Is Richard Dawkins an Embarrassment to Atheism?
Before you go any farther, listen to this short BBC debate between Richard Dawkins and Giles Fraser (this will take you to another tab — if you’re using Internet Explorer — since I can’t embed an audioboo player in WordPress).
Now that you’ve listened to it, you’ll have noticed how Richard stumbles over the full title of Darwin’s Origin — which, to remind you, is: On the Origin of Species by Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Here’s the stumble:
Fraser: Richard, if I said to you what is the full title of The Origin Of Species, I’m sure you could tell me that.
Dawkins: Yes I could.
Fraser: Go on then.
Dawkins: On the Origin of Species…Uh…With, oh, God, On the Origin of Species. There is a sub-title with respect to the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life.
Now that, having already said that he could, must have been embarrassing, and that may explain why Richard found it hard to respond to Giles Fraser’s idea about how people self-identify themselves, and his idea that we have no right to question that self-identification. For of course people self-identify, but all that Dawkins was trying to do was to explain how Christianity appears “out there” at the grass-roots as a kind of cultural “of course I’m Christian”, without in any sense being aware of basic Christian beliefs or participating in Christian liturgy and practice. This is not, clearly, the same as having forgotten, for the moment, the full title of Darwin’s book, since it is by convention referred to as “The Origin”. For, had Giles Fraser gone on to ask Richard to explain Darwin’s theory and the evidence upon which he bases it, Richard would doubtless have been able to give a good account of himself.
So how does this little moment of forgetfulness get turned into a cause célèbre, so that even the Huffington Post is crowing:
Richard Dawkins has been labelled an “embarrassment to atheism” after clashing with a priest in a debate on BBC Radio 4?
Although, in fairness, it should be added that the Huffington Post also has a fairly impartial summary of the results of the Ipsos/MORI poll in question. And then the Telegraph, of course, preens itself over the fact, as Stephen Pollard sees it, that
Atheists’ arrogance is their Achilles’ heel, as a cringemaking radio performance has proved.
Which is really making a mountain out of a molehill. And an otherwise unknown figure, Dr Jim West — Adjunct Professor of Biblical Studies at the Quartz Hill School of Theology and Pastor of Petros Baptist Church, Petros, Tennessee — has put up a blog post entitled “Richard Dawkins is a Liar,” based solely on a misunderstanding. For West thinks that the RDFRS UK/Ipsos MORI Poll was carried out by the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Religion and Science itself, and is therefore biased. But it was carried out by an independent polling company, and is not tainted in the way that West implies in his rather brazen attack on Richard Dawkins’ integrity. (Indeed, he even has a picture of Richard Dawkins with the caption “Britain’s Liar in Chief”.) And doubtless there will be many more stabs a Dawkins for his momentary lapse of memory, which, it has to be said, is not in the same league at all, as Giles Fraser seemed to suggest, with those who cannot speak with any confidence at all about a religious faith of which they count themselves as adherents — though I do agree that, if someone calls himself or herself a Christian, we should take them at their word, rather than questioning their credentials. I can remember years ago asking a church warden to mark a passage in one of the gospels for a guest. He went up to the lectern, flipped uneasily through the pages for a while, and then asked: “Is Matthew in the Old or the New Testament?” It would never dawned on me to question his faith, even though his knowledge of the Bible was lamentable, and I tend to agree with Giles Fraser that we should not be in the business of assessing whether or not someone is a Christian when that is what they claim to be.
However, having said all this, it does not seem to me that Dawkins’ appearance with Giles Fraser on BBC radio was in any sense cringemaking, as Pollard claims. Nor does it show that Dawkins is an embarrassment to atheism. This kind of point scoring is scarcely the way to carry on a reasoned discussion, and, to do him credit, Giles Fraser does not suggest this. The conversation, despite the momentary lapse, carries on quite confidently on both sides, both of them, it seems to me, making some telling points. A reasonably fair account of the debate is provided by the atheist blogger Gurder, who says, at one point:
Dawkins is the kind of person Fraser would instinctively recognise; a moral campaigner who is genuinely dedicated.
It’s a pity that Dawkins did not recognise back. A bit of quick thought and knowledge would have been enough to rebut Fraser by pointing out there are plenty of Christians who are only all too ready to damn other Christians as being not Christian enough. Yet Dawkins had so set his own position that such a riposte was rendered impossible.
The point I think is that Giles is much more accomplished at the public journalistic kind of give and take, and did have some advantage over Dawkins, by easily shifting position in response to Dawkins, which put the latter at some disadvantage.
However, Dawkins main point is not lost in the war of words, the main point being that the constant claim of the religious that Britain is a Christian country, and that religion should play a more visible and public role in the governance of the country, is belied by the fact — taking the RDFRS/Ipsos MORI poll as reasonably accurate reflection of Christian opinion in Britain, as there is no reason not to do — that most Christians in Britain seem to be more comfortable with religion being a private affair, instead of having governments “doing god”, as the ministerial delegation to the Vatican led by Baroness Warsi is recommending. Religion in Britain is being threatened by the advance of militant secularism, according to Baroness Warsi, representing the government of David Cameron. Indeed, she has been quoted as saying in the Telegraph that “to create a more just society, people need to feel stronger in their religious identities and more confident in their creeds”.
While such a proposal may play into the hands of Baroness Warsi’s devotion to Islam, it is not clear how increasing the public footprints of the multitudinous religious creeds now multiplying in Britain (as well as in most Western nations) would help to create a more just society. Indeed, if the RDFRS/Ipsos MORI poll shows anything, it shows that most Christians think that less emphasis on the public face of Christianity in a multi-faith society would accord better with justice and equality. Giles’ position, based as it is on the seventeenth century settlement of religious differences in England, when it was accepted that there was never going to be a single, unified Christian faith in Britain, thus creating the Church of England as a very broad house in which people of very different theological commitments could dwell in peace within the same ecclesial structure, is simply irrelevant to the problems facing multi-religious societies in the early 21st century. Out of the seventeenth century settlement developed all the institutions with which we are now familiar — things like equality before the law, universal suffrage, democratic governance, human rights, freedom of expression, as well as the gradual marginalisation of religion in public life. But it was by way of showing the irrelevance of the varieties of faith to public life that this development was made possible. This is particularly important where we have not only many different Christian creeds, but many different religions. In present the situation, where Islam is making enormous claims for itself, and sometimes speaking as though it represents the wave of the future, it is important for all religions to recognise that they should not have a decisive voice in the nation’s affairs, and it is significant that the RDFRS/Ipsos MORI poll indicates that majority of Christians in Britain believe this too. It is important that no religious voice be predominant, so that religion can become gradually more and more a matter of private preference, and not the kind of true belief that believes it should be able to carry decisions in matters of public significance before it.
But the most important point, which Giles Fraser does not seem to understand, is that this is a very different situation to the one in the seventeenth century. We are now dealing with multiple religions, not simply multiple expressions of one religion. In this situation, it is hard to have a national body like the Church of England which can claim to be a meeting place for a broad spectrum of religious belief, since all the religions actually think, as varieties of Protestantism did in the seventeenth century in their struggle against Catholicism, that they are true in ways that other religions are not, and thus deserve to have the major voice in deciding issues of public importance, as the Church of England did for so long in England, and the Church of Scotland in Scotland. Now the religious fabric of the land is completely fractured, at the same time that religious conviction is declining. It is not the responsibility of the government to encourage religious expression of any kind, nor is it the function of government to make decisions based on religious conviction. Britain is increasingly secular, and that is a good thing, because, in the present circumstances, the way to bring about peace amongst religions is to make sure that none of them is related more closely to political power and to public decision-making than any other. This much must surely be evident. In such a situation decisions are made, and should be made, based on questions of public good, and no one should, like Baroness Warsi, claim on behalf of the government, that increased religious expression should be a factor in achieving that public good. What Warsi’s campaign will do, if it succeeds, will be to show how fractured the religious life of contemporary Britain really is, and how important it is for this fracturing not to be expressed in the national agenda.
So, while I think that Gurdur’s assessment of the Giles Fraser – Richard Dawkins debate is reasonably fair-minded, I think he underestimates the success of Dawkins in getting his point across. Anyone listening to the broadcast with an open mind will have to grant that Dawkins’ points are much stronger than Giles Fraser’s responses suggest. Dawkins may sound like a 17th century Puritan to Gurdur, but he sounds very much like a 21st century secularist to me, and the importance of the poll sponsored by the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science is much greater than people seem to suppose. It makes Baroness Warsi’s delegation to the Vatican look a bit like a trip up the yellow brick road to visit the Wizard of Oz, and when we look behind all the ruffles and lace, we’ll see old men pulling the strings and voices amplified by centuries of obsequious devotion, not by the reasoned or substantive content of what anyone has to say.
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A related post is Jerry Coyne’s Britain is in danger from “militant secularists” :-)
It is telling that the focus would be a minor mistake in attempting a rote recitation from memory. Dawkins hit every major part of the title, if not word for word.
As if as atheists we would criticize believers for not being able to list the books of the bible in order. Such an ability would be impressive, but in the end irrelevant. No serious educator wants a wrote recitation from students, understanding is much more important. Tell me if there is more than one creation account in Genesis, “yes there is” will suffice,I don’t need a word for word recitation.
I think it is wise to allow the odd verbal bobble for anyone speaking in public.Unfortunately there are too many pressure groups who seize on the smallest error and trumpet it from the rooftops. God-struck or god-free speakers, it doesn’t matter in the long term. Actions and long term attitudes are what count.
While I might disagree in some minor details with Richard Dawkins, or PZ Myers, or even Eric MacDonald(!) I am glad that there are people who are prepared to challenge the unthinking respect and privilege demanded by the religious.
And anyway, Richard Dawkins could only be an embarrassment to Atheism if Atheists were part of some formal organisation, rather than a social movement.
I disagree, for general and specific reasons.
In general, if you claim to be a Christian, but neither believe in God nor that Jesus was the Son of God, then you are redefining — or at least stretching the definition of — the term in a way that renders it meaningless. By all means profess to follow the teachings of a man called Jesus as recorded in the NT and eschew all supernatural elements. But how can that Jesus be Jesus Christ if neither of those things are true?
And specifically, wrt the Census, the question in 2001 and 2011 was posed in a way and in a context that spoke more of cultural associations than religious belief (see the BHA’s Census Campaign website for more details). Even the ONS admitted it was a badly worded question!
I’m reminded of the time I was in hospital a year or so ago, and overheard several other patients admitted. In response to the question, “What’s your religion?” all answered, “Church of England”, but not one of them failed to qualify that with, “I suppose,” or something similar. The census question captured a lot of those I-suppose Christians.
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PS. I agree that dropping the ball didn’t lose Dawkins the game.
So, let’s be clear about this…the whole thing about the title of Darwin’s book has to do with the word “races”.
Which had a different meaning back in the mid-1800s. Much like the word “gay” had a different meaning back then.
This is a theistic claim that Darwin was racist — which he clearly wasn’t. And that his “racism” somehow makes his entire body of observation worthless — which, even if true, doesn’t. I
It’s a common creationist trap. That Dawkins didn’t recognize this is the main issue. It might be an embarrassment to him; but certainly not to atheists.
Oh yeah, I should mention that in the entire Origins, the issue of human races is not mentioned at all. So, if the book was about human races and “favored races” at that — well, the book suffers from not addressing the subtitle.
This little bit of doggerel is even on the Creationist Bingo Card. I’m flummoxed as to why Dawkins didn’t spot it instantly.
@ Kevin I’m pretty sure that Fraser wasn’t actually thinking of that. It was just a counterpoint to the survey question about “Matthew”.
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There are a number of points to be made, I think. The ‘Matthew’ question is just one among many in the survey which were looking to tease out what the census ‘Christians’ believed, so that religious leaders could be prevented from using that percentage (70 odd in the last census) as a homogeneous block to support the churches’ homophobia, misogyny, anti-secularism, and so on (which they have done).To this end, it’s just one indication of what these ‘Christians’ are about, and doesn’t mean too much by itself, but it’s hard to deny how surprising it is that many of them don’t know the answer, and it speaks to their Biblical literacy.
The Origin of Species question, while superficially similar, is quite different. The fact that Darwin’s book is not used in anything like the same way as the Bible makes the comparison a non-starter from the off, but it’s clear that feeble and shallow thinkers will get some satisfaction from Dawkins’s discomfort, as Jim West demonstrates. Dawkins should have responded to Fraser by asking for four options (which is what the survey offered). That would have flummoxed Fraser, I suspect!
The survey is devastating to the pretensions of church leaders because of the wide ranging answers it gathered. It can also fuel the debate on the definition of a Christian, but that is subsidiary, to my mind, because it’s such a hard one to pin down. I’m not really against people self-identifying, but as soon as someone who is perceived as ‘very evil’ self-identifies as a Christian, theists dust off the No True Scotsman defence, and self-identification suddenly becomes less attractive.
I think Dawkins’ has made a successful long term victory against the deception and spin played by Christian lobbyists over the past years here in Britain. Giles Fraser came across as a complete bully, and an insincere one at that.
The results of the survey are not surprising, and only confirm the results of the British Social Attitudes survey over the last thirty years.
Ant (#3), I don’t want to disagree with you strongly, but I should have thought that people like Martin Rees, who calls himself a cultural Anglican, qualifies as a Christian, and if he does then people whose relationship to the church is as loose as “I suppose” mayu reasonably be counted among their number as well. I think it is up to the church to define its own membership. and if they want to count such marginal members as Christians — and I think they do — then that is up to them, as well as to the people who are Christian in this sense without even having thought about it. Oriana Fallaci used to say that she was an atheist, but a Catholic atheist, and that makes some sort of sense, to me, anyway. As an Anglican, my wife Elizabeth used to say that she was an Anglican, but not a Christian, and she meant that she belonged in that cultural tradition, not as a believer, but as one for whom that expression of human life had meaning, even if not a strongly religious, and certanly not a supernatural one. Don Cupitt is a Christian in that sense too.
I think this is a symptom of two false beliefs that are waning but still have some popular currency.
(1) Everyone has a religion
(2) Religion is a hereditary condition.
I have had Jews (who knew that I don’t believe in god or the divinity of Jesus or attend church) tell me several times that I am a Christian. I then had to explain politely that I am not a Christian, and that although my grandparents were Christians, it’s not a hereditary ailment. If someone thinks that everyone has a religion and/or that religion is hereditary, then you will be more likely to self-describe as “christian” even if they actually have no religion.
I would love to see billboard campaigns stressing these two points. “Some people have no religion and that’s fine.” and “Everyone is born with no religion.”
So, what is Christianity, then? Seems very “hush hush” to me.
No, Gordon, I think we just let people self-identify. I think Giles Fraser is right to this extent, and if someone self-identifies as an atheist Christian, then I think we have to allow for this category of religious thought. The Sea of Faith movement is very much along these lines. They are people for whom religious thought and practice has great meaning, but who consider that religion is nonetheless a purely human creation. I don’t think that this is beyond the realm of imagination. I mean, what’s the point of telling Martin Rees that he is not an Anglican, and therefore not a Christian? He self-identifies in this way. That’s his affair, even if atheists might continue to say that he is only a “pretend” Christian. But by that logic there have been a lot of pretend Christians. Can we just say, “No, you can’t be a Christian”? That is trying to define from your point of view who can and who cannot be a Christian and who qualifies, and by what logic does one get to do that?
Eric,
I think you are arguing that all religious self-ascriptions “I am of religion X” are analytic. Maybe it could be compared to the idea that claims like “I affiliated with X” are analytic in that making a statement that I affiliate with X just is what it is to affiliate with X. But people can deny these claims. I think it’s quite reasonable to believe that people can be quite wrong with their religious self-ascriptions, that they are just misusing the word “Christian” when they claim to be Christians. As a practical matter, I think it is reasonable to accept self-identifications on an everyday basis, but it also seems quite wrong to me to think that someone’s self-identification is infallible.
Yes, but the point is that it makes the term “christian” into something completely meaningless. No one has the right to tell anyone else what Christian doctrine is, because it would deny someone else the right to call themselves christian. By the same token it makes a census identifying so many people as “self-declared christians” useless for religious people who wish to claim that Christianity is alive and well. It’s only useful if you want to shut the sceptics up, but completely useless if you want to congratulate yourself that so many percent still believe that Christ died to save sinners. I can call myself a Christian because I like Thomas Tallis and give up eating fish for Lent. I dare you to say I’m not.
Sorry, that was a reply to Eric.
If we were to define X as someone who practices a religion properly, then that would exclude 95% of people who identify with X. Take orthodox Jews, for example, who have to obey something like 600 ridiculous rules in the Torah, many of this very group still try to dodge the strict rules in very silly ways.
Religion is really about group identity, or social status. People want to belong to a group because it makes them feel safe and they get special privileges. Otherwise, very few actually take their religion seriously. We all know this, because we’ve debated Christians and we’ve exposed their ignorance of Christianity.
Another good reason to belong to a religion is to avoid the fear of being an outcast. Being an outcast means you are more or less cursed, and open to abuse.
That is what religion is really all about, it’s not about some noble or meaningful search into spirituality, it’s about following the crowd and gaining status.
That is what religion is really all about, it’s not about some noble or meaningful search into spirituality, it’s about following the crowd and gaining status.
But Egbert, if religion is not actually about religion, on what basis do religious people attack one another or nonbelievers? How can they justify it on the religious grounds they invariably trot out? And if you say that 95% of people who identify with X do not practise X properly, aren’t you saying that 95% of self-declared Xians are not proper Xians?
Daniel (#13). No, of course ascriptions of religion are not analytic, but ascriptions do not necessarily prescribe a certain set of doctrines.
For example, there is an association of pro-choice Catholics. The Catholic Church, of course, says that they are not Catholics, because the Catholic Church is “pro-life” and not pro-choice. Well, from one point of view — the official church made up of popes, cardinals, etc. — they are not Catholics; perhaps they have even been excommunicated fromt he Catholic Church, but what they are claiming is that Catholicism should not be confined to those who take this point of view, and that the defintion of Catholic should be wider than this. If membership of the Catholic Church depends upon official definition, then there is no way that such Catholics could even attempt to change the church’s mind, as it has regularly done over the centuries.
So, who is a Catholic depends much more on the sense that people have that they so belong. And most churches are much looser in their definition of what beliefs are required in order to claim membership. The Church of England used to be notoriously loose-jointed in this way, and to a certain extent still is, since it came out of the time of the Commonwealth with a sense of itself as the national church to which all Christians, despite their widespread disagreement over specific doctrine, could belong. And then of course churches like the Unitarian Univeralists cast an even wider net.
The relationship of churches with each other is sometimes a very extremely complex matter, and even messy, so, for example, some Lutheran and Anglican Churches are in full communion, and recognise each other’s ministries, but some do not, and so on. These things are all connected to the peculiar histories of different strains of Christianity. But it is certainly not up to atheists to define for Christians what they hold to be the basic minimum of what will count as membership of a Christian church. They define these things for themselves more or less tightly, but whichever way it is done ascriptions of religion are synthetic.
That doesn’t mean, I hasten to add, that atheists can have nothing to say here, for, as Gordon points out, this has the tendency to make Christian self-identity more or less meaningless. Atheists can define what they mean when they say they are dismissing the truth of religious beliefs. They can of course say that the kind of religion they are rejecting is any religion in which there is a belief in supernatural powers that enter into relationship with human beings and intervene in the world for good for those who are faithful believers in such beings’ goodness and grace. If there are religions that are purely mythical, in the sense suggested by Philip Ball, then they are very few. There are people at the margins of Christianity who certainly hold these views, but the central doctrines of Christianity tend to demand belief in transcendent beings of goodness and power.
However, what right do atheists have to declare that these people on the margins, whose theology tends to think in terms of myth, are not members of the religions concerned? Even if, by doing so, they let other Christians pretend that this is what Christians really believe, so that the accusations of atheists miss their mark? The best way is to define carefully what it is that is being denied, and then saying that, so far as we can see, cultural Christians, who do not have any supernatural beliefs, are not Christian or Jewish, etc. in the traditional sense expressed in the founding documents of these faiths. That’s why Antony Flew in God and Philosophy spends so much time making sure that the identity of the being that is in question in religious belief is clearly defined and identified. Of course, that makes it easy for clever theologians to slip away, but if they do, the point is that, whether Christian or not (and about this we are not qualified to judge — the judicatories of the churches must do this), they are not religious in the sense denied by atheism.
What atheists might say — as I do — is that these mythical expressions of religion are convenient fictions that others can use to slip in beliefs in really existing transcendent or supernatural beings. I think theologians who make this move are really making it easier for Christians who believe in the entire supernatural apparatus of Christianity to keep holding faith in a traditional way, while theologians make it seem as though no one really thinks this way any more. But this means that religions are there in the very traditional sense but proceeding under false colours, and are still capable of the same kinds of injustice and evil that religions have always been up to. It is for this reason that atheism must both make clear, and require others to make clear what it is that they are believing when they say things like there is a God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, or that Muhammad is the Prophet of the last revelation. They mustn’t be allowed to get away with cloudy statements about what their beliefs entail. If they continue to do this, they need to be told that woo doesn’t constitute belief. The point is not to define the limits of Christianity or Judaism or Islam, etc., but to make certain standards of clarity necessary before it makes sense to enter into the question of whether what they believe is true or false. And, in general, it must be true in some robust sense if they are going to go on making the kinds of claims that they do to our attention.
Egbert, taking your point seriously for a moment, if religion is only a matter of identity, then mobilising thousands of people to violently protest against a few cartoons or a novel or a teddy bear is to appeal merely to their “identity” and to cynically accept that many of them will not be shouting for any actual religious reasons at all. This may of course be the case, but you see where it leaves the religious position? It reduces to a matter of an elite exploiting the keywords which will turn on the reaction they want, and in no way expresses any meaningful depth of religious belief (except possibly in the case of a few). We might as well say that genuine religious belief is irrelevant, for all practical purposes: what matters are words people say and things they do for reasons of identity or social security. If you accept this, it relativises to the point of meaninglessness the whole idea of religion as a set of moral and sacred doctrines actually given by an actual god. This means that the more people choose religion as identity, the less they actually believe in it.
Yes Gordon (comment 19), that is exactly how I view religion. Everything you said is the consequence of taking my point seriously. Once you understand religion as group identity, it is no longer based on beliefs or even moral principles. Those are rationalizations made by the religious to justify their irrationality and delusion.
That means I agree with Eric above, that Christian is not confined to some true set of principles or core beliefs, any group can identify themselves Christian, including atheists, and some atheists actually do identify as cultural and practicing Christians. The majority of Jews are cultural Jews, and here we can clearly see how group identity shapes Judaism more than core beliefs.
“However, what right do atheists have to declare that these people on the margins, whose theology tends to think in terms of myth, are not members of the religions concerned?”
Atheists have a right to say that someone isn’t a christian if that person isn’t a christian. I People have a general right to make true claims. The entire issue gets around to whether there are any facts of the matter about whether people are Christians or not. If you think there are such facts, as I do, then you think that people can be wrong in their self-descriptions. Someone who doesn’t believe in god or the divinity of Jesus, and who doesn’t attend services or pray but who self-describes as a “christian”, doesn’t really understand what the word means. Yes, there are vague margins, just as there are margins for many family-resemblance concepts, but that doesn’t mean anything goes.
Daniel Lafave,
What exactly makes someone a ‘true’ or authentic Christian from a fake one? Same for Judaism and Islam? What are the facts of the matter, how do you make such judgments?
Egberg,
“True Christian” strikes me as just pleonastic and “fake Christian” just means “not Christian”. The question is what makes someone a Christian. Some family resemblance theory is probably true. I’m sure there are many factors involved and that there are paradigm Christians and ones who are on the vague boundaries of the concept. If that isn’t the case and there are no facts about who are Christians, then we should stop calling people Christians and stick to the term “self-described christian” or similar.
You can disagree with me as strongly as you like, Eric! This is your blog, after all!
That was my point as well!
I think the most telling answer to Dawkins’ survey was the reason why people self-identified as Christians (multiple answers were allowed):
• 72% consider themselves to be Christian because they were christened or baptised into the religion
• 38% because their parents were members of the religion.
• only 28% say one of the reasons is that they believe in the teachings of Christianity.
Whatever “makes someone a ‘true’ or authentic Christian“ (Egbert), self-identifiied belief in the teachings of Christianity must be a strong candidate, surely.
Even if we’re prepared to be generous, 50% do not think of themselves as religious. If Christianity is a religion, are non-religious Christians Christians? If non-religious Christians are Christians, what then is Christianity?
If you posit that religion is more about group identity or social standing (Egbert), consider that the survey found that, apart from special occasions such as weddings, funerals and baptisms, 49% had not attended a church service in the previous 12 months. How does this group identity or social standing manifest itself for this 49%?
I agree, Eric, that there has to be some latitude in exactly what believers believe and yet still be counted as Christian — although the Spanish Inquisition might have differed. (No-one expected me to say that, did they?) But if Christian is such an elastic term that it encompasses people who were baptised or whose parents were Christian, but don’t themselves believe in God, don’t believe that Jesus was the Son of God, don’t believe in the resurrection (even in a spiritual rather than physical sense), &c., &c. then it becomes altogether useless as a label.
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I’m confused. The actual title is “On the Origin of Species by Natural Selection, or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.”
But that embarrassment Dawkins thought it was “On the Origin of Species: the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life.”
Not even close, dummy! Or, no, wait. It was really close. He left out ”by natural selection,” and therefore…?
This is a great blog post of yours, and many thanks for the link!
By the way, your Twitter account as given on your page (“FineOld”) seems totally unused? A big pity, since I personally rely on Twitter for most of my networking. I will make sure to cite your post soon in a new post of mine, and I’ve put up the trackback under my post.
Thank you Eric for posting the link to the debate.
Sad to say, but I think Richard Dawkins has become a victim of his own success and is fast becoming both an embarrassment and a liability, not exclusively through no fault of his own.
You only have to witness how the mere mention of his name in a newspaper online comment section has as many self-professed atheists lining up to disown him as to defend him to recognise that he’s already an embarrassment to many of his allies, and I find myself increasingly identifying with this former group. Whilst I rarely disagree with the substance of what he says, I find myself cringing inwardly whenever I hear or read his name in a headline these days, not because I think I’ll disagree with him, but because he’s like a lightening rod for the very stupidest, most entrenched of his opponents and supporters alike, and his involvement inevitably ensures that the actual issue at hand will be forgotten as another pro vs anti-Dawkins bun fight breaks out.
Indeed so strongly is he associated with the anti-clerical cause in the UK that even when he [i]doesn’t[/i] weigh in he still gets used as a get-out clause by his opponents, who shrug and say “Oh it’s just Dawkins at it again” and that’s the end of that. Witness, for example, the recent House of Lords debate on Collective Worship in Schools where Dawkins was name-checked several times, not by his secularist would-be allies, [i]but by his clerical opponents[/i]. Unfairly or not, the Richard Dawkins that resides in the public consciousness is very much the strident, shrill, ranty, zealous, intolerant, militant caricature that has been painted of him.
This survey that he’s had carried out is just the latest example. He’s done everything right and above board, and the survey itself is useful and interesting, and yet any usefulness is going to be entirely negated by its association with Richard. Like a politician who’s been in office too long, he’s just too familiar, has made too many tactical mistakes during his time on the front line, and made too many enemies out of allies, that it’s just easy for his opponents to dismiss him these days, and sadly whatever issue he’s discussing gets dismissed along with him regardless of its merits.
He deserved great credit, indeed gratitude, for all that he’s done, but I think it’s time for him to take his foot off the gas now.
That’s really shameful, Zedeeyen. You’re embarrassed to be seen with someone, even though you’re grateful to him and he’s right, of course. That’s cowardly. Sorry, but what you say is disgraceful.
Unfairly or not, the Richard Dawkins that resides in the public consciousness is very much the strident, shrill, ranty, zealous, intolerant, militant caricature that has been painted of him.
Well, you can help put that right, can’t you? Can’t you?
It’s a pragmatic and honest answer to Eric’s question. I really don’t see what’s shameful, disgraceful or cowardly about it, I just see the question of whether he’s right separately from the question of whether he’s effective.
Ant #24,
“How does this group identity or social standing manifest itself for this 49%?”
Once a person has converted to the group, they don’t have to be physically among the group to be part of it. And group identity can range from weak to strong.
Social status is not a reality, it’s something that exists within a person’s head. It acts rather like a magical spell or placebo that makes a person feel immortal or more filled with life energy.
Also, how do you determine what the true teachings of Christianity are? There are none.
Zedeeyen #26,
Although your comment is very harsh, you are probably correct about Richard Dawkins being a victim of his own success. He is an academic of enormous integrity and honesty who is interested in education and science, he’s not a politician or a lawyer and he’s not skilled in being witty or charming in the way Hitchens was.
This is the problem with going from atheism to politics, and why new atheists have to start switching from being scientifically or sceptically orientated ito politically orientated.
Dawkins has an opportunity to strike a massive blow to religious lobbyists, but those lobbyists are now lying about history and still persisting with the lie about majority belief in order to keep their grip on power and privilege.
Zedeeyen
“Indeed so strongly is he associated with the anti-clerical cause in the UK”
In my own little neck of the woods, I am considered to be too strongly against religion, especially Catholicism. If someone were to compare me to Dawkins, I would take the comparison as a compliment.
Re: “the Richard Dawkins that resides in the public consciousness is very much the strident, shrill, ranty, zealous, intolerant, militant caricature that has been painted of him.”
I listened to the debate, and, to my ear Fraser is loud, grating strident and at times strident. Dawkins’ replies are reasoned and reasonable.
You seem to be implying that you are seen as guilty by association with Dawkins. That’s your personal feeling; however, I would like to see more Catholics realize that they are guilty by association with the present pope. “I find myself cringing inwardly” every time I see a Catholic/Christian wearing a crucifix or walking down the street on the way to Sunday services.
Coming late to this debate, can I just say that I am totally with Ant on this one – sorry Eric! Perhaps it is because we are both here in the UK, and having just got rid of born again Catholic Tony Bliar (sic), are disgusted to find our current prime minister toadying up to the church in a quite embarrassing manner, presumably because he thinks there are votes in it. If he and the rest of the country can be persuaded that we are not a christian nation, then perhaps we can get on with getting rid of bishops in the upper house, NHS paying for hospital chaplains, and faith schools (do you know that anyone of any faith can get in to a normal secular school, but only those professing the appropriate religion can get in to a faith school, thus creating an unfair discrimination against the atheists).
I think Giles Fraser is being seriously misleading and patronising when he says:
From the press release:
Oh, yes! Silly little questions, really trivial in relation to the christian faith.
And Eric, this part of the poll was interesting:
And finally, in answer to your initial question, No!
Hmm… that’s another reason for people to identify as Christians even when they are not (since Church schools tend to have better academic records). I know another atheist who sent his children to a Church school for the quality of the education, knowing that his children could weather the religious malarky.
/@
Nobody knows the full name of most FASB rules. We just call them by their numbers. Like FAS 165 which is easy to remember (Subsequent Events). But mostly, they’re really hard to remember, like this one (FAS 158):
Employers’ Accounting for Defined Benefit Pension and Other Postretirement Plans—an amendment of FASB Statements No. 87, 88, 106, and 132(R)
If you asked me the titlle of FAS 158, I could have said it was about defined benefit pension plans and related… I couldn’t have possibly remembered its title. If only because WE DO NOT USE THE FULL TITLE. EVER.
So, it’s a typical effing ‘gotcha’ question. Complete BS, and in now way actually speaks to what Dawkns knows or doesn’t know about the title of the book… Which is, btw, the least important part of the book.
@ /@ #36 (that looks strange – perhaps I’ll give you your nom) Ant
Good point, which I had missed.
@ Moseszd – agreed, but I had to Google FASB Rules. We’re not all accountants here, you know! (defined benefits pension plans – aah, these were the days).
Haggis, it’s not so much that I disagree with the claim that some who claim to be Christians are in some sense marginal Christians. It’s just that I don’t think anyone gets to decide for someone else what they are. That’s my point. Of course, lots of cultural Christians are very marginal, and are probably not listed anywhere on Parish rolls. And, as I say, there is a certain meaninglessness in claiming to be a Christian and not sharing any of the beliefs that are part of the deal of being a Christian.
I acknowledge all this, but at the same time I am aware that many Christian theologians are very tentative about their own subscription to orthodox Christian beliefs, and it is hard to say that they are not Christian. I think we are better off letting people self-identify. Trying to say that someone is not a Christian, just because he sits rather loosely to Christian beliefs, or interprets them in figurative ways, may indeed lead him to say something to the effect that he’ll be damned if he’ll allow someone else to say whether he is or is not a Christian, and he’ll show them who’s right by beginning to take Christian beliefs more seriously. So, it’s far better, in my view, to let marginal Christians lie (on the principle that it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie). The church can’t count on their support, unless there’s some additional reason to give it, and they’ll simply remain as marginal as they claim to be. We gain no advantage by trying to say that they are not Christians after all. Although I had not factored in the advantage that some might reap by claiming to be Christians, so that their children could go to better schools. There simply should be no faith schools at all, and the children of religious believers should not be able to benefit in this way.
Regarding the stats on support for assisted dying, if the poll is right this is a decline over a few years ago when 63% of communicating Anglicans supported assisted dying, and I would still like to get the terminality requirement out of the discussion. It’s a bad one, and the assisted dying community seems to have signed off on it.
or getting elected to public office in the US.
Now Mormons are emphasizing that they are really Christians in their attempt to enter the US mainstream. I am with Eric and Egbert on this one – I can’t see how anyone can definitively determine who is or is not a Christian. Many Christian sects would so narrowly define Christianity that most so-called Christians wouldn’t qualify.
@Zedeeyen
I have to say that I would be honoured to be associated with Richard Dawkins in any way what so ever.
You on the other hand make me cringe at your disgusting willingness to throw someone under the bus because you find him embarrassing, in one of the most egregious displays of self-centred narcissism that I’ve had the pleasure of witnessing in quite a while.
If I understand your argument, such as it is, people make shit up about Dawkins, and that makes him a liability ?
And you appear to be assisting in that process.
My only criteria for evaluating the man is, is what he says true or not.
And I’d say it’s time for you to take your foot out of your mouth now.
@ Steve
No, I don’t think you understand my argument at all.
I don’t “want to throw him under a bus because I find him embarrassing”, I think it’s time for him to take a step back because I think his contributions have become, or are becoming, at best ineffective and at worst counter-productive. I’m not saying I think that’s how things should be, or how I wish them to be, I’m saying I think that’s how things are, at least as I see them.
The main reason I think he is becoming ineffective, as I said in my first post, is that he’s become a victim of his own success. He has been so prolific and so successful in giving prominence to the issue of unbelief that he’s become a rock-star and a hero to his supporters and the Big Bad Bogieman to his opponents, to the extent that his personality now overpowers his own arguments. It used to be the case that people decided whether they liked Richard Dawkins based on what he had to say, but nowadays it seems to be the other way around – people react to his arguments based on how they feel about the man. When the mere mention of your name causes everyone’s shutters to come down then you’re no longer helping. Additionally, I think all the provocative statements he’s made over the years, while absolutely necessary in context, have caught up with him and become a millstone around his neck. Was he wrong to equate religious indoctrination with child abuse? Absolutely not. As a consciousness-raising exercise it worked exactly as it was intended to, and it made space for the subsequent debate. The trouble it is that he can’t unsay it now that the debate he kick-started is in full swing, and it necessarily underpins everything else he’ll ever say on the subject. No one who is in favour of faith schools or even neutral on the question will ever, ever listen to a single word he says about them.
I think he’s becoming an embarrassment (which is slightly different from “being embarrassed by him”) because, while I broadly agree with his reasoning and his conclusions, I don’t share his motivations, or at least the balance of motivations. We’re both atheists and secularists, but I’m a secularist first and foremost – I’m mainly interested in what people do and really don’t care what they believe so long as it doesn’t affect me. I care far more about my child not having to pray in school than whether or not his teacher believes any of it. Dawkins, on the other hand, seems to be interested above all else in truth, and is involved in a quest to convince the world to stop believing stupid, dangerous nonsense. Sometimes there’s no conflict between those two motivations, but sometimes there is.
Take the radio interview in question. This survey he’s had carried out shows some really interesting things, the biggest of which from a secular point of view is that most self-identifying Christians are actually as secular as the non-religious. That’s a big finding, and Dawkins should have been leading with this because it’s a message that would have resonated, and is 100% supported by the data, but instead he chose to make the far more contentious and anyway meaningless claim that most Christians aren’t really Christians at all, and the whole debate has become about that arrogant atheist who wants to decide and define who is and isn’t a Christian, and yet another big, unhelpful conflation of “atheist” and “secularist”. The fact that he fluffed the name of a book made it slightly worse, but only slightly.
As I said, I don’t think Dawkins’ contribution can be overstated and we all owe him a debt of gratitude. But that gratitude and affection shouldn’t negate recognising that he may now be operating on diminishing returns.
Zedeeyen (#42). I agree with you completely that Richard Dawkins introduced an issue upon which he could not possibly win, and that this was a tactical error in debate. However, I don’t think this makes him an embarrassment to atheism. Indeed, he recovered very well, and for the most part gave a good account of himself. I just think he overreached himself on this one issue only. He had much more potent ammunition to hand, and he should have used this to its full effect, and he did not. It’s so easy to do, as I know to my own cost, on TV or radio. The moment is past almost before you have a chance to think, and once you’ve committed yourself, there’s no way back. But this doesn’t make Dawkins a liability at all, because in most other situations he’s right on the money. I think he should be forgiven a relatively minor tactical error. I do not think we have reached a point where his is operating on diminishing returns. That is to turn a small mistake into something much more significant than it really is.
I should add that the difference in your motivations, as you put it, really does put Dawkins in a better light. He is concerned with the truth, and wishes that people would stop believing silly and dangerous nonsense. I think that is something we should all wish for — and when people do believe dangerous nonsense, it should be of concern to all of us.
When the mere mention of your name causes everyone’s shutters to come down then you’re no longer helping. Additionally, I think all the provocative statements he’s made over the years, while absolutely necessary in context, have caught up with him and become a millstone around his neck. Was he wrong to equate religious indoctrination with child abuse? Absolutely not. As a consciousness-raising exercise it worked exactly as it was intended to, and it made space for the subsequent debate. The trouble it is that he can’t unsay it now that the debate he kick-started is in full swing, and it necessarily underpins everything else he’ll ever say on the subject. No one who is in favour of faith schools or even neutral on the question will ever, ever listen to a single word he says about them.
This is the whole damn point. Of course people’s shutters come down, whatever did you expect? And we have to keep banging on them. Dawkins’s “provocative statements” are precisely necessary to make people think, and when they don’t like thinking they are obviously going to call him “harsh” and “shrill” and “strident”, even when he manifestly isn’t, and are going to pretend that he’s insignificant. And, to let you into a secret, Zedeeyen, that is what always happens when the other side pretend to principles but have no scruples. I am disgusted to read that you regret that Dawkins can’t unsay anything. He has nothing to unsay. How can you “unsay” the truth and not be a liar? I am with Steve on this. Dawkins is an honourable man fighting brilliantly in an honourable cause, and it is an honour to support him. I am dismayed, but I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, that anyone should call Dawkins an embarrassment at exactly the moment when he is stoutly defending his position against precisely the kind of methods which we expect — methods which are obviously working well against you. Go and hide if you like.
I care far more about my child not having to pray in school than whether or not his teacher believes any of it. Dawkins, on the other hand, seems to be interested above all else in truth, and is involved in a quest to convince the world to stop believing stupid, dangerous nonsense. Sometimes there’s no conflict between those two motivations, but sometimes there is.
Dawkins has a dual role. He is a scientist, and sees science, and his own discipline in particular, under threat from religious extremists. And without science we’re sunk. Without a proper understanding of ourselves we’re sunk. He also understands the importance of education both as a matter of personal freedom from mere belief and blindness to the actual world and as the means by which people can become clear-sighted and informed and society can improve in both justice and quality of life. Both of these considerations are deeply humanitarian, both are concerned with liberation from lies and superstition. Of course people can believe what they like, so long as they are not forced to do so from the cradle, but are given the means to make intelligent and informed decisions — which is to say, impartial education in an impartial democratic system. Necessarily, then, you can’t in practice separate the two things, as you are trying to do.
@Michael #40
Many Christian sects would so narrowly define Christianity that most so-called Christians wouldn’t qualify.
And if they all define Christianity as they please then either they all qualify — or no one does. This is one way to define a “religion” out of existence: don’t define it at all. Whose religion? Which religion? What religion? What, then, is in a name…?
Here’s a pretty conundrum:
Do Christians believe (let’s not overdo it here) that Christ was important? Presumably, but so do the Muslims.
Do Christians believe in God as a real live being? Well, some do, but so do the Muslims.
Do Christians respect Mary? Well, some do, but so do the Muslims.
Do Christians believe in miracles? Well, some do, but so do the Muslims.
Do Christians read the Koran? Probably not, except perhaps for information (on the other hand, Tony Blair was once quite complimentary about it, I seem to remember, but then he’s a politician).
Ah, so there’s a difference.
Do Christians believe that Mohammed was a true prophet? Unlikely (though who knows?), unless they happen to live in a Muslim country, in which case they’ll say anything if they don’t want to end up like Asia Bibi.
So we can definitely say that Christians are probably not Muslims.
But we need to be careful here. After all, we’ve no right to assume any particular belief or lack of belief on the part of Christians, have we?
Of course, all these people — Christians, Muslims, Jews — never tire of telling us what they believe and complaining that we don’t respect their beliefs, but if we can’t say what their beliefs actually are they have only themselves to blame.
@Zedeeyen
Anybody who thinks that accommodationism is a recent development need only look at the history of the civil rights movements that gave negros, women and homosexuals (sadly this is still in progress) full rights before the law.
There were people just like you telling the folks doing the actual work to tone it down a bit and please what ever you do don’t hurt the feelings of and alienate the in group busy fucking over the out group of the day.
Luckily they didn’t listen to them then and hopefully we’ll be sensible enough not to listen to them now.