What Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini Get Wrong

Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini are no creationists, but 'outright, card-carrying, signed-up, dyed-in-the-wool, no-holds-barred atheists'. That, however, only makes worse the incoherence of their understanding of Darwinism. There is much that Darwin got wrong, from his views of racial struggle to his occasional espousal of Lamarckism. There is nothing in this book, however, to suggest a fundamental flaw in his central argument about evolution by natural selection.

-- Kenan Malik, in "Pigs Won't Fly", his review of What Darwin Got Wrong by Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini (Profile Books 262pp £20).

Poll: "Milennials" ain't very religious

A Christian polling agency has determined that the members of the Milennial generation are not very religiously observant, according to an article in USA Today:

Most young adults today don't pray, don't worship and don't read the Bible, a major survey by a Christian research firm shows.

If the trends continue, "the Millennial generation will see churches closing as quickly as GM dealerships," says Thom Rainer, president of LifeWay Christian Resources. In the group's survey of 1,200 18- to 29-year-olds, 72% say they're "really more spiritual than religious."

Feel free to join a discussion of this latest development in the demystification of American youth, over at the Boston Atheists message board.

Weighing intelligence in Atheists and the religious

In an article for Psychology Today, Satoshi Kanazawa -- "the Scientific Fundamentalist" -- examines the hypothesis that Atheists are more intelligent than the religion (since it requires novel features associated with intelligence to overcome the evolved tendency to believe in gods).

Christian healthcare in the Houston Chronicle

Apparently if you watch the sex and the smokes, your fellow churchgoer may pitch in to cover your medical bills. It wouldn't hurt if you drop in a little prayer to make sure they pay, though, since they won't be under any legal obligation to do so. That's the thing with insurance: it's assured. It should also be non-profit, but that's another blog post.

From an article in the Houston Chronicle:

Here's how it works at Christian Healthcare: Members send in a monthly fee, resembling an insurance premium, which can range from about $50 for a single person to $450 for a family of four. That money, along with the payments from thousands of other members, is then distributed to pay sick members' medical bills. [...]

But they've been steadily growing in numbers and prominence — so much so that the recent federal health reform legislation has language exempting members from paying penalties most uninsured Americans will eventually have to pay. [...]

Said Chandler, the UH law professor: “People participating in this do need to have a little concern about solvency. You've sort of got to be relying on God here that this scheme will work out.”[...]

There are, however, a few catches. The ministries require members to be Christian, and they check with pastors for confirmation.[...]

There are also health care costs that can't be shared, most notably abortions or sexually transmitted diseases contracted out of marriage. Participants must also refrain from using tobacco and avoid sex outside of marriage, among other lifestyle requirements. [...]

Instead of paying more than $700 per month for premiums, Mark McLeod, a self-employed Houston geologist, currently pays Samaritan Ministries about $300 per month to cover himself, his wife and four of his children in a sharing plan.

“Who is going to take care of you — a company or people? I'd rather put my faith in people who believe in God.” McLeod explained.

Emphasis mine. Judging from the people I've met in the non-god-believin' community, I'm glad to say that Mark McLeod would be happily surprised to see how much he can rely on people of evolved ethics who happen not to share his religion. I've got no problem citing Scripture on this one, Galatians 6:2, "Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ."

Oh, you Bible you. Even a stopped clock is correct twice a day. For "law of Christ" here, read "the law of decency."

Dennett in the Globe on the unbelievers

The Boston Globe today has an interview with Daniel Dennett, on his research into the number of clergy that lack belief in a higher power:

It’s true, here are these young people in seminary, they have come with the purest of hearts and the noblest of intentions and they’re going to devote their lives to God. And one of the first things they learn is textual criticism. They’re looking at all the existing papyruses and scrolls and so forth and learning about the recension of the texts — the tortuous and often controversial historical path from Hebrew, Greek, and Latin versions of the books of the Bible — and all the Apocryphal books that got rejected — to the King James Version and all the later English translations. And that’s not what they taught you in Sunday school.

That’s the joke that we often provoke from people when we talk about this: Anybody who goes through seminary and comes out believing in God hasn’t been paying attention.

The article cited in the interview, containing initial anecdotal results from Dennett's collaborative investigations, appears at the Washington Post website. An excerpt:

The interviews were all conducted by Linda LaScola, a clinical social worker with years of professional experience as a qualitative researcher and psychotherapist, and, until recently, a regular churchgoer. Like her co-author, philosopher Daniel Dennett, the author of Breaking the Spell, she is an atheist who is nevertheless a sympathetic and fascinated observer of religious practices and attitudes. For this pilot study we managed to identify five brave pastors, all still actively engaged with parishes, who were prepared to trust us with their stories. All five are Protestants, with master’s level seminary education. Three represented liberal denominations (the liberals) and two came from more conservative, evangelical traditions (the literals). (We decided to concentrate this first project on Christians, and we would have included a Roman Catholic or Greek Orthodox priest, for instance–if we had encountered any, but we didn’t.) We initially had six participants, but one, a woman in the Episcopal church, had a change of heart as we were about to go to press and, at her request, all further references to her and quotations from her interviews have been removed.

Dawkins, Hitchens support legal challenge against Ratzinger

Richard Dawkins writes, in response to a Times article suggesting that he plans to arrest Joseph Ratzinger:

Needless to say, I did NOT say "I will arrest Pope Benedict XVI" or anything so personally grandiloquent. You have to remember that The Sunday Times is a Murdoch newspaper, and that all newspapers follow the odd custom of entrusting headlines to a sub-editor, not the author of the article itself.

What I DID say to Marc Horne when he telephoned me out of the blue, and I repeat it here, is that I am whole-heartedly behind the initiative by Geoffrey Robertson and Mark Stephens to mount a legal challenge to the Pope's proposed visit to Britain. Beyond that, I declined to comment to Marc Horme, other than to refer him to my 'Ratzinger is the Perfect Pope' article here: http://richarddawkins.net/articles/5341

Here is what really happened. Christopher Hitchens first proposed the legal challenge idea to me on March 14th. I responded enthusiastically, and suggested the name of a high profile human rights lawyer whom I know. I had lost her address, however, and set about tracking her down. Meanwhile, Christopher made the brilliant suggestion of Geoffrey Robertson. He approached him, and Mr Robertson's subsequent 'Put the Pope in the Dock' article in The Guardian shows him to be ideal.

The case is obviously in good hands, with him and Mark Stephens. I am especially intrigued by the proposed challenge to the legality of the Vatican as a sovereign state whose head can claim diplomatic immunity.

Even if the Pope doesn't end up in the dock, and even if the Vatican doesn't cancel the visit, I am optimistic that we shall raise public consciousness to the point where the British government will find it very awkward indeed to go ahead with the Pope's visit, let alone pay for it.

Also from the Times, an article surmising that the practice of sending abusive priests to therapy (rather than jail) contributed to high abuse rates.

What do members of the Boston-area nontheist community think -- how should the man known as Pope Benedict XV be held to account for the crimes of Catholic priests protected by the Church? Submit your vote.

Members of the Boston Atheists will be collaborating on a letter to the Archdiocese of Boston. We think the Catholic leadership should know what their secular neighbors think of the current situation. We're all in this together, eh? I don't think it is a legitimate argument that this is a Catholic problem to be dealt with by Catholics; rather it is a social problem to be dealt with by whomever is willing to step up and be counted as adult enough to accept responsibility for enforcing a durable ethics.

"Finding God after losing a job"

From the T rider's daily scrapsheet, the Boston Metro: "The religious community is responding to those who ... are turning towards the church in their time of need. Across the greater Boston area, institutions of faith are providing support programs for the jobless, based mostly on professional help as well as spiritual guidance."

Spiritual guidance is of little help for secular problems. Whatever benefits there are for a religious person in seeking spiritual solutions to their problems, depend entirely on the degree to which they've framed their social and ethical worldview in religious terms. Everyone can use a little guidance, support, and aid from time to time. Wouldn't it be nice, though, if everyone could enjoy such help without having to believe in untrue things about the world?

Christopher Hitchens proposes new commandments

In Vanity Fair, Christopher Hitchens considers -- and finds fault in -- a version of the Biblical commandments. Not one to tear down without suggesting we prepare to rebuild soon thereafter, he concludes his column with an attractive alternative draft:

• "Do not condemn people on the basis of their ethnicity or color.
  
• "Do not ever use people as private property.
  
• "Despise those who use violence or the threat of it in sexual relations.
  
• "Hide your face and weep if you dare to harm a child.
  
• "Do not condemn people for their inborn [sexual] nature.
  
• "Be aware that you too are an animal and dependent on the web of nature, and think and act accordingly.
  
• "Do not imagine that you can escape judgment if you rob people with a false prospectus rather than with a knife.
  
• "Turn off that fucking cell phone—you have no idea how unimportant your call is to us.
  
• "Denounce all jihadists and crusaders for what they are: psychopathic criminals with ugly delusions.
  
• "Be willing to renounce any god or any religion if any holy commandments should contradict any of the above.

"In short: Do not swallow your moral code in tablet form."

Smut for Smut Program

CBS News reports that an atheist group at the University of Texas, San Antonio is giving out pornography in exchange for Bibles, a campaign they call "Smut for Smut". This of course prompted complaints from the University's Christian group with complaints that it is offensive. However, University officials have decided to let students conduct the swap.

"As long as students are not violating laws or violating the Constitution, they have the freedom of speech and assembly," stated University spokesman, David Gabler.

Personally I think the Smut for Smut Campaign is pure brilliance and I think more groups should follow this example. Although, I must admit, the comparison isn't quite fair. With pornography, you at least get something out of it.

German Christian homeschoolers receive asylum

The NY Times is reporting on a German Christian family that sought and has won asylum status here in the United States. A Tennesse court agreed that the German state ban on home schooling is a form of unconscionable political oppression. The rationale behind the German policy is that home schooling enables different communities -- of faith, of national origin, etc. -- to diverge from the mainstream culture. By prohibiting homeschooling, the government seeks to avoid the creation of parallel or pocket cultures -- such as the Christian "quiverful" families in the US Bible Belt.

We've discussed the issue of homeschooling on the Boston Atheists podcast, and how it pertains to childrearing and cultural ownership. Opinions vary, but education is obviously a topic of central importance.

The insufficiency of a theological response to Haiti

Thus the whole world in every member groans:
All born for torment and for mutual death.
And o’er this ghastly chaos you would say
The ills of each make up the good of all!

-- Voltaire, from Poem on the Lisbon Disaster

This morning, Jackie Lavache -- an Assistant Organizer with the Boston Atheists-- asked me in her role as Boston Atheism Examiner asked me to put on my local organizer and State Director hat. She wanted to know what my response is to the news that a Christian ministry is spending time and money to send solar-powered talking Bibles to victims of the earthquake in Haiti.

My initial response is irritated revulsion. Hey! You! Get out of the way. Go back to church, study your scripture, and leave the problem-solving to us grown-ups who have learned to live in reality and to respond to reality in grown-up ways. This is an example of the consequences of believing honestly in untrue things. I can appreciate that the Christian folks at the Faith Comes By Hearing ministry think that they're helping to provide the most essential kind of relief, but thinking so doesn't make it so. Garbage in, garbage out -- when you believe in an eternal life after this one that can only be accessed through a relationship with a Bronze Age book, you're going to end up making some pretty wacky judgments about how to respond to crisis. What, there's been a natural disaster? Well, before we worry about food and water and infrastructure and medical care -- all of which cater to mortal needs only -- let's be sure we've got these poor people on board with the Gospel message. They might be battered, hungry, and hurt in the here and now, but they'll sure be glad in the long run that they've got eternity with God in the hereafter.

A friend pointed out to me that, since it is reasonable to guess that most Haitians are religious, solace of a religious kind will be greatly needed. True enough. I don't think that a good response to tragedy is to mock the faith of others and deny them the kind of comfort they are sincerely asking for. When I see that while some groups are sending food, money, and medicine, I have to shake my head at the relative placebo benefits of Bible study. But while I regret that religion is pandemic in Haiti, I don't think this is the moment for anti-religious crusading.

Now I read that Scientology is sending in personnel to do their version of disaster relief -- touch assists and detoxification, the usual flippery. Who knows how many prayer meetings have been organized already, and other calls to spiritual action. Certainly Christianity doesn't have a monopoly on well intentioned time-wasting. But: before we succumb to cynicism, let's consider that there are two separate impulses here. The first is the reflexive urge that human beings feel when others are in distress. Christians, Hubbardites, Atheists, all feel this urge. But then we have to channel this compassionate impulse into action, make decisions about how to help -- and that's when the worldview makes all the difference.

If you subscribe to untrue beliefs about reality, your judgment is likely to be impaired -- as we see when Christians pack and ship Bibles to Haiti, instead of diverting resources to aid agencies like the Red Cross. Or as when John Travolta uses his means to fly his fellow churchmembers down to Port au Prince to use the healing touch to accomplish exactly nothing.

Atheism doesn't have all the answers. It doesn't have any answers -- it is a doctrine-free worldview, one that consists simply and wholly of the lack of belief in deities. But at least atheism doesn't get in the way of our natural human impulse to HELP those in need. What we can learn from the response made by different groups to the Haiti tragedy is that people are most times better than their beliefs. And that people are better off without beliefs if those beliefs interfere with our ability to effectively discharge our duty as brother's keeper. What we can learn from the Haiti tragedy itself is that if gods exist, they are without question unworthy of our worship.

In such circumstances, let's put theology aside and roll up our sleeves. What's going on in Haiti isn't a "teaching moment." It is a natural disaster, and a call to action. The American Atheists website is reporting that Richard Dawkins has committed to paying PayPal fees (up to $10,000) for donations to Doctors Without Borders and the Red Cross. The Non-believers Giving Aid project provides a gateway to donate money to aid agencies that are known to be effective: http://givingaid.richarddawkins.net. I'd be surprised if any of you reading this haven't already learned how you can donate -- and if you hadn't already donated, knowing how generous you are -- but if you haven't, I encourage you to consider these agencies. They are efficient, and they are on the ground now.


NB: The epigraph to this post comes from "Poème sur le désastre de Lisbonne," in which Voltaire considers the 1755 earthquake that killed perhaps 100,000 people in Lisbon, Portugal. This event challenged religious and nonreligious thinkers alike to reconcile their respective worldviews with the existence of such profound suffering. The Enlightenment soon followed.

Theodicy is the branch of philosophy which attempts to explain the existence of suffering. I admit to being impatient with this project of understanding evil; rather I'm wanting a chance to pass judgment on the Christian god and his crimes. The image above, an engraving by William Blake, shows the Biblical figure Job being rebuked by his friends. Let us instead imagine that this is Jehovah, all-powerful and all-loving, finally brought to trial in front of the mortal beings whom he created and who He has subjected to such terrible needless affliction. This wish-fulfillment is exactly the plot of James Morrow's "Blameless in Abaddon," an excellent novelistic treatment of theodicy.

Boston Atheists membership hits 666

Fictional character has disdain for other fictional characters

Goldstein's arguments for a fictional god

At Edge.org, John Brockman introduces a brief excerpt from the first chapter of Rebecca Newberger Goldstein's forthcoming 2010 novel, 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction. Especially interesting in this preview, is the nonfiction appendix from the book -- it lists 36 arguments for the existence of god, and the reasons they each fail. Including "15. The Argument from the Inconceivability of Personal Annihilation":

1. I cannot conceive of my own annihilation: as soon as I start to think about what it would be like not to exist, I am thinking, which implies that I would exist (as in Descartes' Cogito ergo sum), which implies that I would not be thinking about what it is like not to exist.


2. My annihilation is inconceivable (from 1).


3. What cannot be conceived, cannot be.


4. I cannot be annihilated (from 2 & 3).


5. I survive after my death (from 4)

[The argument now proceeds on as in the argument from Survival After Death, only substituting in 'I' for 'a person,' until we get to:]

6. God exists.

FLAW 1: Premise 2 confuses psychological inconceivability with logical inconceivability. The sense in which I can't conceive of my own annihilation is like the sense in which I can't conceive of those whom I love may betray me—a failure of the imagination, not an impossible state of affairs. Thus Premise 2 ought to read "My annihilation is inconceivable to me.", which is a fact about what my brain can conceive, not a fact about what exists.

FLAW 2: Same as Flaw 3 from The Argument from the Survival of Death.

COMMENT: Though logically unsound, this is among the most powerful psychological impulses to believe in a soul, and an afterlife, and God. It genuinely is difficult—not to speak of disheartening— to conceive of oneself not existing!

The public responds to our Coalition of Reason

Spotted on a Red Line train, 11/9/09.

Boston Atheists Report 1.16

Our end-of-October podcast (having skipped our middle-of-October session), recorded 11/1/2009. Topics: Atheists celebrate Halloween in Boston; Religious zealotry still in Salem; spirituality threatens health care reform. Roundtable: Being good without gods

Download this podcast from our website, or, look for us on iTunes!

Sources Cited:

• Spiritual Health Care Bills Alert (Freedom From Religion Foundation)
• Keep Nonsense Out of Health Care Reform (Ed Brayton)
• Haunted Happenings - Salem, MA Halloween
• The Last Witchfinder by James Morrow - Review
• Church burns "witchcraft" children (Daily Telegraph)
• Decomposing Humanism: Why Replace Religion?
• Does Morality Depend on God? The Problem of Circularity
• Trust your Gut? Study Explores Religion, Morality, and Trust in Authority (Science Daily)

Scientology self-destructs a bit more

Ah, Boston -- the Athens of American, home to dozens of schools of higher learning. But even here, in this Beanpot of bibliophiles and brainiacs, the worst forms of collective delusion are able to survive. One of the more incredible organizations is Scientology, which houses its Boston programs in a lovely old brownstone building on Beacon Street in the Back Bay. In the past two years, Anonymous protesters have made a bit out noise out in front of their facility, but the Hubbardites are pretty snug in there... I don't think they're really considering dissolving their local activities just because a group of Guy Fawkes clones are inciting passing cars to honk their horns. The Church of Xenu, it often seems to me, is here to stay.

Which is why it is good to read about the increasingly bizarre public behavior, and increasingly rancorous internal politics, of Scientology's upper echelon. Optimistically, I'd like to label as just the latest step toward the cult's eventual collapse.

What Hitchens has learned from debating the religious

I haven't yet run into an argument that has made me want to change my mind. After all, a believing religious person, however brilliant or however good in debate, is compelled to stick fairly closely to a "script" that is known in advance, and known to me, too. However, I have discovered that the so-called Christian right is much less monolithic, and very much more polite and hospitable, than I would once have thought, or than most liberals believe.

-- Christopher Hitchens, the meanest Atheist in the world, in his latest column for Slate magazine.

Boston CoR ads on the Red Line, and in the Globe

Visit the website of the Boston Coalition of Reason, or read about the BostonCor ad campaign in the Globe.

Hello, Atheists who saw the Chronicle show!

We've seen a surge in our web traffic today, which must have something to do with Channel 5's feature on the nonreligious community, those of us who are good without gods.

To those of you who are here looking for more information about the secular community in Boston, I suggest you start with the website of the Boston Coalition of Reason. This website will lead you to the individual websites for all of the most active local secular resources -- social groups, campus organizations, and secular congregations.

Attending a Boston Atheists brunch or pub night is a great opportunity to meet like-minded people in the area. Our events calendar is managed at our Meetup.com page.

Jackie Lavache is the Boston Atheist Examiner, and writes about life in Boston from an Atheist perspective as well as about events of interest to the secular community. Her articles are a great and often entertaining blend of blogger commentary and journalism -- check it out at Examiner.com.

As the Director of the Boston Atheists, I work with our group's assistant organizers to plan events, create a programming calendar, and work toward a greater sense of shared interests among our members. Feel free to email me if you'd like to ask questions directly about our organization. I am also the State Director of the American Atheists, and happy to answer your questions about that educational organization.

The Chronicle broadcast could only offer a limit ed view of our community. We're happy to meet new people, answer questions, and share our experiences. So please, come on out!

UPDATE 11:51 pm, 10/27/09:
PS: I am marginally irritated that the Mormons are riding on our bespoke secular coattails. The video advertisement preceding the fourth segment of the Channel 5 Chronicle web broadcast is selling LDS snake oil.