OK, am I over-reacting here...?

[onager]

Poking around the bookstore recently, I came across the new book by Charles Freeman - AD 381: Heretics, Pagans and the Dawn of the Monotheistic State.

"AD 381" refers to the year in which Emperor Theodosius I announced a new law requiring belief in the Trinity. The law led to decades of horrendous persecution of pagans and Off-Brand Xians.

I loved Freeman's earlier book, The Closing of the Western Mind, and have often quoted from it. Freeman begins by noting that the last Greek scientific observatory closed in the Fifth Century, and the next one didn't open until a thousand years later. Overall, that book was a stunning indictment of how Xianity oppressed human thought for centuries.

AD 381 seemed similar, and I happily added it to my stack of stuff to buy.

Then I made the mistake of reading the Foreword. I am SOFA KING tired of reading crap like this! I put the book back on the shelf and grumped off.

Which is why I think I over-reacted.

But let me know what you think. (In the first line, Freeman is talking about the response to Closing of the Western Mind):

One response, however, continued to bother me. It was the criticism that I had set out to oppose Christianity.

I am not particularly drawn to organised religion but I enjoy many religious activities, especially listening and talking to those who have read widely in spiritual literature, Christian or otherwise.

In fact, I believe that a spiritual dimension is part of any healthy mind. It is surely right to reflect on values that go beyond the purely material, and I find the somewhat frenzied denunciations of Richard Dawkins and his supporters simplistic.

Human beings have always organized themselves to participate in what can only be called 'religious' activities and to speculate on what may or may not lie beyond the material world.

They have gained great comfort from their shared involvement in these activities.

How Professor Dawkins imagines one can ringfence this aspect of human behaviour and somehow eliminate it is not clear. (One thing I notice about Dawkins' work is that he has no sense of the emotions that drive people to search for religious meaning.)

I'd like to know when Dawkins said that, but...nope, I'll shut up until I hear some other opinions. What is it, open season on Dawkins?

The Amazon reviews contain one of the greatest titles I've ever read, at least for history geeks:

Athanasius was the Rush Limbaugh of his Day.

:rofl:

http://www.amazon.com/AD-381-Charles-Freeman/dp/159020171X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1248232102&sr=1-1

[enlightenment]

1. Hmm.

Maybe a little over-reaction, but I can understand why.

Freeman seems to be over-reacting himself; focusing on what he perceives as Dawkins' inability to comprehend the 'emotions that drive people . . .'

Frankly, it sound like something Dawkins wrote hit a nerve and he's lashing out. Clearly the man isn't atheist - he's simply not into organized religion, and for whatever reason, he's decided - as have so many others, lately - that Dawkins makes a great target.

Makes them feel better about themselves, I suppose.

The book sounds interesting; if you enjoyed his previous work it would be a shame to toss the baby out with the bathwater over the forward. You don't have to like the author to appreciate his research.

And I LOVE the review title. What a perfect comparison! I'd never thought of it quite that way, but boy, does it fit that fourth century twit.

[rrneck]

2. I haven't read any of

Dawkins stuff beyond the usual internet snippets, but Freeman sounds about right. Dawkins and the rest started some pretty good shit and they should expect some pushback.


Sounds like a good book.

[tbyg52]

3. I haven't read any books on atheism since I was a kid

When I read Bertrand Russell's _Why I Am Not a Christian_. I kinda stopped worrying about it as long as Xtians left me alone.

So, from a perspective of having read absolutely no Dawkins whatsoever, I think he may be getting a little carried away if he doesn't think most people have a religious impulse or something like it. That's not the same thing as saying there's a god - it's saying something about how the human brain is wired. I just finished reading _Kluge_ - very interesting.

I remember a few years ago I saw an interview with Carlos Santana, and his religion seemed to be music. Made sense to me.

[Warpy]

4. So he found it necessary to placate thin skinned Christians

in the foreword. I sincerely doubt they'd stay placated through the body of the book.

It sounds like an interesting history. I might pick it up, myself.

[onager]

5. Some on-topic Dawkins quotes

Interview with Sheena McDonald:

McDonald: And there is no possibility of there being something beyond our knowing, beyond your ability as a scientist, zoologist, to <...>

Dawkins: No, that's quite different. I think there's every possibility that there might be something beyond our knowing. All I've said is that I don't think there is any intelligence or any creativity or any purposiveness before the first few hundred million years that the universe has been in existence. So I don't think it's helpful to equate that which we don't understand with God in any sense that is already understood in the existing religions.

The gods that are already understood in existing religions are all thoroughly documented. They do things like forgive sins and impregnate virgins, and they do all sorts of rather ordinary, mundane, human kinds of things. That has nothing whatever to do with the high-flown profound difficulties that science may yet face in understanding the deep problems of the universe...

McDonald: How do you prepare for death in a world where there isn't a god?

Dawkins: You prepare for it by facing up to the truth, which is that life is what we have and so we had better live our life to the full while we have it, because there is nothing after it...we ought to use our brief time in the sunlight to maximum effect by trying to understand things and get as full a vision of the world and life as our brains allow us to, which is pretty full.

McDonald: And that is the first duty, right, responsibility, pleasure of man and woman. Christians would say "love God, love your neighbor". You would say "try to understand".

Dawkins: Well, I wouldn't wish to downplay love your neighbor. It would be rather sad if we didn't do that. But, having agreed that we should love our neighbor and all the other things that are embraced by that wee phrase, I think that, yes, "understand" is a pretty good commandment.

http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/dawkins1.htm

******************************************************************************************

Debate with David Quinn, Professional Irish Catholic. This one got pretty hot. And guess what prompted that first response:

Dawkins: Stalin was a very, very bad man and his persecution of religion was a very, very bad thing. End of story. It’s nothing to do with the fact that he was an atheist. We can’t just compile lists of bad people who were atheists and lists of bad people who were religious. I am afraid there were plenty on both sides.

Quinn: Yes, but Richard you are always compiling lists of bad religious people. I mean you do it continually in all your books, and then you devote a paragraph to basically trying to absolve atheism of all blame for any atrocity throughout history. You cannot have it both ways! You cannot...

Dawkins: I deny that.

Quinn: But of course you do it. Every time you are on a program talking about religion, you bring up the atrocities committed in the name of religion. And then you try to minimize the atrocities committed by atheists because they were so anti-religious and because they regarded it as a malign force in much the same way you do. You are trying to have it both ways.

Dawkins: Well, I simply deny that. I do think that there is some evil in faith because faith is belief in something without evidence.

Quinn: But, you see, that is not what faith is. You see, that is a caricature and a straw man and is so typical. That is not what faith is! You have faith that God doesn’t...

Dawkins: What is faith? What is faith!?

Quinn: Wait a second! You have faith that doesn’t exist. You are a man of faith as well.

Dawkins: I do not! I have looked at the evidence!

Quinn: Well, I have looked — I have looked at the evidence too!

Dawkins: If somebody comes up with evidence that goes the other way, I will be the first to change my mind.

Quinn: Well, I think the very existence of matter is evidence that God exists.

:eyes:

http://catholiceducation.org/articles/science/sc0086.htm

[FiveGoodMen]

8. "I think the very existence of matter is evidence that God exists"

I think we're all fucked because of the sizable contingent of humans who would be swayed by such a statement.

Fuck! People are stupid.

[Deep13]

6. Frenzied denunciations? Of what?

"...reflect on values that go beyond the purely material..."

Fallacy of equivocation. "Materialism" has two different meanings. The idea that the universe including the brain that makes our thoughts and feelings is made from one kind of stuff and that there is no devine substance. The other is the idea we should only be concerned with base needs, getting stuff, social status, superficial beauty, while ignoring what are considered higher ideals. When the writer says "material" he seems to be using it in the second meaning of the term. Dawkins is a materialist in the first, scientific definition of the term.

[charlie]

7. Dawkins, again

It's always Dawkins. They gun for the mouse and ignore the big fat target pasted on Hitchens, the guy who thinks pissing everybody off is part of a job properly done (eg, he calls Catholic outreach No Child's Behind Left). Unlike Dawkins, he'll argue about anything, with anyone, anywhere, and he'll fly to your town to do it. They're probably afraid of smelling his beery breath on the other side of their door one day, so they oversell Dawkins' nastiness and whack on him instead.