote:

“Our failure to discern a universal good does not record any lack of insight or ingenuity, but merely demonstrates that nature contains no moral messages framed in human terms. Morality is a subject for philosophers, theologians, students of the humanities, indeed for all thinking people. The answers will not be read passively from nature; they do not, and cannot, arise from the data of science.”

Some animals mate for life, others are wildly promiscuous and indiscriminating in their sexual behaviour. In Bonobo apes about 75% of sexual activity is non-reproductive, and often involves infants. Sexual cannibalism is common in insects. In several species of mammals, including stoats and hyaena, sexual activity between adults and infant cubs has been observed (with the mother of the infants declining to interfere). Male bottlenose dolphins regularly engage in what appears to be forced intercourse, both within their species and towards other species. Female penguins exchange sexual favours for nest-building materials. Killing and eating infants (within a species, even within family groups) is common in many mammals.

But it is a very human peculiarity to look unfavourably on this sort of behaviour. Human child molesters are not tolerated: in fact they are generally perceived as the most abhorrent of people. We are outraged by such behaviour in our own society because we recognise an objective morality by which we can judge different actions.

This idea of “evolved ethics” is not new, of course, and the difficulties of trying to extrapolate morality from evolution have long been recognised. T. H. Huxley wrote in 1893:

“The propounders of [the evolution of ethics] adduce a number of more or less interesting facts and more or less sound arguments, in favour of the origin of the moral sentiments, in the same way as other natural phenomena, by a process of evolution. I have little doubt, for my part, that they are on the right track; but as the immoral sentiments have no less been evolved, there is, so far, as much natural sanction for the one as the other. The thief and the murderer follow nature just as much as the philanthropist. Cosmic evolution may teach us how the good and the evil tendencies of man may have come about; but, in itself, it is incompetent to furnish any better reason why what we call good is preferable to what we call evil than we had before.” (Evolution and Ethics)

Huxley makes a vital point here. Our understanding of morality and our application of moral principles to society (in our systems of justice, for instance) are far removed from the evolutionary perspective. All societies believe in the existence of objective morality, and we all live our lives accordingly. This leads us to the possibility that absolute moral standards, like the laws of mathematics, are written into the universe and await discovery. In his excellent pair of articles on evolving morality over at the blog Engineering Ethics (see here for part 1 and part 2), Karl Stephan notes five principles which psychological research has found to be widely accepted throughout different societies:

(1) Harm—don’t hurt other people and help them if you can.

(2) Fairness—people in comparable situations should be treated comparably.

(3) Group loyalty—other things being equal, take care of your own (family, friends, city, nation) first.

(4) Authority—there are rules, rulers, and rulemakers who should be respected and deferred to.

(5) Purity—Saintliness, cleanliness, and being without spot or blemish are good things, and grubbiness, filth, and disorder are bad ones.

Stephan also observes that the concept of morality as a Natural Law was also espoused by Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century, so the while the psychological research is new, the idea has a long pedigree.

Looking even further back,  St. Paul wrote a letter to the newly-established church in Rome in the first century AD. In it, he described how people who had not been instructed in Christian morality nonetheless acted in accordance with that morality, because God has written His law on the hearts of all people:

“Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law.  They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.” (Rom 2:14-15, NIV)

All of our human experience declares that objective morality exists, but an objective morality cannot possibly be ascribed to evolution. Are there laws of  morality written into the fabric of the universe? Do they await discovery?

Or can they be discovered more readily from looking within?

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Secular (in)Humanism

Chesterton on Nature

Two evolutionists walk into a bar…

.

The power of narrative

I’ve been reading Richard Swinburne’s Revelation, and it is a remarkable book. The first couple of chapters deal in great depth with analysing what the “meaning” of a sentence actually is, how (and if) it can be falsifiable, and how to discern exactly when such devices as metaphor, analogy and so on are being employed. (And yes, this really does need multiple chapters. Fortunately, Swinburne is an eminently readable philosopher and communicates so well that even this dry subject matter becomes fascinating in his hands).

Reading the book has gotten me thinking a lot about different literary genres: not just the reality of their existence, but rather the reasons that an author might choose to employ them.

.

.

I think it is worth observing that certain messages are better suited to certain styles of communication. Let us consider the novel as an example. We are familiar with novels that simply tell an entertaining story: Steinbeck’s Cannery Row and Tolkein’s The Hobbit are books that I would suggest are overwhelmingly story-driven. On the other extreme, we have books that are making deliberate and specific commentary by means of a story: Orwell’s Animal Farm, Golding’s Lord of the Flies and Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress are all obvious examples. And in between we have a broad range of novels which tell a story and also make philosophical/political/social commentary on the side: Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Hugo’s Les Miserables and Hemmingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls all make important and incisive statements as well as telling great stories.

Which brings us to the question: if Hemmingway decided he had something important to say about death, suicide, Fascism and the nature of duty, why did he write For Whom the Bell Tolls instead of just expressing himself more clearly in an essay? Why resort to imagery and a great big framing narrative to communicate what you want to say?

An obvious reason is multitasking. Hemmingway wasn’t just trying to make socio-political commentary, he was also describing some of the history of the Spanish Civil War and trying to entertain his readers with interesting characters and a good story. Doing all of these things independently would be fragmented and weak. Perhaps more importantly, if he had just written a dry academic paper on Fascism, how many people would ever read it? Or having read it, remember it? Or having remembered it, care about it?

This is a vital function of the narrative-as-framing-device: it connects with us on a human level and gives the message much more impact. An abstract description of psychological tendencies which can manifest in people contemplating their own probably-impending death would lack any emotional impact and be difficult to absorb. Describing Robert Jordan’s last few days in the Spainish mountains is vivid and accessible, and at the same time it gives a much greater and more nuanced expression of the same subject.

In short, the narrative carries us along and holds our interest as we absorb the grand themes that the author is trying to express. A well-written novel also resonates with the reader: we recognise the characters and events as credible, and thus the message has greater authority.

.

Biblical narrative

The Bible is not fiction, and does not contain anything which really corresponds to a conventional novel (understandably, since the novel as a literary style only dates from the 17th century). However, I believe that it is important to use what we have learnt from reading prose fiction in reading and interpreting the Bible.

It is hardly revolutionary to note that the Bible is neither an instruction manual nor a straightforward theological treatise. It is not, as Gordon Fee and Douglas Stewart note, simply a collection of “Sayings from Chairman God”. Not only does its subject matter cover the full breadth of human experience, it does so in a confusing blend of genres and writing styles. Why make things so complicated? I won’t try to give a comprehensive answer here, but I will at least look at the use of narrative history in the Old Testament.

The “novel with a message” approach works because people respond more readily to messages framed in stories. Consider King David, whose story of “humble shepherd to mighty king of Israel” is recounted in 1 Samuel 16 – 1 Kings 2.  When we read the history of David’s reign, we see a tangible and powerful picture of a flawed human living with overwhelming dedication to God. Many of the key teachings of the story could be summarised in point form:

• People are flawed. Even the greatest of us will fail to live up to our own standards, and will certainly never meet God’s.
• The first step in dealing with our mistakes is to honestly admit them.
• God loves us. He is faithful and ready to forgive our wrongdoing.
• Our sin carries consequences in this life. Forgiveness does not remove these consequences.

…and that’s nice and neat. But which resonates more powerfully: the single line “People are all flawed and prone to sin”, or the story of David lusting after the married Bathsheba and arranging to have her husband killed (2 Samuel 11)? Which is more memorable? And is there not much greater authority and impact in the message when it comes in the context of an historical narrative?

There are dangers of framing a message in the context of a narrative, of course: it can be misinterpreted more easily than a set of bullet points. But there are strong safeguards against this in the Bible, as long as we actually read it in context. Let’s consider the same story: could we not say, “David was God’s chosen king and a really great guy, and he committed adultery, so it’s clearly ok!” But if we read the passage in context it is easy to see that David’s action was offensive to God. In the very next chapter, the prophet Nathan provides God’s perspective on the story and rebukes David for his actions. The Old Testament prophets often provide  a sort of commentary from God on the events which are taking place.

There are many other advantages to the use of historical narrative in the Old Testament, such as the multi-tasking mentioned earlier: recounting the history of the people of Israel is important in its own right. But this post is probably long enough already and I’m still working through a lot of these ideas, so I’ll unpack more thoughts on genre and hermeneutics in another post. To close, consider that some genres allow a writer to express things which are impossible (or at least difficult) to adequately convey in simple declarative statements. We have seen that the narrative form allows us to convey an over-arching message in a more compelling and accessible way; likewise, the poetic form allows an author much greater use of metaphorical imagery to convey emotions and ideas not easily captured in prose.

“Genre is not a restriction on an author. Rather, it provides him with a set of conventions, all ready to use, to express his message.” (Richard Swinburne, Revelation: From metaphor to analogy)

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Matters of interpretation

On reading both books

.

Elephants and blind men

The well-known story of the six blind men trying to describe an elephant is often portrayed as an allegory of religious diversity: the descriptions of the elephant are different for each person, based on the particular aspect with which he came into contact:

The first touches its leg and says that an elephant is like a tree, another touches its side and says that an elephant is like a rough wall. Another feels its tail and says that an elephant is like a piece of rope. Each comes into contact with a different part of the elephant and is convinced that their own explanation is correct and that the others are wrong. None of them realises that they are all experiencing just one part of the same elephant and that none of their explanations are complete.

The suggestion is that diverse religions are likewise each only seeing part of the fuller and more complete truth. The problem with this explanation is that it takes the perspective of a sighted person who can actually see the whole elephant: without this perspective the story makes no sense. To make the claim that “all religions are just seeing a different part of the same truth” is to claim knowledge of that truth, and to claim to stand in a similar relation to the truth as the sighted observer in the elephant story.

Over at bethinking.org, Chris Knight offers an alternative version of the story which provides significantly more illumination on the question of religious diversity. Read it here:

The Blind Men and the Elephant at the Zoo

.

There’s no “I” in atheism

I recently posted Creed, a poem by Steve Turner which outlines the relativist worldview. Although satirical, the poem does present many commonly-held beliefs amongst atheists. But it also does something which goes beyond the typical atheist approach: it actually sets out those beliefs clearly.

Yes, I’m aware that atheism isn’t a uniform worldview. But neither is Christianity. The central core of Christianity is uniform – that’s how we recognise it. But there are plenty of differences in opinion and a great deal of (often heated) discussion about everything beyond what is covered in the ecumenical creeds. There are many denominations in Christianity, but within each denomination there is a clear articulation of their beliefs. In short, you know exactly what you’re dealing with if you want to debate what Catholics or Baptists believe.

.

Speaking of clear articulations, let’s have a couple of definitions so that we all know what we’re talking about:

Encyclopaedia Britannica (2010):

Instead of saying that an atheist is someone who believes that it is false or probably false that there is a God, a more adequate characterization of atheism consists in the more complex claim that to be an atheist is to be someone who rejects belief in God.

Encyclopedia of Philosophy (MacMillan, 2005):

On our definition, an ‘atheist’ is a person who rejects belief in God.

.

Within atheism there are also many different views on issues of secondary importance. The primary issue is denial of God (and usually the supernatural), but beyond that it’s an open field. And that’s great: discussions about why we hold different beliefs can be an excellent way of learning about alternative points of view, and also help us to understand our own beliefs better.

But we have to actually hold a coherent set of beliefs before we can have a useful discussion.

.

.

I recently had a lengthy exchange with an atheist about the origins of morality. In over 2500 words of discussion, my correspondent never offered a concrete statement of personal beliefs. All sorts of theories were suggested, mention was made of “fascinating new research about morality” in various quarters, books titles and authors were offered as solemn incantations.

But as to the beliefs held personally by the individual? Not a peep. My own personal beliefs were articulated and examined at length, but repeated requests for a clear statement of my correspondent’s beliefs were met only with deflection and evasion.

I mention this particular exchange as but one example of a much larger trend. I observe in conversations with atheists an almost pathological aversion to the personal pronoun.

“Look, all these people have been writing big books on the subject!”

Yes, and…? What do you personally believe?

“Research supports this particular belief!”

Great. Do you personally believe that?

“Recent advances in [genetics]/[cosmology]/[evolutionary biology] indicate that…”

Do you personally use those advances as the basis of your worldview, or are your beliefs based on something else? And if so, what?

.

Socrates famously declared that “An unexamined life is not worth living”. But an unexaminable life is no life at all. If personal beliefs cannot be articulated, they cannot be understood the individual, let alone by others.

The Nicene Creed is a towering pillar of the Christian faith. It is a clear and succinct articulation of the core beliefs of Christianity, a concise expression of primary doctrine. To affirm the creed is to draw a clear line in the sand and say, “these are my beliefs.” That is the starting point for a useful discussion.

The Creed does not start off with: “Christians in general maintain that…”, or “It has long been the opinion of great theologians…”, or “The official Church position is that…”

It starts much more simply:

“I believe …”

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Lumpy atheism

Having the wrong conversation

The relativist creed

.

Religion, sex and truth claims

Truth claims are everywhere.

Sometimes the connections are complicated: our systems of justice are predicated on the assumption of free will, because without the choice to act or not in a particular situation, there can be no question of responsibility for actions. This in turn makes the truth claim that rigid materialism is false (because otherwise our actions are merely the results of random unguided processes – indeed, we are just collections of random unguided processes).

The ones I’m interested in today are a little more straightforward, but still quite subtle. For example:

“Religion should evolve with society.”

Buried in this statement is the claim that religious beliefs do not contain ultimate truth, and that religions are really just support clubs. If the core teaching of a religion should evolve, then it contains no absolute truth, for such truth would transcend social fashions.

“The Bible was written by primitive people in an ancient culture thousands of years ago, so it can’t be relevant to us now.”

Again, if there is objective truth, if there is an objective morality, if human life is objectively valuable, then these things are impervious to the passage of time. And if such teaching is contained in the Bible then it remains just as relevant today as when it was originally penned.

But the statement that I really want to look at today is this one:

“Everyone is entitled to their own religious views, but they must keep them at home and out of the public space.”

While it looks all sweet and tolerant and accepting on the surface, this statement actually claims that religion is irrelevant and contains nothing of real truth or value. Because if we believe that something is important, then we need to talk about it and explore it, not conceal it. Francis Crick once said, “Christianity may be OK between consenting adults in private but should not be taught to young children.” I doubt that he would have advocated similarly for protecting children from learning about biology. In making that statement, he was actually claiming that religion is neither true nor valuable.

Which brings us to sex, of course.

On the surface, sex may seem like a rebuttal to my argument, since we certainly try to shield children from too much contact with it. But sex is still something that is very important to us, and we actually don’t keep it out of public: we talk about it all the time, we wear wedding rings, we are outraged by incidents involving sexual abuse. We acknowledge that it is very important, so we talk about it and keep it in public view. This isn’t just a new permissive 21st century phenomenon, either – we have always kept sex in public. The really important part of sex is the joining of two individuals, not the physical details. Marriage is an important part of sex. So are the children which result from it. Even the most prudish Victorians actually kept the reality of sex and discussion of sexually-related topics firmly in the public domain.

Earlier this year the Global Atheist Convention came to Melbourne. Amidst all the silliness and ravings, all the outlandish and ridiculous grandstanding, the convention did perform a valuable function: it brought the conversation about God into the public domain.

We need to keep it there. It’s important, it’s not going away, and it deserves our attention.

And let’s also stop pretending that “Keep your religion at home” is either innocuous or tolerant.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Living a good and/or Christian life

Believing and understanding

Chesterton on Miracles

.

Sex and science: Discuss

Sex and science: we need to talk about both. And not just on this blog – we need to talk about them in church and at home, too.

Both sex and science are hugely powerful and important. Both have the potential to be wonderful, or to be terribly destructive. Responsibility and maturity are needed before we can safely handle either.

This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t teach our kids about sex, or science for that matter. Interest and curiosity (in both areas) are aroused from a young age, so let’s rather start the discussions early. Parents and pastors need to be willing to engage openly with both subjects.

But we need to be honest about both. Eventually, kids are going to grow up and engage with the wider world, and the wider world is drenched in both science and sex.

.

Choose your perversion

.

Teaching kids that sex is bad or wrong or evil is ultimately destructive. At best, they will grow up with all sorts of psychological baggage that will inhibit their ability to engage in healthy and fulfilling sex lives when they eventually get married. At worst, this sort of teaching will just make sex more attractive and alluring, and the desire to experiment will be irresistable. We’ve all seen the results of irresponsible sexual experimentation, and it’s tragic. But this does not mean that sex itself is bad, or that it should always be avoided. It just means that we need to be aware of what defines a responsible and safe context within which to engage with the power of sex.

I’ve quoted elsewhere the observation by Vox Day that rebellion against religious teachings on sexuality can be a powerful incentive to start ignoring God:

“The idea that there is any rational basis for atheism is further damaged by the way in which so many atheists become atheists during adolescence, an age that combines a tendency toward mindless rebellion as well as the onset of sexual desires that collide with religious strictures on their satisfaction.”

But this does not necessarily indicate a mindless nihilism. If the adolescent has never been given an understanding of why there are limits on how, where and when sexual desires should be fulfilled, then there is no reason not to discard such strictures in favour of a raging libido. “I really REALLY want to do this, and I don’t find myself with any compelling arguments opposing it, so why not?”

.

Which brings us to science. Francis Collins, former head of the Human Genome Project, writes about his own transition from a nominally Christian upbringing to an atheist worldview:

“I became an atheist because as a graduate student studying quantum physics, life seemed to be reducible to second-order differential equations. Mathematics, chemistry and physics had it all. And I didn’t see any need to go beyond that. Frankly, I was at a point in my young life where it was convenient for me to not have to deal with a God. I kind of liked being in charge myself.”

We note that there is the adolescent rebellion thing again, but there also another motivation: Collins was exposed to new scientific concepts that seemed to explain everything and left no room for God. This is always a danger if a student has never learned to recognise the limits of science and how these limits relate to theology. (As a general rule, science is good on the “How?” questions and proximate causes; it’s really bad on the “Why?” questions and ultimate causes. Happy footnote: Collins later rejected the bankruptcy of atheism and recognised the intellectual fulfillment offered by the Christian worldview).

In particular, it’s very common for explanations of mechanism (such as scientific theories of evolution, quantum physics or cosmology) to be falsely imbued with the quality of agency. Although this is an elementary error, it is a very frequent one: we see it from countless first-year university students, and also from eminent scientists such as biologists Richard Dawkins and Francis Crick, and chemist Peter Atkins. A well-known example comes from Dawkins’ book The Blind Watchmaker. Responding to William Paley’s classic “argument from design” (in which Paley suggested that the apparent design of living creatures points to their designer in the same way that a watch points to a watchmaker), Dawkins writes:

“Natural selection, the blind, unconscious automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life, has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no mind’s eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. If it can be said to play the role of watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker.”

It’s stirring rhetoric, but if you actually read it closely enough it stops making any sense. Philosophically, this is an example of a category error – what Dawkins does is substitute a mechanism (natural selection) for an agent (the Creator). In other words, to return to the metaphor, he has found a watch spring, and concluded that the watch did not need a designer. Indeed, he goes further: he claims that the watch spring built the whole watch.

This is ridiculous.  But in the absence of any previous exposure to evolutionary theory, it’s easy to get carried away by the prose until you don’t even notice that it is no longer logically coherent. Of course the Darwinian paradigm is a wonderful framework for structuring biological research, but it still has limits, and Dawkins has gone way beyond what evolutionary science can claim. Likewise, gravity is splendid for predicting the movement of celestial bodies, but it’s useless for explaining magnetism.

Like a hormonally-addled teenager on a hot date, we can be swept along on emotion rather than rationality if we have not learned to recognise the proper limitations of science.

Scientific repression is no solution. There are very real advantages to living with the products of scientific progress, and anybody can see that (although there are certainly dangers as well). But as with sex, we need to teach kids to engage with science responsibly.

And offering a silly substitute like “creation science” instead of the real thing will never be intellectually satisfying, much like a subscription to Playboy will never be a replacement for a loving, intimate relationship.

.

If we can start talking to kids about why a sexually promiscuous lifestyle is destructive, they are much more likely to actually value and protect their sexuality.

If we can start talking to kids about why Dawkins, Crick, Atkins, Harris etc. are scientifically off their collective rockers, we won’t have to worry that one day we’ll discover a copy of The God Delusion shoved furtively beneath the mattress.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Hypothetically speaking

“Creation Science” isn’t.

Overlap in the Magisterium?

.

The relativist creed

An atheist worldview encourages relativism, with its insistence on removal of moral absolutes and rejection of truth claims. One of the finest expressions of self-defeating nature of relativism is the poem Creed, written in 1993 by English poet and music journalist Steve Turner. (The postscript, called Chance, was added later).

Personally, I prefer the Nicene.

.

Creed by Steve Turner

We believe in Marxfreudanddarwin
We believe everything is OK
as long as you don’t hurt anyone
to the best of your definition of hurt,
and to the best of your knowledge.
.
We believe in sex before, during, and
after marriage.
We believe in the therapy of sin.
We believe that adultery is fun.
We believe that sodomy’s OK.
We believe that taboos are taboo.
.
We believe that everything’s getting better
despite evidence to the contrary.
The evidence must be investigated
And you can prove anything with evidence.
.
We believe there’s something in horoscopes
UFO’s and bent spoons.
Jesus was a good man just like Buddha,
Mohammed, and ourselves.
He was a good moral teacher though we think
His good morals were bad.
.
We believe that all religions are basically the same-
at least the one that we read was.
They all believe in love and goodness.
They only differ on matters of creation,
sin, heaven, hell, God, and salvation.
.
We believe that after death comes the Nothing
Because when you ask the dead what happens
they say nothing.
If death is not the end, if the dead have lied, then it’s compulsory heaven for all
excepting perhaps
Hitler, Stalin, and Genghis Kahn
.
We believe in Masters and Johnson
What’s selected is average.
What’s average is normal.
What’s normal is good.
.
We believe in total disarmament.
We believe there are direct links between warfare and bloodshed.
Americans should beat their guns into tractors
and the Russians would be sure to follow.
.
We believe that man is essentially good.
It’s only his behavior that lets him down.
This is the fault of society.
Society is the fault of conditions.
Conditions are the fault of society.
.
We believe that each man must find the truth that
is right for him.
Reality will adapt accordingly.
The universe will readjust.
History will alter.
We believe that there is no absolute truth
excepting the truth
that there is no absolute truth.
.
We believe in the rejection of creeds,
And the flowering of individual thought.
.
Postscript:
If chance be
the Father of all flesh,
disaster is his rainbow in the sky
and when you hear:
.
State of Emergency!
Sniper Kills Ten!
Troops on Rampage!
Whites go Looting!
.
It is but the sound of man
worshipping his maker.
.

—————————————

Related posts:

Living a good and/or Christian life

Children of God

Secular (in)Humanism

.

Faith is a part of life

In my last post, I wrote about what “faith” means in a Christian context. It’s a complex and multi-faceted term, but it is important to appreciate that faith is not just an aspect of Christianity. It is a part of life.

Theologian Tyron Inbody wrote the following:

“…faith is a dimension of the human existence as such. There can be no human life without the presence of faith. The opposite of faith is not doubt but nihilism – the loss of order, meaning and purpose in life… The scientist cannot operate apart from faith – faith in the dependability of nature, the orderliness and intelligibility of the universe, the unity of nature and the harmony of its laws. Social life is impossible apart from faith. We cannot exist without elemental trust in each other. If you doubt this, consider what one terrorist attack can do to undermine our confidence in the social order. And we act as if this social order is to some degree moral. We assume and affirm that there are things we ought to do and things we ought not to do. Although we may not agree on which things are which, we act with moral demands that are binding. These beliefs point to the fact that we cannot exist as humans apart from faith. They are justified not because they are demonstrable but because we cannot live without them. They constitute a primordial faith.” (The faith of the Christian church: an introduction to theology)

.

More specifically, science depends on faith.

Eugene Wigner received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1963. Like Einstein before him, Wigner was particularly interested in how well mathematics describes the physical universe:

“The enormous usefulness of mathematics in the natural sciences is something bordering on the mysterious, and there is no rational explanation for it… it is an article of faith.” (The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics)

.

Similarly, from physicist Sir John Polkinghorne:

“Science does not explain the mathematical intelligibility of the physical world, for it is part of science’s founding faith that this is so.” (Reason and Reality)

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Faith: reflecting on evidence

Believing and understanding

Chesterton on Miracles

.

A theoretical faith

The title of this post contains a pair of words that can be difficult to nail down. Let’s take them one at a time:

.

Theory

In common parlance the word “theory” is used to denote something purely conceptual, usually in contrast to something which has been implemented in the real world. This causes difficulty when referring to scientific theories, because in science, the word carries somewhat different implications. Scientific explanations for observed phenomena start as hypotheses, which are basically conjecture. After more testing and data collection, if the hypothesis appears to be useful in explaining the data and predicting results, confidence in the explanation increases. Once there is a strong weight of supporting evidence, we start to refer to the explanation as a “theory”.

The American National Academy of Sciences describes the distinction in usage thus:

“In everyday language a theory means a hunch or speculation. Not so in science. In science, the word theory refers to a comprehensive explanation of an important feature of nature supported by [data] gathered over time. Theories also allow scientists to make predictions about as yet unobserved phenomena…”

So it is understandable that scientists become frustrated with the dismissal of a scientific theory with phrases like, “oh, it’s just a theory”. This sort of language shows a grave misunderstanding of the subject.

.

Faith

Likewise, in common parlance, “faith” is often understood to mean “a belief without evidence”. But in the Christian context, faith carries very different connotations. Theologian Tyron Inbody (in The faith of the Christian church: an introduction to theology) notes three uses of “faith” within Christianity:

• Assent: we believe that God has revealed Himself to us and can be known personally. This aspect of faith is largely intellectual: we are presented with God’s assertions about Himself (in the Bible, for instance), we decide that they are trustworthy and assert that they are true.
• Trust: we believe that God will honour His promises, and that He is reliable.
• Loyalty: we strive to ‘live out our faith’. In this context: “To have faith is… to obey Jesus; it is to be loyal in life and death to the God whom we meet in Jesus Christ.”

Although these three aspects of Christian faith are distinguishable, they are also inseparable. Christian faith is inextricably entwined with understanding: we have knowledge and understanding of God from personal experience, Scripture and the community of believers, and this forms the basis of our trust in God. Inbody writes:

“Faith in the New Testament means belief, specifically belief in God’s Word in Scripture. To have faith is to assent or to give credence; it is to believe. Faith refers to our acceptance of the message of the gospel… Faith means ‘belief in and acceptance of His revelation as true… an act of intellect assenting to revealed truth.”

The Christian faith is not divorced from reason: it is inseparable from reason. But as Thomas Aquinas explained, it is not just an intellectual exercise: it is also an act of will. I decide that certain things are true, and I choose to act on that belief.

.

A theoretical faith

Now, why have I put these two difficult words together?

Well, my personal exploration and acceptance of the Christian faith was similar in many ways to the development of a scientific theory. From the tentative hypothesis that Christianity is true, I sought more data with which to test this conjecture. The central elements of Christianity are the claims about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. I found the evidence of his death and resurrection convincing enough to explore further.

A scientific theory is a framework which helps to explain observed phenomena. What about Jesus’ life and teachings? Do they make sense of the world I experience?  The framework of Christianity explains the world that I see around me more coherently than any other.

Of course, we should seek to challenge any theory to test its robustness, so I do this with my faith. The “problem of evil” is often considered the biggest counter to Christianity: Given that we observe evil in the world, how can we believe in the existence of a God who is both loving and all-powerful? I explore this question, and I come to a remarkable conclusion: Firstly, I find in Christianity a compelling and convincing framework to explain the coexistence of evil in this world and the Christian understanding of God. Secondly, if I try to remove God from the picture, I don’t even know what the word “evil” means. It turns out that the “challenge” becomes still further support for my beliefs. And so my faith grows. The more that I test it, the more compelling it becomes.

Christianity also claims that we can experience God personally. Here we must move to the “belief in”. I move from a position of intellectual assent and step out: I seek to meet with God through prayer and personal experience. He meets me. The God I encounter personally resonates completely with the God of my intellectual assent. My faith grows.

From my experience, my belief in God, comes my loyalty to God. I have found that if I seek to live my life in accordance with His will and listening to Him, my life is a much better place. He has shown Himself to be faithful and good.

.

I do not think that my personal experiences are unusual: in fact, I would say that the process I have described is analogous to the faith of most any Christian. The details will be a bit different, of course. St Paul had a rather more dramatic starting point for his faith, but he still based it on beliefs about God: specifically, beliefs that Jesus was God and that he was resurrected from the dead. Paul’s belief in and loyalty to God were a response to this.

Christian faith intrinsically contains a rational and evidentiary basis. N. T. Wright, the bishop of Durham, writes:

“I cannot… imagine a Christianity in which the would-be Christian has no sense, and never has had any sense, of the presence and love of God, or the reality of prayer, of their everyday, this-worldly life being somehow addressed, interpenetrated, confronted, embraced by a personal being understood as the God we know through Jesus.”

For a final description of faith in a Christian context, I close – as is often the case – with C. S. Lewis. In Mere Christianity, Lewis writes:

“Faith, in the sense in which I am here using the word, is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods.”

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Faith: reflecting on evidence

Believing and understanding

Chesterton on Miracles

.

Hypothetically speaking

It’s a common atheist article of faith  – at least amongst members of the more vocal denominations – that science is the only reliable path to knowledge. There are a few problems with this belief, mostly to do with the fundamental limitations of the framework in which scientific inquiry operates, which usually leads to flawed claims about what science can demonstrate.

The problem becomes even bigger when we move away from the proper domain of science but still try and sound all “sciencey” – generally to try and give a weak argument a veneer of authority. Thus we see such unfortunate mixed metaphors as “mind virus”, “meme” and “cultural evolution”, all of which take concepts from their proper scientific domain of biology and arbitrarily apply them to psychology and sociology, in which fields they are hopelessly inappropriate.

What exactly is the memetic equivalent for DNA? Has it been identified?

How exactly is a “mind virus” distinct from “a popular idea that I personally don’t like”?

.

“Memes” and other non-scientific ravings

This unfortunate tendency is displayed by professional scientists as well as dilettantes. Let’s look, for example, at an early instance of Richard Dawkins stepping off the edge of the scientific map but clinging desperately to the jargon. The passage below is from The Selfish Gene, in which Dawkins first introduced his odious “meme”:

The laws of physics are supposed to be true all over the accessible universe.  Are there any principles of biology that are likely to have similar universal validity? … I think that a new kind of replicator has recently emerged on this very planet… Examples of memes are tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches.  Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperms or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process which, in the broad sense, can be called imitation.

…And this isn’t just a way of talking — the meme for, say, “belief in life after death” is actually realized physically, millions of times over, as a structure in the nervous systems of individual men the world over.

…Consider the idea of God.  We do not know how it arose in the meme pool.  Probably it originated many times by independent `mutation’.

Here’s the recipe that Dawkins seems to be following to create his theory:

1. Take a tiny pinch of physics.

2. Misappropriate a dab of biology.

3. Mix in a whole lot of crazy guesswork and random analogies.

4. Top it off with a broad covering of atheism.

Let me unpack that in a bit more detail:

His opening statement about physics is misleading. He refers to the universal applicability of the laws of physics, but this is in itself an assumption. The laws of physics that we know about operate only within limits: we hope that there are even more fundamental (as yet unknown) laws that are universal, but it’s still a work in progress. The Dark Matter questions illustrate these problems.

From a wobbly starting assumption about physics, Dawkins leaps straight to a wholly unfounded assumption about biology – that it must operate the same way that physics (maybe) operates. From there he moves confidently to claiming to have identified a universal principle of biology (the existence of mutating replicators), and identifying (how, exactly?) a new example of the type (memes).

Then he dives headfirst into the jargon soup: meme-pools, memetic propogation, etc, freely borrowing from biological terminology with no explanation of how such analogues are justifiable.

This would be misleading enough if he were merely employing a bad metaphor, but he freely claims that “this isn’t just a way of talking” – his meme is an identifiable feature of the universe!

Wow, those are some big claims.

What’s his evidence for memes, by the way? Oh, that’s right: there isn’t any.

Well, as Dawkins famously said:

“…next time somebody tells you that something is true, why not say to them: ‘What kind of evidence is there for that?’ And if they can’t give you a good answer, I hope you’ll think very carefully before you believe a word they say.”

How, in all this, is his use of “meme” more useful to the conversation than just saying “idea”? What it his justification for the new term?

Simple: it sounds more sciencey.

.

“God hypothesis” is not a scientific term

There is another misleading expression much beloved of Dawkins and his ilk, and that is “the God hypothesis”. Like “meme”, this terminology is pseudo-scientific claptrap masquerading as rationality.

The word “hypothesis” has a specific meaning in science: it’s a tentative explanation for something which can be further tested. But the expression “God hypothesis” is ridiculous, particularly when the discussion concerns Christianity (in which context it is most often employed). God supercedes the natural world, and is impervious to experimentation.

More importantly, the impression conveyed by the phrase “God hypothesis” is that “well, we don’t know how this thing works, so let’s invoke some supernatural creator of the universe and claim that he did it”. But this is also ridiculous and misleading.

Let’s take the origin of the universe as an example, since that’s where the phrase is most often used.

Scientific consensus is that time and space were created about 15 billion years ago, and also that observation is impossible of events “before” t=0. Thus scientific consensus also declares that scientific inquiry is limited to the period after the Big Bang, and cannot investigate a causal agent.

So the short version is, science can’t help us with the question of whether God created the universe.

At this point, big and fancy words like “parsimony” tend to get thrown into the conversation. The argument is that “God” is a complex idea, and introducing “God” just to explain the Big Bang is philosophical overkill. (Philosophical, note, not scientific – remember that we are off the scientific map).

However, the Christian view does not suggest God as an arbitrary causal agent: knowledge of God exists independently of Origin questions, and views of God creating everything (including time) from outside of creation predate the Big Bang model by nearly three millenia. Augustine, writing 1500 years before the genesis of the Big Bang theory, described God outside of Time and God as a Prime Cause – this in an age when an eternal universe was the norm for non-Christian thought. Similarly, when Thomas Aquinas developed his argument of a “necessary God”  in Summa Theologica, this line of reasoning was independent of the Prime Cause issue.

The point is, God already exists in the Christian worldview. We already have knowledge of God from personal and historical revelation, from rational inquiry into the Universe, and so on. If anything, it actually simplifies the picture for God to also be the prime cause – He is not invoked to fill a gap, He is already in the worldview.

.

—————————————

Related posts:

Believing and understanding

Seeing the gardener

Two evolutionists walk into a bar…

.