Evangelizing Science

WASP views science and religion as opposing forces with irreconcilable views of reality.

Science and religion: complementary methods of studying competing spheres of experience or opposing forces with irreconcilable views of reality? Regardless of your position on this question, I suspect you will agree that science has been marginalized under the Bush administration. If you are still not convinced of this, do yourself a favor and read Chris Mooney's The Republican War on Science.

In this post, I'd like to draw your attention to a recent article in the New York Times by George Johnson, "A Free-for-All on Science and Religion." The article discusses the manner in which science should respond to religion, and you will see that there is anything but unanimous agreement here. In fact, this article reflects some fairly heated disagreement among atheist scientists.

Acknowledging some oversimplification, let me label one side of the argument as cautious realism. According to this position, our goals should be realistic. According to Francisco J. Ayala, “If we think that we are going to persuade them [theists] to live a rational life based on scientific knowledge, we are not only dreaming — it is like believing in the fairy godmother.” Clearly, it is unrealistic to expect a world without religion anytime soon or to expect that science will provide people with the meaning they currently find in religion. Perhaps our efforts should be both cautious and respectful. As Lawrence M. Krauss suggests, maybe science does not necessarily render theism impossible. “We should recognize that fact and live with it and stop being so pompous about it.”

I will label the other side of the debate aggressive secularism for lack of a better phrase. This is the position of Dawkins and Harris, and I'll assume that you are generally familiar with it. According to Dawkins, “I am utterly fed up with the respect that we — all of us, including the secular among us — are brainwashed into bestowing on religion.” The idea here is that science should be hostile to religion and that respect for religious belief simply perpetuates ignorance and the many maladaptive effects of religion.

While I generally find myself in closer agreement with the aggressive secularist camp, I do worry that their methods may do more to increase hostility to science and lead to an even more thorough embrace of religion. Why? Because their attacks are unlikely to reach anyone who is susceptible to influence. They will remain popular among atheists, continue to be demonized by theists, and be largely misunderstood by the rest.

reposted from: atheist revolution
my: highlights / emphasis / key points / comments

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Call Us Passionate Atheists, Call Us Atheist Activists

reposted from: atheist revolution
my: highlights / emphasis / key points / comments

Atheist Revolution debates the terms: fundamentalist atheist, militant atheist, atheist extremists, outspoken atheists, passionate "atheist activists ...

Ever drawn to conflict, real or imagined, the media is now trying to make it sound like there is a great split in the atheist community over how vocal we should be in our criticism of religion. I am not convinced that this is a real conflict, but there are clearly differences among atheists in what is perceived as our responsibility to society. The mistake the media is making, as is its tendency, is one of oversimplification. Sure, there are atheists who just want religious people to leave them alone and who have no interest in expressing their opinions. There are also outspoken atheists, activists working toward meaningful change. The problem is that most atheists fall somewhere between these poles such that any artificial dichotomization is going to be misleading.

It is interesting that the question buzzing around the atheist blogosphere is what to call atheists who tend toward the outspoken pole. One rarely hears people asking what we should call the atheists who just want to avoid any meaningful debate or controversy. Could this be due to the fact that this is exactly how believers wish we would all behave?

As I have previously shown, there is no such thing a "fundamentalist atheist," as this is a contradiction in terms. While Similarly, while it may be possible to imagine a "militant atheist" taking up arms against believers, this is the stuff of fiction and can be discarded rather easily. I have suggested that there may be a tiny minority of my fellow atheists who could possibly warrant the label "atheist extremists" because they could be imagined engaging in the sort of irrational thinking which characterizes all forms of extremism. But even if this is possible, it is extremely rare and none of the media's favorite scapegoats fit this mold (e.g., Dawkins, Harris, etc.). These men are passionate, but their arguments are far from irrational.

So what should we call the outspoken atheists who rightly criticize religion and work toward positive change? Call us passionate "atheist activists," and yes, I happily count myself among them. We are passionate about what we are doing because it is personally meaningful to us. We care about our fellow humans and want to help make the world a better place, free of superstition. We are activists because we work for positive change. Much like the activists of the Civil Rights era, passionate activism can accomplish worthy goals which originally seemed impossible.

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Fundamentalist secularists and the religion of atheism

Editorial by Terry Sanderson:

Have you noticed how the concept of “fundamentalist secularists” and “extremist atheists” has been so eagerly embraced by religious people? These phrases are in common usage in America where they were invented, and where ‘secularism’ is becoming a dirty word in the same way that ‘liberal’ or ‘communist’ are. Now, in the US media, accusations of “secularism” are tantamount to calling someone an enemy of the state, even though the state is based on secularism. You can see an example of the way that non-believers are represented as “fundamentalists” and “extremists” in this article, which is typical of many.

As a means of undermining the threat that secularism (and atheism) pose to religious power, church propagandists find that labelling their critics as “extremists” is proving very effective. Nowadays if you have the temerity to even question religion you immediately become a “fundamentalist atheist”. This has happened to Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, who simply wrote books giving their opinion that there is no evidence for supernatural beings, that belief in such beings undermines science and that organised religion can in some circumstances justify anti-social behaviour. As Brian Flemming, producer of the film The God Who Wasn’t There says: “The term ‘fundamentalist’ necessarily implies dogmatism. It is simply an inaccurate description of someone who specifically rejects dogma of any kind. Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris explicitly reject dogma... Fundamentalism is when reason fails you and you say, ‘Well, this book says so and I’m sticking to it.’ Christian fundamentalists happily and openly do just that. Dawkins and Harris do nothing of the kind.”

Professor Dawkins is now routinely accused of being a mirror image of a religious extremist. This gentle biologist, whose only crime is to pose questions and challenge unreason, is suddenly on a par with Osama bin Laden. According to the new religious thinking, the “religion” of atheism is as evil and threatening as that of the Taliban,.

It is surprising how many people have fallen for this argument. Even some people who think of themselves as rationalists will come out with it. . Why do they attack those who seek to buttress the integrity of science and demand evidence for claims that have wide-spread consequences for the safety of the world?

But as honorary associate A.C. Grayling has written: “It is worth pointing out an allied and characteristic bit of jesuitry employed by folk of faith. This is their attempt to describe naturalism (atheism) as itself a ‘religion’. But, by definition, a religion is something centred upon belief in the existence of supernatural agencies or entities in the universe; and not merely in their existence, but in their interest in human beings on this planet; and not merely their interest, but their particularly detailed interest in what humans wear, what they eat, when they eat it, what they read or see, what they treat as clean and unclean, who they have sex with and how and when; and so for a multitude of other things, like making women invisible beneath enveloping clothing, or strapping little boxes to their foreheads, or iterating formulae by rote five times a day, and so endlessly forth; with threats of punishment for getting any of it wrong.

“But naturalism (atheism) by definition does not premise such belief. Any view of the world that does not premise the existence of something supernatural is a philosophy, or a theory, or at worst an ideology. If it is either of the two first, at its best it proportions what it accepts to the evidence for accepting it, knows what would refute it, and stands ready to revise itself in the light of new evidence. This is the essence of science. It comes as no surprise that no wars have been fought, pogroms carried out, or burnings conducted at the stake, over rival theories in biology or astrophysics.

“And one can grant that the word ‘fundamental’ does after all apply to this: in the phrase ‘fundamentally sensible’.”

A.C. Grayling’s books “Against all Gods” and “What is Good” are available from the NSS shop www.secularism.org.uk.

reposted from: NSS
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