Atheism

A heckler took on Mitt Romney for not “stand[ing] for the Lord Jesus Christ” because he’s a Mormon (video clip). This resulted in boos from the audience. Romney replied by saying that “one of the great things about this great land is that we have people of different faiths and different persuasions, and I’m convinced that the nation does need to have people of different faiths, but we need to have a person of faith lead the country.” This led to audience applause and a standing ovation. Radley Balko observes: “Romney and his supporters have already deflected as religious bigotry (correctly, in my view) the idea (supported by polls) that America isn’t ready for a Mormon in the White House. But Romney has no problem declaring that America isn’t ready for an atheist or agnostic in the White House. Frankly, that’s offensive." I agree, but also note this comment from the above video link: ...

You are 100% atheist! Hooray you are an atheist with respect to most or all gods. Good work. Hope you aren't disbelieving in the wrong one... Am I An Atheist Create a Quiz ...

P.Z. Myers pointed out the beginnings of a backlash against “the new atheism” in the Wall Street Journal on January 5, now on January 16 Ken Ham at Answers in Genesis has joined in: We’ve warned you about them before on our website—but now they’re on a much more aggressive march all across America. No longer are they just staying in their classrooms or writing books and articles in the comfort of their offices. They are “the new atheists,” and they are aggressively going after your children, your liberties, and your faith! … These atheists are not just publicity seekers. They are very serious about their mission. Dawkins, from England, was recently crusading across America to proclaim his atheism to newspapers, websites, and at public meetings. ...

I figured as much from his performance at this year’s Skeptics Society conference, where he refused to defend the scientific claims in his book State of Fear, but here’s how he’s responded to Washington journalist Michael Crowley’s critique in The New Republic–by putting Crowley as a character into his most recent novel, as a child rapist with a small penis: Alex Burnet was in the middle of the most difficult trial of her career, a rape case involving the sexual assault of a two-year-old boy in Malibu. The defendant, thirty-year-old Mick Crowley, was a Washington-based political columnist who was visiting his sister-in-law when he experienced an overwhelming urge to have anal sex with her young son, still in diapers. Crowley was a wealthy, spoiled Yale graduate and heir to a pharmaceutical fortune. … It turned out Crowley’s taste in love objects was well known in Washington, but [his lawyer]–as was his custom–tried the case vigorously in the press months before the trial, repeatedly characterizing Alex and the child’s mother as “fantasizing feminist fundamentalists” who had made up the whole thing from “their sick, twisted imaginations.” This, despite a well-documented hospital examination of the child. (Crowley’s penis was small, but he had still caused significant tears to the toddler’s rectum.) ...

Adrienne Shelly, an actress who starred in Hal Hartley’s films The Unbelievable Trust and Truth, was found dead in her NYC office by her husband. She was 40. Shelly, an agnostic, was a writer and director of independent films as well as an actress. UPDATE (November 7, 2006): A 19-year-old worker, Diego Pillco, who was helping renovate the Manhattan apartment that was Shelly’s office, has confessed to killing her and hanging her from the shower rod in the apartment bathroom. Very sad. UPDATE (February 18, 2007): Adrienne Shelly’s murder has now been fictionalized into an episode of Law & Order that aired last week, titled “Melting Pot.” The episode is really a mix of Adrienne Shelly’s murder and Theo van Gogh’s murder after making the film “Submission” with Ayaan Hirsi Ali–the character Erin Garrett is a combination of Shelly and Hirsi Ali. She is found hanged in her film office, and to have recently made a documentary film called “Fire Under the Veil.” (Shelly and Hirsi Ali are both known for being atheists, but atheism doesn’t factor in the Law & Order episode.) This may be the first time when the murder of someone who appeared on Law & Order was fictionalized in an episode of the show. She appeared in the episode “High & Low” in 2000. ...

Science writer John Horgan (author of the excellent book Rational Mysticism) weighs in on Jerry Adler’s “The New Naysayers” in Newsweek, an article about Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, and Sam Harris: As I expected—can it be otherwise for a mass-market essayist?–he panders to his audience, which is after all predominantly religious. (Adler notes that a recent Newsweek poll found that 92 percent of Americans believe in God and only 37 would vote for an atheist for President.) He does a fair job of summarizing the “highly inflammatory” arguments of Dennett/Dawkins/Harris, namely, that religions make false and contradictory claims and spur people to commit destructive acts. But Adler not-so-subtly distances himself from the skeptics’ viewpoints. … And what is Adler really saying here? Just this: we must give a pass to delusional beliefs that are held sincerely by millions of people, especially if they are Newsweek subscribers. I have my differences with Dawkins et al, but I admire their courage, especially compared to the cowardice that afflicts pop-culture intellectuals like Adler when they write about religion.P.Z. Myers has are more detailed critique of the Newsweek piece here.

ASU’s Secular Devils are sponsoring two showings this weekend of Neil Abramson’s documentary, “Bob Smith, USA”: Bob Smith, USA is a hilarious documentary film that provides a view into American culture through the eyes of seven men named Bob Smith. One of the seven Bob Smiths will be attending the screenings and will discuss the film afterwards. The filmmakers traveled across the United States documenting the lives of the Bob Smiths. Despite their common names, the men vary greatly - from septic tank repairman to yoga instructor; from twenty eight to eighty-eight years old; from Evangelical Christian to Evangelical Atheist. As each man’s story unfolds in their own words, intimate portraits are drawn; creating a poetic, non-judgmental and highly entertaining document of American life.The showings are on Friday, March 3 at 6 p.m. and Saturday, March 4 at 2 p.m. in ASU’s Life Sciences building, room 191. (Map here.) The screenings are free and open to the public, and there will be a party for Bob Smith on Saturday night, details to be provided at both showings. Since the Secular Devils’ event page says that “Normal Bob Smith and his Unholy Army of Catholic School Girls invade downtown Tempe” following the Friday night screening, it’s a safe bet that the Bob Smith who will be appearing to discuss the film is Normal Bob Smith, who has some entertaining games and pamphlets on his website. UPDATE (March 28, 2007): Normal Bob Smith’s ASU visit happened to coincide with a Brother Jed preaching tour…

Leon Wieseltier, literary editor of the New Republic, has written an strongly negative review of Daniel Dennett’s new book, Breaking the Spell. Wieseltier maintains that religion is beyond the scope of scientific examination, and so takes issue with a key aspect of Dennett’s project. Wieseltier’s review has been critiqued by Brian Leiter (at Leiter Reports, here), P.Z. Myers (at Pharyngula, here), Taner Edis (at the Secular Outpost, here), and Michael Bains (at Silly Humans, here). I disagree with Bains about the term “scientism,” even though I am quite sympathetic to “naturalized epistemology” and giving science a major role in philosophical questions. There is clearly quite a lot of room for disagreement about the idea that science should be the primary mechanism of inquiry in all domains–most scientists regularly argue that science draws no moral or ethical conclusions, which means they leave that area to philosophy or (a mistake, in my opinion) religion. There is a key passage of Wieseltier’s review that I partly agree with: It will be plain that Dennett’s approach to religion is contrived to evade religion’s substance. He thinks that an inquiry into belief is made superfluous by an inquiry into the belief in belief. This is a very revealing mistake. You cannot disprove a belief unless you disprove its content. If you believe that you can disprove it any other way, by describing its origins or by describing its consequences, then you do not believe in reason.In general, the origin of a belief is irrelevant to its truth or falsity. However, if Dennett’s mission is like Pascal Boyer’s, to give an account of why people believe in religion in general, rather than to prove that religion is false, then this is not an objection to what Dennett is doing. Further, if the explanation produced is the best explanation around, then that is good reason to believe that explanation (over an explanation that says religion is divinely inspired). The fact is that there are lots of different religious beliefs that people hold, and they contradict each other. We know from the outset that all religions cannot be true–in fact, the mere existence of the contradictions is sufficient to show that much of the content of most religions must be false. Why people continue to believe it is something that requires explanation. If the best such explanation is a naturalistic one, and that explanation fits the evidence for all religious belief better than supernatural explanations, then that is good reason to favor the naturalistic explanation over the supernatural explanations. Wieseltier seems to reject “inference to the best explanation” as a form of reason. UPDATE: Dennett has responded with a letter to the New York Times, and Wieseltier responds immediately following.

Jeff Lowder, one of the founders and former president of the Internet Infidels, now has a blog, Naturalistic Atheism. Historical Comments Danny Boy, FCD (2006-12-09): Wow, sounds good. I've asked II before if they would be interested in doing a group blog. J. Lowder said he was interested about blogging, somewhat. I'm glad to see that he has indeed taken the plunge into the blogosphere. ...

This little parable/thought experiment was inspired by Steve’s comment in the Stirner birthday message, where he advocates for agnosticism over either theism or atheism. Imagine yourself in the following scenario: You’ve just returned home from a day at work. While you set your keys on the kitchen counter and remove your coat you can hear the familiar voices of your roommate and her/his S.O. in the other room. You start to wonder about what you might make yourself for dinner when suddenly you are startled by a loud gunshot, followed by what sounds like a body falling to the floor. Rather than getting the hell out of there you somewhat foolishly run to the other room to see what happened. Once there, you see your roommate standing there, arm outstretched, holding a still-smoking pistol pointed at what is now, apparently, a corpse. Your roommate looks at you and says “Santa Claus did it.” Do you: a) Sincerely believe that your roommate is telling the actual truth? b) Decide that, because you didn’t actually see your roommate fire the gun, you just can’t know one way or another whether Santa did it? c) Consider your roommate a murderer, and the claim to be the rationalization of a mind that has snapped? ...