Addressing Sam Harris

I’m going to try a different approach to Sam Harris’s accusations. Since one of the problems with grappling with the objectionable ideas Harris has thrown out is that they’re fuzzily presented and laced with caveats to hide behind, I’ll just state my position as clearly as I can on a couple of the contentious issues, and why I think that way. Maybe contrasting them with Harris’s arguments will at least clarify the differences.

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Tellin’ it like it is

I have seen that many people object to the last bit of the comment, that incredulity that half the country is considering voting for a Mormon. That, I think, is a perfectly reasonable dismay. It is not about being unhappy that he is allowed to run for the presidency — I think it is a good thing that the government cannot dictate who is even allowed to run, and it would be a violation of the separation of church and state to suggest that it should — but that’s not what the comment is about. It is that so many will willingly ignore the conflict between reason and religion to the extent that they will make excuses for why you should vote for some guy who believes his laws were handed down on golden plates to a con artist in upstate New York, and who believes it is his destiny to rule a Mormon kingdom on earth, which will be translated into the award of his own planet and harem of willing, fertile concubines.

Let’s cut the crap. I support Romney’s legal right to become the president. I want people to reject his superstitious bullshit and adherence to a dogmatic institution and not vote him into office.

Oh, gosh — I have cheesed off Sam Harris!

He is clearly quite peeved. It looks like the final straw was that I, as he claims, “gleefully endorsed” a post on The 5 Most Awful Atheists. Actually, what I did was challenge the author to write something positive about atheists, and agreed that the criticisms were valid, but not gleefully, and I also said that I do not consider any of those atheists irredeemable (except, of course, SE Cupp).

And I’ll stand by that.

Sam Harris has been a significant contributor to the atheist movement, and is far better known than I am. But that does not make him flawless. I disagree strongly with him on his position on torture, as do many others; I know he’s not a casual advocate of torture, but he does invent ridiculous, improbable scenarios (in which torture wouldn’t even work!) to justify some instances. I think his advocacy of profiling was repugnant, irrational and unjustifiable, and Bruce Schneier also found it problematic. To now dismiss Schneier’s informed discussion as a “long and rather tedious debate” and to characterize Schneier’s position as a failed argument from expediency is ridiculous.

For real fun, look at his complaints about blogs in general.

It is difficult to overlook the role that blog comments play in all this. Having a blog and building a large community of readers can destroy a person’s intellectual integrity—as appears to have happened in the case of PZ Myers. Many people who read his blog come away convinced that I am a racist who advocates the widespread use of torture and a nuclear first strike against the entire Muslim world. The most despicable claims about me appear in the comment thread, of course, but Myers is responsible for publishing them. And so I hold him responsible for circulating and amplifying some of the worst distortions of my views found on the Internet.

Hmmm. I think Harris’s reputation as an illiberal advocate for atrocious policies long preceded any of my criticisms of his positions, and I suspect that the commenters here could make a far better indictment of Harris than he can a defense. But what do I know? You guys have destroyed my integrity!

Let’s complete the total sellout. Since I am now a notorious and unscrupulous opponent of all that is Sam, I will turn it over to you: there is currently a competition to raise money for Camp Quest. I’m falling far behind. If you think I’m on the side of Goodness and Righteousness, donate to Team PZ’s Revenge. If you think I’m full of it and adore Sam Harris, donate to Team Awful Re-defeat PZ, that gang of 13 bloggers (we’re all evil!) who have teamed up to conquer sad, lonely, isolated me.

Sam could really teach me a lesson by making a big donation to Team Awful. A good trouncing would show everyone how pathetic my influence actually is.

I resign from the Atheist Papacy

All the time now, I’ve got people yammering at me about how I’m an awful, terrible, wicked person because I’ve become what I hate. I’ve got one guy calling me the “god of atheism”, another person calling me part of the “high priesthood of atheism”, illustrated with that lovely photoshopped image to the right. Then I’m accused of “believing [my] own press” and “thinking [I] can do no wrong” because my “swarm of mindless groupies” are all telling me my every word is golden.

You know, if I actually started believing my press, I’d have to go shoot myself. The only people lauding me as an atheist god or pope are the people who detest me; there are whole sites out there dedicated to spitting on Pharyngula, and my mailbox is full of missives telling me how arrogant/stupid/evil/ugly/Jewish/female (yeah, they think those last two are insults) I am, and very few praising what I’ve written. Here on my own blog, some people despise me, and even my allies nag and carp and pick at every phrase (which is what I expect). Ah, what I’d give for at least one blind, obedient minion who’d revere me as a deity…why, I might pay as much as a quarter.

You have to have a thick skin to be an assertive blogger on the internet; my primary input from the world is not that I’m coddled in a little bubble of approval, but that I’ve put myself in a prime position for every rock-thrower out there to take a shot at me. I don’t post with the attitude that I’ll get accolades for every word, but as an act of defiance.

And then we got complaints like that one on bitchspot, which dismiss every one who even partially agrees with me as “highly fanatical followers” who must “Stop being a groupie. Stop bowing before the altar.” That isn’t legitimate, valid criticism. That’s a kind of blindness in itself, treating everyone who might align themselves with my position as incapable of independent thought. It is a dishonest, dismissive tactic. What we have here is a horde of thoughtful, often angry people who think science, social justice, and the Enlightenment are good things, and are willing to fight for their causes.

Whining that I am an atheist pope is also incredibly dishonest, but OK, I resign. I’ll stop doing the things that make me equivalent to a high-ranking priest. I’ll give up my non-profit status. I’ll sell off my Italian villas and all their exquisite, priceless furnishings and art. I’ll give up the support of a well-established atheist institution, staffed with lawyers and professional apologists and PR persons. I’ll step down from my official position at the top of the atheist hierarchy. I’ll stop dogmatically pushing the infallible words of Charles Darwin on the populace. I’ll take off my uniform that grants me special privileges and respect.

I’ll just become an ordinary citizen, a guy with a blog. Will that do? Or is it expected that I also shut that down and be silent?

Because that’s all these baseless criticisms of my godless papacy are about: I’m already nothing but a guy with a blog, and there isn’t much more I can give up to satisfy these wanking whiners.

Why I am an atheist – Thomas Schratwieser

I was born into a Texan Catholic family. Growing up outside of Washington, D.C. I was raised to believe in God, but no real emphasis was placed on attendance of church, nor on the catechism. Despite my parents’ backgrounds they were very rational people, and encouraged my love of science from a young age. My father studied Chemical Engineering at university before changing tack when he realised that he preferred Law, but he always held out hope that I would go into the sciences when I was old enough to choose for myself. I recall a conversation I had with him when I was very young wherein he casually explained that he had been browbeaten into an engineering discipline in lieu of a pure (and I am not using this as a value term, purely as a demarcation) science, and had he gone into Chemistry or Physics he would probably still be in one of those fields today.

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Can we send them to Mars?

As we all know, now that the trivial and relatively uninteresting business of mere engineering has cleared a hurdle, Mars Curiosity can get to work on the important stuff: finding evidence of biology on Mars. This is where it’s also going to get peculiarly controversial, because some creationists are feeling a bit threatened: there is a subset of creationists (definitely not all of them!) who are convinced that there can be no other life elsewhere in the universe. There’s also a weird subset that believes there may be intelligent life elsewhere, but it must believe in the Christian god, and these alien worlds must have been visited by an incarnation of Jesus…but let’s not get that deep in the bizarre yet.

Because this is bizarre enough. Faye Flam got an angry letter from a creationist who is upset at all the money wasted on Mars Curiosity, because it’s absurd to consider the idea that life may have arisen somewhere where a god didn’t put it.

Her answer is excellent, you should go read it. Although, sad to say, it’s not true that her correspondent is from some strange dimension…he’s pretty typically from our tiny corner of this galaxy.

Creationist sophistry

Did you know that only animals are alive? Bacteria, fungi, and protists…also not alive. This is according to Henry Morris III, creationist. He makes this argument by specifying certain criteria, rather arbitrarily and independent of anything biology has to say — the four things that determine whether something is alive are:

  • It’s unique. I know, that sounds like it ought to apply to plants, but that’s not really the criterion: after saying “Life is unique”, he explains that it’s because the Bible used the Hebrew word “chay” 763 times, and never applies it to plants. Therefore, the reason plants aren’t alive is Hebrew word use patterns.

  • Life has independent movement. So things that twitch and crawl are alive, plants don’t, therefore they aren’t. Also, the Bible uses the Hebrew word “ramas” for movement 17 times, and never applies it to plants. Therefore, the reason plants aren’t alive is Hebrew word use patterns.

  • Life has blood. God sent a clear message by rejecting Cain’s offering of plants — He demands blood sacrifice, nothing else will do. The more potent blood comes from people; the blood of bulls and goats was not sufficient to take away human sins, which was why Jesus had to be sacrificed.

    OK, this argument is just ghoulish. His best argument for why plants aren’t alive is that you can’t butcher them to get blood which will magically cure sins?

  • Life has soul and spirit. So this criterion is for something we can’t see or measure in any way — if recognition of my life is dependent on having a “soul”, then I guess I’m dead already. And once again, Morris pointlessly tells us that the Bible uses the word “nephesh” 753 times and “ruwach” 389 times, never applying it to a plant. Therefore, the reason plants aren’t alive is Hebrew word use patterns.

The only thing this whole mess persuades me of is that creationists are even dumber than I thought.

But I do have to say one thing to his essay’s credit: I agreed with the conclusion.

If God designed death into creation, then death is as “good” as all other factors—and the atheistic evolutionary doctrine is right. Death is the “good” force that brings about the ultimate “fittest” in our universe. Death, therefore, is not “the wages of sin,” and our Lord Jesus’ death was not necessary for salvation—it was just the wasted effort of a deluded martyr.

These teachings cannot be harmonized. Either the Bible is Truth (capitalization intended) or it is Error. The choice is clear. The message is clear. The effect is eternal!

The answer is clear. Jesus was a deluded martyr. It is Error.

And the hatchet strikes…

I’m sure you’re all wondering who the 5 most awful atheists are — are you on the list? You’re probably safe unless you are Sam Harris, Bill Maher, Penn Jillette, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, or S.E. Cupp. I think the criticisms offered in the article are all on target, but I refuse to believe that any of them are irredeemable…well, except for Cupp, who is just a right-wing fraud. But I also have to say that this comment is spot on, and is the source of a lot of conflict right now as the movement is growing.

The thing about the so-called “rationalist” movement in America is that disbelief in gods seems to be the only qualification to join the club. Disbelief in a supernatural creator, especially as the movement becomes more popular or “hep,” as I’m pretending the kids say, in no way guarantees rationality in matters of foreign policy or economics, for example. Many notable atheists believe in some powerfully stupid stuff—likely owing their prominence to these same benighted beliefs, lending an air of scientific credibility to the myths corporate media seeks to highlight, and thereby eroding the credibility of all atheists in the long-term. In other words: The crap always rises to the top.

But now I’d like to challenge the author, Ian Murphy, to write a complementary article that lists the five best atheists in America, and what makes them good. Give us something to aspire to and set as a standard, instead of just taking potshots at a few big names (and one Fox News nobody).

Just to be really annoying, I’d name Eugenie Scott, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Bill Nye, Susan Jacoby, and Barry Lynn, because most of them would run away from the label and one would outright reject it (with good reason, too). Maybe Murphy could surprise us with some unusual suspects and different perspectives. (You know, Surly Amy’s growing list might also be a good place to start.)