New Article - Sam Harris' Pearl of Great Price
I have a new article entitled "Sam Harris' Pearl of Great Price" published by Christian Faith and Reason Magazine.
The hard-copy version of this is set to release in the Nashville area this week, circulating 25,000 copies. The magazine, edited by Michael Patrick Leahy - who has also written a response to Sam Harris entitled Letter to an Atheist - is planned to go national two months from now.
There are still a few bugs in this online version, and the footnotes have not been posted yet, but the meat is there. Also, they say that I have begun my Ph.D. studies, when actually I hope to start next year, but haven't yet. Not a big deal.
You may post comments on the article here, since they are not set up for it.
The hard-copy version of this is set to release in the Nashville area this week, circulating 25,000 copies. The magazine, edited by Michael Patrick Leahy - who has also written a response to Sam Harris entitled Letter to an Atheist - is planned to go national two months from now.
There are still a few bugs in this online version, and the footnotes have not been posted yet, but the meat is there. Also, they say that I have begun my Ph.D. studies, when actually I hope to start next year, but haven't yet. Not a big deal.
You may post comments on the article here, since they are not set up for it.
9 Comments:
Congrats on the beginnings (or should we say "pre-beginnings"?) of the Ph.D. program, Joel. May I ask where you are studying and what the emphasis will be?
This post has been removed by the author.
This post has been removed by a blog administrator.
Tim,
Thanks for the interest.
You may email me at
joel -at- americanvision.org
and we can talk about these kinds of matters privately.
Thanks for the tip Jane. Feel free to use the same address.
Joel,
I have three comments about your article. The first is a bird's eye observation about the jist of it, followed by a specific point about your complaint with Sam's notions of evidence, and finally a reluctant ad hominem.
First, you must surely know that this specific article is an argument for deism, not Christianity. Deism is a fairly harmless ism as isms go, and if it dominated the real world of religious thinking and acting, the New Atheists--again you must know this--would surely be occupied by entirely different pursuits. In fact, there would be no New Atheism, and the only people you'd have to argue these matters with would be other members of the academic philosophy club.
As to evidence, you denigrate the notion that physical evidence need come into play in religious argument. You surely misrepresent the extent to which religion, and we'll limit ourselves to Christianity here, is in fact based in your own mind on the acceptance of a kind of physical evidence.
You believe that a Jew lived about 2000 years ago who reflected deeply about the big questions of existence and goodness, gained a loyal following, rebelled against the corruption of the rabbis, was executed, and so on, and you believe all this--in fact you only know about it--because it is told in stories passed down through the generations from one living person to another, initially only verbally and later in writing (this latter, after a bit of wrangling--bloodshed was involved, as I understand it--about just which parts to preserve and which to destroy).
So, your specific religious beliefs do not come at source from abstract contemplation or from personal revelation. They come from data. No Christ stories told and heard, no Joel-the-Christian. Now, I too believe in lots of stories based on this kind of evidence, like, about a general named Alexander, and another named Napoleon who led an army all the way to Russia, etc.
But you believe in stories with magic bits in them. You believe in stories that, were you to read about in the newspaper as having occurred yesterday in Fargo or Berne, you would surely disbelieve. And the removal of that unbelief would require hugely compelling evidence which you would skeptically examine for the slightest fault, lest you be taken for a fool.
You, just like Sam Harris and I, believe in data as a basis for religious belief. You differ with atheists about the standards of evidence.
Finally, the ad hominem (regrettably I am not endowed with greater wisdom). It's nothing too vicious. I just don't understand people who are intelligent by ordinary standards but so willing to go to such lengths, to cling and to claw, to a way of thinking that despite a certain emotional appeal contains so few supportable truth claims. (There are some good sociological and recent-historical claims for the institutions, but you know I'm talking fundamentals here.)
Essentially everyone as smart as Francis Bacon who's living today, knowing what's now known, is atheistic or perhaps fuzzily deistic (which is sort of like "don't really care much").
All the New Atheists (nearly all? don't know) started out as Abrahamics. We enjoyed the songs, the stories, the food, the gifts... even the terror has a kind of uplifting quality. We weren't buggered by priests. We didn't hear Satan's call.
We didn't easily decide to make an enemy of the all-powerful god of our youth. Personally, I figure I wanted his love as much as the next guy. We just had a bunch of questions, and it turned out that some pretty good answers--not especially comforting answers at first, but extremely compelling answers--were waiting.
How do you put up with the compartmentalization of your thoughts?
Thank you, Neil, for your thoughtful comments, as well as your calm tone. As well, I commend you for your clarity, something so often lacking in the so-called “blogosphere.” I hope you will excuse my delay in responding, as I am quite busy, and please know that I am grateful for your time and concern. To your comments:
First, you must surely know that this specific article is an argument for deism, not Christianity.
Well, actually, the article was intended to be much less than even that. It was not necessarily a positive argument at all, but merely a critique of Sam’s claim that belief in God is “as evidentiary in spirit as any other.” Having re-read my writing in light of your “Deism” comment, I don’t see why you would feel compelled to conclude so. While I did make a reference to the “supreme clockwork of the universe” — perhaps an poorly chosen phrase — there is much else there to dispel the notion than I have opted to defend that “harmless ism.” My references to Hebrews 1:3 and “benevolent Providence” stand out.
Were I to pair my criticism with a positive argument, I would no doubt be compelled by the one-and-many nature of human experience to explore the thought that any Creator of human experience might exhibit that nature as well. A Trinity perhaps.
As to evidence, you denigrate the notion that physical evidence need come into play in religious argument. You surely misrepresent the extent to which religion, and we'll limit ourselves to Christianity here, is in fact based in your own mind on the acceptance of a kind of physical evidence.
I politely and completely deny that I “denigrate” the notion you speak of. Re-reading again, nowhere did I reject the use, or even primacy in some cases, of physical evidences. My criticism is simply that physical evidence is not the only force behind human reasoning and convictions, nor can it possibly be a tool for denying the existence of a non-physical God. To claim that every belief must be as evidentiary in spirit as any other is simply to stack the deck in favor of what I see to be a materialistic view of the universe. Not only is that an unprovable claim (by any stretch of evidence), but it takes advantage of the limitations of human sense perception, which, I argue, is as much an argument for Something as it is for nothing beyond. The question must be determined by other means than “physical evidence.”
Were I again to pair my criticism with a positive argument, I might be compelled by the parameters of the question before me — of the interaction of a material, physical world with immaterial laws, intuitions, and imagination — to at least ponder the idea that any Savior of human experience might Himself also exhibit a union of the divine and the mundane. An Incarnation maybe.
So, your specific religious beliefs do not come at source from abstract contemplation or from personal revelation. They come from data. No Christ stories told and heard, no Joel-the-Christian. Now, I too believe in lots of stories based on this kind of evidence, like, about a general named Alexander, and another named Napoleon who led an army all the way to Russia, etc.
But you believe in stories with magic bits in them. You believe in stories that, were you to read about in the newspaper as having occurred yesterday in Fargo or Berne, you would surely disbelieve. And the removal of that unbelief would require hugely compelling evidence which you would skeptically examine for the slightest fault, lest you be taken for a fool.
Giving what I’ve said so far, let me add that I readily accept the physical way in which the data has arrived at my doorstep – we Anglicans call it “Scripture, Tradition and Reason.” I furthermore embrace the fact that Christianity claims to have ties in history, in fact, is inseparably intertwined with history. But I can and do still deny that all religious beliefs, or all beliefs period for that matter, are “as evidentiary as any other.”
So I think you and I quite nearly agree that I simply “differ with atheists about the standards of evidence.” But if God exists, then all probabilistic “piece-meal” appeals to evidence are moot. God does not roll dice, rather, He lands them however He wants. If, however, God does not exist, and this is a materialistic universe after all, then appeals to probability have some weight — but even then not necessarily a conclusive weight. The problem is, you have to first disbelieve in the existence of God to reason that way, and this, of course, is a classic circular argument.
So I readily grant that “magic bits” require something more than newspapers to make them compelling. Of course, the Christian claim is exactly that that Something More must be involved in order for such a conviction even be possible. Jesus, if you grant the veracity of the Gospels, was quite clear to that end:
“No man can come to me, except the father which hath sent me draw him” (John 6:44; Cf. John 16:7-11)
My job, and my intention in the article, is not to pull the atheist across that impossible divide, but rather to show that, due to the limitations of human knowledge to start with, Sam is not justified in his claim about religious belief being merely and purely “evidentiary as any other.”
I just don't understand people who are intelligent by ordinary standards but so willing to go to such lengths, to cling and to claw, to a way of thinking that despite a certain emotional appeal contains so few supportable truth claims.
I suspect you are right here: you just don’t understand. Perhaps I don’t either. Perhaps, considering your wording, “willing” simply trumps “intelligence” most of the time. But that could be as great an indictment of atheism as my position. And I would simply reject the idea that religion has little more to offer than a certain emotional appeal. Atheism, after all, offers the same in a different way.
Essentially everyone as smart as Francis Bacon who's living today, knowing what's now known, is atheistic or perhaps fuzzily deistic (which is sort of like "don't really care much").
Depending on exactly how “smart” Bacon was, I would simply reject this claim. I would love to see a statistical study that takes into account education (all facets) as well as IQ before I pondered it further. I know it is fashionable among some atheists today to claim something like “the vast majority of scientists and intellectuals are atheists,” but how easy is it, really, to say that? I have personally known many bright and some brilliant people who are Christians — scholars, entrepreneurs, bankers, biologists, airline pilots.
We weren't buggered by priests.
I think Dawkins does admit to having been fondled, actually.
We just had a bunch of questions, and it turned out that some pretty good answers--not especially comforting answers at first, but extremely compelling answers--were waiting.
I have been through similar decisions. They are not easy or fun. It is, however, always worth it to consider in retrospect what other factors on either side of the decision — factors which may have even seemed peripheral at the time — may currently escape your assessment of what was more “comfortable” compared with “compelling.” What is more comfortable?
How do you put up with the compartmentalization of your thoughts?
I have heard Harris mention “compartmentalization,” and I admit I have not made a broad search of the idea, especially since even he didn’t seem to have a good use of the term at the time. So I don’t think it a very useful description, let alone something to “put up with.” This is perhaps your worst comment, btw — a classic fallacy of complex question. From what little I have read of how the brain works, to speak of “compartmentalization” — analogous to partitioning a hard-drive — is perhaps the crudest comparison possible. Not to mention it again assumes something like materialism up front. So the idea is intellectually both crude and rude.
Thank you again for your comments. I hope my lengthy response is not too much “clinging and clawing” for you. I simply hope to show that a Christian worldview is perfectly rational and coherent, and that Sam’s criticisms, in the end, are circular and quite limited.
Joel,
Your compliment about the clarity of what I'd written would have carried more weight if you had responded in kind. Instead:
I would no doubt be compelled by the one-and-many nature of human experience to explore the thought that any Creator of human experience might exhibit that nature as well.
I might be compelled by the parameters of the question before me — of the interaction of a material, physical world with immaterial laws, intuitions, and imagination — to at least ponder the idea that any Savior of human experience might Himself also exhibit a union of the divine and the mundane.
Now these are what I would call grotesque sequences of words. While I do realize that this kind of sham intellectuality is veritable currency in certain places within the academy, Divinity schools providing one of the friendlier environs for its exchange (notwithstanding impressive competition from post-modernist social science), it really does diminish my appetite to engage you.
But I've had some time, so I got over it.
In your reply, you say the article was intended to be much less than even [an argument for deism]. ... I don’t see why you would feel compelled to conclude so.
Well, in the original article you wrote:
[I]n a God-created universe, there can be nothing but evidence for the existence of God. Such a universe - and I believe this is such a universe - declares God's existence and His glory at every turn. It can do no other.
If this is not arguing for -- claiming by assertion, really -- the existence of some kind of god, what should I smoke before reading Joel McDurmon? And I thought I was being generous in overlooking your gentle hints towards a specifically Christian god.
Another instance:
The individual is forced to the choice, then, of believing in a God Who created everything, and Who is Providentially "upholding all things by the word of His power" (Heb. 1:3), or of believing in (and trying to justify science in) a universe of chance, meaninglessness, and lawless flux.
If you can't acknowledge that your article stakes out a deistic position at the very least, how can you even be trusted to pass the mashed potatoes at the dinner table?
Elsewhere in your reply you say: nowhere did I reject the use, or even primacy in some cases, of physical evidences. From the original article, speaking to whether God exists:
the decision cannot be made by simply taking samples of isolated bits of the universe, because we are asking a much larger question about how to account for the existence and nature of the universe, and everything else for that matter.
What you're saying is that evidence as conventionally understood, the kind of evidence that's employed to determine whether zebras ever lived in North America, or whether the Dutch language is closer to Indo-European than Czech is, or whether Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone--evidence that sometimes settles or substantialy shifts the probabilities on hard questions that baffle strong and genuinely curious minds--that kind of evidence cannot suffice for the Big Questions. Apparently, such evidence only suffices for all other questions humans have asked. To who or what then do we go to find answers to the Big Questions? rabbis? sioux medicine men? catholic priests? guys with degrees in divinity?
And if your difficulty with evidence was as simple (and Jesus-like) as, "well, yeah, you need a combination of evidence and faith", that would be honourable. But instead, you repeatedly trumpet grandiose metaphysical claims about evidence being instrinsically impotent:
Don't we first have to ask why we can rest assured in extrapolating beliefs about the present and future from a series of measurements taken from the past?
A very fine question. If you know anyone in the business of promoting the perfect truth of supernatural stories passed down in mangled form from the Bronze Age, have them ask it of themselves daily. It may help them decide to get into a better business.
And there's plenty more along these lines:
[Sam] is content to accept the regularity of nature unexplained and live like it doesn't matter.
If Sam's analogy were to actually work against belief in God, then it would undermine induction, and thus science
... since our beliefs about the future stand on no evidence at all
But who readily acknowledges that just because we might successfully predict 100 consecutive times that we'll be alive the next day, that this is no a basis for belief in eternal life? Or that 100 consecutive days of pleasant sunshine and gentle breezes cannot be followed by a murderous hurricane? Or that our life-supporting sun has a finite lifetime? It's atheists informed by science who face up to these things. It takes a True Believer to acquiesce in the notion that these are all manifestations of His Plan, and to find solace in understanding the world as a prison run by a maniac.
So, Joel, I find disingenuity in your denials.
And--I'm near to closing off--if you're genuinely comfortable saying things like God's existence is in itself the very reason that I believe it. This is pretty much self-evident, you might want to reconsider your readiness to toss about the circular argument critique.
Finally, I found this line from the original article to be particularly revealing:
data that heretofore have seemed to have no point or meaning at all, must be re-learned to point to the One Who has creates meaning.
Now, prior to reading this with the appropriate care, I was inclined to think of you as perhaps a fairly sporting chap, if one who employs his intellect in a way I frankly don't admire (which can happen often enough among friends, neigbours and relatives). But a statement like that reminds me of the genuine fear I have about people of your mindset increasing in influence. What you say is exactly what the worst of the Mullahs say. Please rethink -- a bright, shining light awaits.
Neil,
I don't think one has to agree with you to find your last comment an exquisite and entertaining piece of writing.
But since I happen to agree, it made it all the more enjoyable.
Jane
Post a Comment
<< Home