Stephen Law

The Chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, has accused Richard Dawkins of being anti-semitic. That's a pretty serious charge. In a BBC TV exchange (which you can view here ), Sacks says that a passage in Dawkins’s book The God Delusion - in which Dawkins says that "the God of the Old Testament" is a "vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser" as well as "misogynist", "homophobic", "racist", "pestilential" and "infanticidal" - is “profoundly anti-semitic”. According to Sacks, the passage reflects a centuries-old anti-Jewish attitude. Of course there are centuries-old anti-Jewish attitudes, but this is not an example. According to Sacks, Dawkins has misunderstood those sections of the Hebrew Bible because he is a "Christian atheist" rather than a "Jewish atheist". Dawkins, says Sacks, reads the Old Testament in an "adversarial way," and that is "Christian" because Chris...

The one thing I'll pull from this last chapter is Dawkins suggestion that few religious people seem really to believe. Or, if they do, it's hard to understand why their reaction to death is as it is. "I can't help wondering how many moderate religious people who claim such belief really hold it, in their hearts. If they were truly sincere, shouldn't they behave like the Abbot of Ampleforth? When Cardinal Basil Hume told him he was dying, the abbot was delighted for him: "Congratulations! That's brilliant news. I wish I was coming with you." The abbot, it seems, really was a sincere believer. But it is precisely because it is so rare and unexpected that this story catches our attention, almost provokes our amusement...Why don't all Christians and Muslims say something like the abbot when they hear that a friend is dying?" pp. 398-399 There are two main criteria for what someone believes - what they do, and what they say. Sometimes, these crite...

This chapter is to a large extent anecdote-driven. There are some real horror stories about what has been done to children in the name of religion. And of course these are not isolated incidents. Nevertheless, this is to a large extent a series of anecdotes, and there is always a risk attached to that. Anecdotes are highly effective as rhetorical tool, irrespective of whether there's much truth to the claims they are being used to illustrate. People tend to respond best to narrative - to a story. The Daily Mail , for example, is chock full of anecdotes about foreigners, edicts from Brussels, crime, and so on, and that can, and does, often give a highly misleading impression of what the situation is really like. In response, Dawkins's opponents will simply trot out endless anecdotes about the benefits of raising children in a religious belief system (take a look at e.g. the work of Melanie Phillips - Mail columnist and author of such anecdote-driven rhetoric as the dreadful All...

This chapter explains Dawkins antipathy to religion. He lists many examples of religious fundamentalism and nuttiness, much of it malign. But what of my local vicar? His brand of religion seems very benign. Yet Dawkins sees even the moderate religious person as posing a danger, for they are still, he thinks, promoting unquestioning "faith" as a virtue: Christianity...teaches children that unquestioned faith is a virtue. You don't have to make the case for what you believe. If someone announces that it is part of his faith, the rest of society, whether of the same faith or another, or none, is obliged, by ingrained custom, to 'respect' it without question; respect it until the day it manifests itself in a horrible massacre like the destruction of the World Trade Center, or the London or Madrid bombings. Then there is a great chorus of disownings, as clerics and 'community leaders' (who elected them by the way?) line up to explain that this extremism is a pe...

In comments on the previous post, Kyle S has been defending his version of the Biblical theory of atonement from the charge that it "doesn't make sense" (see previous post ). I respond below. Hi Kyle S You say the Biblical account (or rather, your version of it – many Christians, such as Rev Sam, reject your version) must make sense, “Otherwise, how would we be able to discuss the precise meaning of certain statements or consider possible counter examples?” As I said, the sense in which it “doesn’t make sense” is not that the words are meaningless, but that the theory is bonkers. E.g. Like believing that fairies are what make the flowers grow (n.b. if you read the preceding post you will see that the context makes it perfectly clear that that is what I meant.) You then say: “Most of the responses to me in this thread seem to be along the lines of 'but that doesn't fit well with my understanding of morality'.” Not quite. I say that these beliefs are not moral t...

This chapter argues that not only should we not base our morality on scripture, as a matter of fact we don't base it on scripture - "and a very good thing too" (p. 267). The chapter begins with the Old Testament - presenting a range of Outrageous Tales . I myself remember, as a child (perhaps about 9 or so), being puzzled by the Old Testament. Not only did my church school present the stories as true, they were clearly supposed to encapsulate a moral perspective we were expected to admire and emulate. Even at the time, I found it hard to reconcile the Christmas message of baby Jesus meek and mild with the jealous, bloodthirsty tyrant who told Abraham to make a burnt offering of his son. There's a lot in this chapter. I am going to focus on one thing, which also puzzled me as a child. The atonement. Dawkins says: "I have described atonement, the central doctrine of Christianity, as vicious, sado-masochistic, and repellent. We should dismiss it as barking mad, but...

It's a week late, but it's here. I found this one of the most interesting chapters of the book, despite the fact that I knew much of what was in it already. Dawkins very effectively marshals much of the recent empirical work that has be done on the evolutionary roots of morality in order to refute the silly, but widespread, view that without religion society will quickly degenerate into a seething cesspool of depravity. Many of the points Dawkins makes here I also make in The War For Children's Minds . He includes some that I don't, and vice verse For example, I didn't include the Hauser/Singer work, and Dawkins does not attempt to deal with that very popular move - "The only reason Western civilization has not collapsed without religion is that the moral capital has not run out yet ." I discuss the "moral capital" move - as used by U.S. neo-cons and the Bishop of Oxford - here . I suppose I should provide at least one criticism of the chapter,...

This chapter looks at explanation for religious belief. Dawkins' suggestion is that religious belief is not something that natural selection has selected for, but a by-product of something it has selected for. He draws an analogy with the moth and the flame - natural selection did not select moths that fly into flames, it selected for e.g. a form of navigation (keeping a fixed point of light - such as the moon - at a certain position in the visual field) that has this unfortunate by-product: moths navigating by a candle will spiral in and fry. Dawkins provides an example of the sort of thing he has in mind. Children need to acquire a lot of information very quickly if they are to have a good chance of survival. They cannot carefully reason though things before accepting - they must take advice from the elders on trust. So natural selection selects for this. But this feature of young humans has a down side - it makes them vulnerable to bullshit beliefs. Bullshit beliefs can slip in,...

Chapter three looks at various arguments for the existence of God, and finds them all wanting. I will pick out two things for discussion (but feel free to bring in other stuff). FIRST THING : Dawkins’ attack on Aquinas’ first three ways is really twofold: (1) First, if we are going to halt the regress with something, why not just stop at e.g. the Big Bang? Why add God and then play the “Oh, and this is the exception to the rule that everything requires a cause” card? Rather than just play the card at the Big Bang? This first objection can be explained by analogy. The ancient Hindus, struck by the fact that things that are not supported fall, wondered what prevented the Earth from falling. If all things fall that are not supported, then the Earth must have a support. But what? They posited a big elephant. But then what supports the elephant? They posited a big turtle to support the elephant. But what supported the turtle? It’s here, it seems, that they played the “exception to the rule...

The thing I am going to pick out from this second chapter is Dawkins's suggestion that whether or not God exists is a scientific question: Either he exists or he doesn’t. It’s a scientific question; one day we may know the answer and meanwhile we can say something pretty strong about the probability . (p. 70) Dawkins admits there may be questions science cannot answer. But clearly he thinks this is unlikely to be an example. What I do like about this chapter is the way that Dawkins shows that, as most people understand “God” (e.g. a superhuman, supernatural intelligence responsible for creating the universe) whether or not God exists is scientifically assessable. Indeed, Dawkins is surely right to point out that double standards are common here. Give an argument based on science for there being no God and you’ll be hit with, “But the existence of God is not scientifically assessable.” Religion and science are supposedly “non-overlapping magesteria” or NOMA for short. But as Dawki...

Chapter One: A deeply religious non-believer I won’t recount the contents of each chapter, as I am assuming you will have read them. Instead I will pull out a few points I think of particular interest. Much of this first chapter is devoted to explaining that while scientists will sometimes talk about God – e.g. Einstein and Hawking both do – they use the word in an unusual way. Einstein, as Dawkins clearly, shows, did not believe in any sort of personal God or creator/designer God, and was perhaps something of a Spinozistic pantheist. Dawkins next turns his attention to the special reverence and privilege that he believes attaches, quite undeservedly, to religious belief. There are two issues here: (i) are religious beliefs and views given special privileges and respect? and (ii) if so, do they deserve those privileges and that respect? Dawkins answer to (i) is yes, they are, and it seems hard to deny he is right about that. What Dawkins does not address, certainly in this chapte...

OK, let's get started with the first book. It will be The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. We will go through the book in ten weeks. I will cover one chapter per week, starting with Chpt 1 "A Deeply religious Non-Believer". Two weeks today - Sat 30th August - (or shortly before) I will post a short piece on the first chapter, and all can then contribute via comments. If you don't yet have a copy, it's available from amazon here...