(Part 1 and Part 2) Continuing with the case for accommodationism as made by the NAS, on page 37 they describe the other group of believers, those who think that science should conform to revealed religion and their holy books. This group is hostile to science but people who believe these things are politically powerful …
Category Archive: New atheism
Sep 22 2010
The accommodationists’ best case (Part 1 of 3)
I have written quite a lot about the conflict between those who say that science and religion are incompatible worldviews (referred to as unapologetic or new atheists) and those who say they are compatible (known as accommodationists). I definitely belong to the first group. On the other hand, the National Academy of Sciences, the most …
Jan 01 2010
A wish for the New Year: A world without religion
(My latest book God vs. Darwin: The War Between Evolution and Creationism in the Classroom has just been released and is now available through the usual outlets. You can order it from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, the publishers Rowman & Littlefield, and also through your local bookstores. For more on the book, see here. You …
Nov 05 2009
Introducing the ‘Unapologetic Atheist’
(My latest book God vs. Darwin: The War Between Evolution and Creationism in the Classroom has just been released and is now available through the usual outlets. You can order it from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, the publishers Rowman & Littlefield, and also through your local bookstores. For more on the book, see here.) The …
Sep 16 2009
Atheism has won the debate
I think it should be clear to any thinking person that atheism has won. Not in terms of numbers, of course. People who call themselves religious still heavily outnumber those who say they are atheists, though the gap is closing. In a future post I will argue that the gap is closer than the raw …
Sep 15 2009
Being a new atheist means not saying you’re sorry
The main complaint against new atheists made by accommodationists is not with what they say but with how they say it, their supposedly hostile ‘tone’. They are accused of being rude, uncivil, arrogant, extreme, militant, shrill, strident, etc. but it is important to note that they are rarely accused of being wrong. This is undoubtedly …
Sep 04 2009
Why Carl Sagan is considered a ‘good’ atheist
There is no doubt that the new atheists have ruffled the feathers of both religious believers and the accommodationists. But since the new atheists are on solid ground in their rejection of god, with science and logic undeniably supporting their position, the opposition to them often takes the form of chiding them for being supposedly …
Sep 02 2009
The irrational core of accommodationism
In the previous post, I said that Robert Wright’s attempt at a compromise between accommodationists and new atheists is likely to be rejected by most religious believers because it requires them to abandon almost everything they hold dear about the idea of god, such as that he has magical powers. Meanwhile what are atheists supposed …
Sep 01 2009
The accommodationists try again
Robert Wright is a science writer and one of those accommodationists who is disturbed by the new atheists, people who say that science and religion are incompatible. He, like many accommodationists before him, wants to build a bridge between science and religion. He has written a book The Evolution of God in which he argues …
Aug 20 2009
The crying game
On Tuesday, I wrote about my discussion with the Cleveland Freethinkers group. Today I want to spend some time on the issue of the Christian woman at the meeting who, right in the middle of a lively discussion on the relative merits of the accommodationist versus the new atheist positions, suddenly and tearfully interjected an …
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