I still haven't finished the God Delusion, although I am significantly further through it. I am finding it an enormously frustrating read. Not becasue I don't agree with him, or even that I am predisposed to disagree with him, I have read other atheist writing and enjoyed and been challenged by it immensely.

I find it frustrating because of Dawkins' style. He has been described as "Darwins Rottwieler" (in a explicit comparison to T.H Huxley who was known as Darwin's Bulldog - and inappropriate comparison in my view). It seems to me that the dog is rabid. It's frustrating because this work could have been an interesting contribution to a long standing debate over the existence of God, instead it is a patchy rant/whine.

Anyway, I was given back my copy of Dawkins' God, written by Alistar McGrath, a prominent philosopher of science. In it there is a great passage where he tackles this very issue, namely the "ferocty with which he (Dawkins) asserts his atheism."

( an extended quote on Dawkin's reasoning process. )

To put it bluntly, Dawkins makes an inference about how to explain the world and then uses that inference to develop logically binding deductions about the existence, or lack thereof, of God.

This is something I have seen over and over again, especially on teh interwebs on sites like Panda's Thumb and respondants to David Heddle's blog He Lives. Essentially there is a confusion whereby some people, theists and atheists both, take physical evidence as absolute confirmation of metaphysical beliefs. Cognitive Psychological research has shown that people tend to seek and interprets evidence that confirms belief(2). So this isn't terribly surprising.

But it is frustrating for the following reasons.

First Dawkins (and others) accuse theists of making this logical error while making it themselves. Most of the skilled theist writers in this debate that I have read are very clear that there arguments are inferential only and thus not logically binding. Most of them seem acutely aware of the difference between physical evidence and metaphysical belief or theory. In fact the recent Intelligent Design writers take pains to point this out. Namely that they are arguing an inference to the best explanation, not a logically necessary deduction. At best they are saying it is eminently rational to be a theist, but that the argument is not logically binding.

There are poor theist writers in this area that make the same mistake and they should be rightly repudiated for it. But so should Dawkins. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. I don't normally seriously engage with these writers because they have little influence. Dawkins' unprecendented influence means that it is necessary to engage with his work.

Second, this debate has gone on for centuries and has largely come to a stalemate (with the exception of the Intelligent Design revival based on recent scientific findings, but, as said, this has more modest intentions and does not set out to prove the existence of God). Dawkins rocks along with his lenghty rant and summarily dismisses the collective centuries of thought by specialists in this area with a few hand waves, some burning of straw men and some red faced ranting and presumes to have settled the matter.

The arrogance of the man is unsettling. Dawkins is, or was, a brilliant scientist. He has contributed profoundly to our understanding of evolution and is, or was, a highly respected Zoologist. What he is not, is a philosopher of any ability. To wade into complex philosophical debates and essentially try and shout everyone down jsut comes across as childish (much of the book reads like a schoolboy argument) and churlish.

To make matters worse, Dawkins has roundly tried to demonize philsophers who want to step into a debate that they justifiably see as on their turf. He has claimed of various people that they are not biologists so they shouldn't be getting involved. Even worse, he has personally attacked theist biologists; essentially damning them for their theism and so never having to actually engage with their actual statements.

All in all The God Delusion is a frustrating read simply because it lacks any real depth or character. Is is largely superfluous ranting that contributes little, if any, real value to the existing debate. It saddens me that he has such a wide influence that people will read it, and may be persuaded by it, when it is, in the final analysis, simply a (poor) piece of propaganda.

If people wanted to read good atheist or agnostic literature in this area I'd suggest Anthony Flew or Micheal Ruse as good places to start.

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(2)Nisbett and Ross: Human Inference: Stategies and Shortcomings of Social Judgement cited in McGrath's Dawkin's God.

I read this article today and had to laugh. It's an interesting piece of propaganda in the toy tossing contest between fundamentalist(1) atheists against fundamentalist Christians. This particular piece of propaganda uses attempts by the other side to produce propaganda (in this case buring effigies) to lampoon them and promote it's own side as the reasonable one.

It's a subtle effect. While never actually claiming to be the reasonable side, the article writer favourably quotes Dawkins. The way the quotes are put is interesting. He says Dawkins: "was especially enraged by creationists, whom he saw as victims of a preposterous, mind-shrinking falsehood." But doesn't offer any qualification of that opinion, thereby suggesting that it is true, at least in the authors opinion.

Of course the article doesn't contain the authors actual opinion, so the implication is that Dawkins' opinion is correct.

The thing that really makes me laugh is this paragraph here:
More recently Dawkins has widened his range of fire, taking on religion in general. He argues that all religions, from Islam to Christianity, depend on a farrago of vacuous supernatural nonsense and it's not just harmless nonsense. He says religion can be lethally dangerous, as it gives believers unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness and teaches enmity toward other equally irrational faiths, leading to barbarous crusades, pogroms and jihads. Dawkins is contemptuous about all organised religion, which he compares to a brain disease.

It makes me laugh, because having read a fair part of The God Delusion (I haven't finished it yet, there is only so much "literary" screaming in ones face that one can take at a time) that the exact same attack can be directed at Dawkins in particular and Atheism in general.

To misquote: "Atheism can be lethally dangerous, as it give believers unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness and teaches emnity toward other equally irrational faiths, leading to barbarous crusades, pogroms and Jihads."

Okay, well maybe not Jihad's per se, but the millions persecuted under communism in Stalinist Russia and Communist China are not good poster children for atheism. And these are just the worst two offenders.

See the thing here is that is not theism that turns people in "barbarians". It's not atheism that turns people into "barbarians". However both theism and atheism have been used to justify barbarism. I think there is a lot of stuff that can be said for peoples psychology, people's willingness to embrace "barbarism" and then backwards tie it in to religious, cultural and philosophical justifications.

In fact, Christianity in particular has an excellent explanation for why this is so. But that's an aside here.

"Arguing" by pointing to excesses is simply not an argument at all. It's just name calling. And by doing it Dawkins, and Brockie, open themselves to being tarred with the same brush.

In the funde atheist vs the funde theist toy throwing contest I think the thing we can see most, especially in the writing of Dawkins in the God Delusion, is exactly the kind of rabid religious fervor that he accuses his opponents of (and that they are clearly guilty off in the effigy burnings(2)). And that is the delicious irony of it all. As they say, it's rather like the pot calling the kettle black.

And Bob Brockie, in his endorsement of Dawkin's rabid fundamentalist atheism merely casts himself in the same light that he tries to cast on the effigy burners.

And, as final word to the effigy burners. Shame on you. If you really followed Jesus you should know better.

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(1) I am not using the term fundamentalist in it's old positive term, of people who stripped away religious cruft and got back to the fundamentals of faith. I am using it in the modern pejorative sense of a "deranged fanatic."

(2) To be honest it sounds like fun if you remove all the religious nutters. Maybe the people should go to Burning Man ^_^