Joe Sobran Wacks Hitchens's Knuckles

http://www.sobran.com/columns/2007/070508.shtml

An excerpt:

"After reading him, I’m always surer I know whom he hates (or, less often, loves) than what he thinks.

[...]

It may seem ironic that Hitchens, a fierce defender of the Iraq war, blames religion for war, when the last two popes have opposed both Iraq wars; but then, he also seems to blame the popes for opposing them. As Huck Finn might put it, and as Hitchens would surely agree, popes is mostly a bad lot.

When you come right down to it, Hitchens’s case against religion is a more impersonal form of the old Phil Donahue argument, which may be summarized thus: Mean old nuns whacked my knuckles with a ruler, ergo God does not exist. This is less inductive reasoning than simple free association with a grudge."

One might wonder the same about Dawkins, who, though he hastens to say that it did not affect him when as a boy he was encountered by a priest, he does make sure to mention it in his book.

Surely The Root of All Evil is a product of a root of bitterness.

Hedges in the Debate

There is another Sam Harris “debate” scheduled for tonight, May 22, 2007, at 8pm, this time with journalist Chris Hedges. The topic appears to be “Religion and Politics: The End of the World?,” which is more of a discussion starter than a formal proposition for serious debate. And this is the problem with Harris’s debates heretofore: he only takes on opponents from the liberal end of the spectrum who already agree with him on the important theological and philosophical issues. For example, did anyone really expect Andrew Sullivan to best the atheist, especially since he already implicitly conceded Sam’s naturalism in ethics (homosexuality), origins (evolution), and authority (Scripture not infallible)? Harris chooses his opponents for his public performances wisely.

So who is this Chris Hedges? Not the kind of guy you want defending your Christianity. He recently referred to “the radical Christian right,” as, “the most dangerous mass movement in American history.”[i] He may be brilliant, but he's hardly the kind of religious expert I want representing my side. He follows, fanatically urging that conservative Christians have “built a binary worldview of command and submission wherein male leaders, who cannot be questioned and claim to speak for God, are in control and all others must follow.”

By caricaturing the Christian right this way, Hedges distances himself from any conservative leaders, and at the same time basically agrees with Harris’s slanderous portrayal of the majority of American Christianity. So whom does Hedges really represent in this debate (representation is always a key issue!)? I'll let the reader figure that out.

Why anyone would take these guys seriously is hard to say. Certainly no conservative Christian should. So why does Sam Harris single him out for debate?

It may very well be a smokescreen. The liberal left is in the process of mounting forces for the next elections. They realize they got beat over the past two elections to the religious vote. Instead of trying to deceive and appear religious themselves, some are mounting a tremendous anti-religion propaganda campaign. They are trying to divide and diffuse the power base of the religious vote. This stands in contrast to another part of the left (Obama, Clinton), that tries to flaunt its religion when publicly advantageous.

This debate is nothing but a showcase of a radical leftist who happens to be an atheist, and a radical leftist who claims religion has some value. Whoever wins, the radical left wins. Religion will appear weak whatever the case, human reason will be exalted beyond measure whatever the case, and the Christian right will be vilified whatever the case. This is no real debate — it is merely a bunch of liberal leftists hedging their bets.

You don’t have to look very far to find evidence that my suspicion is warranted. Just listen to the appeals in Sam Harris’s writings for example. He admits that he has little hope of converting conservative Christians to his views. So he makes his appeal to the so-called “moderate” Christians, who are almost always leftists.

No, this debate is not a debate. It is an intellectual pillow fight. Harris and Hedges might as well show up in their pajamas, dim the lights and play “truth or dare.”

When the atheists, liberals, and other radical leftists get done with their intramural games, then maybe they’ll be practiced up for a real debate. It would be nice to get the outspoken Harris in the ring with a real Christian debater, and do it in a formal debate setting. But we know it’ll probably never happen. Harris likes to choose his opponents — and his stages, and his audiences — too cleverly.

End Notes:
[i] http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070128_christianists_on_the_march/

Some Hot Tea for Russell's Pot

Among the many amateur philosophical stunts pulled by Richard Dawkins in his rage against God is the use of a quip made by 1920's atheist Bertrand Russell, known as his “parable of the celestial tea pot.”[i] This story, as we shall see, is meant to prove that even though the existence of God cannot be disproved, it is still far from likely. This warms Dawkins’s heart, because while he admits that one cannot completely disprove the existence of God, there is still no good reason to take Him seriously, any more than there is reason to believe in a “flying spaghetti monster” or an “invisible, intangible, inaudible unicorn.”[ii] He relies on Russell to demonstrate this. I will show you why Russell’s “tea pot” is cracked and leaking.

Here is the story as Russell told it, and as Dawkins affirms it:

"If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time."[iii]

Why Russell chose a tea pot from among all of the possible silly images he could have produced, I don’t know, but considering some of the ‘angels’ he hung out with, it was probably part of his daily repertoire — and he probably held out his pinky finger when he sipped.[iv] Keeping in fashion, Russell’s argument is as fragile as its dainty subject.

One of the silliest fallacies that is circulating among the atheists — in fact, one of their staple arguments these days — is found in this attempt to shift the “burden of proof” in the debate over God’s existence. It is becoming more and more popular — and one can understand why — for the atheists to assume from the start that their atheistic worldview is the norm, and that any theistic claim is a deviation that must be “proven” (of course, what constitutes proof will be a factor, which we will deal with below). “Atheism” it is claimed, is not a worldview in itself, but merely the common-sense denial of the alleged “additional” and “extraordinary” belief in a god, over and above the natural world that we experience. It is time to dismantle this pure word game, and expose the shivering worldview that cowers behind it.

The Matter of the Matter

Russell’s intellectual ingenuity was almost certainly a product of the stalwart educational foundations he laid for himself during his university years. Part of an elite secret intellectual society at Cambridge — the “Apostles” — Russell would meet for late night discussions with the most brilliant minds of the era. Among intellectual giants the likes of John Maynard Keynes, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Alfred North Whitehead, Russell expanded his mind debating such head-scratchers as, “Does Youth Approve of Age?,” “Ought the Father to Grow a Beard?,” and “Is this an Awkward Age?”[v] An historian of the era recounts with candor, “It was that early Edwardian failing of the Apostles trying to be clever for the sake of being clever and often when there was nothing to be clever about.”[vi] It’s no wonder that Russell produced such forceful blows at God as his “celestial teapot.” One lump, Lord Keynes? Or two?

But there was a real philosophical shortcoming among Russell’s group. One of their influential peers, G. E. Moore, delivered a paper boasting their ultimate belief: “In the beginning was matter, and matter begat the devil, and the devil begat God.”[vii] Here is the underlying force of Russell’s atheism: the classic belief of “materialism,” that nothing exists except matter. Since God is by definition immaterial, therefore He can’t exist. Very simple, isn’t it? Just define your universe so that it can hold no God, and voila, God cannot exist. Words are so powerful!

With this as his background, Moore went on to argue that “then there was the death, first of God, then of the devil, and matter was left as it was in the beginning.”[viii] Even if Moore was talking tongue-in-cheek, it shows the utter circularity of the materialistic worldview. If all you have in the beginning is matter, then that’s all you will ever have — and you can bet that’s the way the atheist wants it.

Well, perhaps this view fits the atheist’s wishes, but it says very little about his philosophical rigor. With the phrase, “In the beginning . . .” taken right from the Bible, Moore reveals to us that the materialistic worldview, which is almost universally assumed by atheists today, is no less a claim of faith than the opening sentence of Holy Writ. And while the atheists pretend that their alleged “scientific” worldview is the norm, and thus superior to the Christian’s, they cannot even consistently answer the most fundamental questions that arise for their own system: where do laws come from? Is there ultimate justice? Why even care about justice? Why is murder, theft, rape, etc., wrong? What exactly is reason? Is it material? It’s no wonder that the historian to wrote this account of Moore and Russell, et al, concluded saying, “They thought they were the equal of the German philosophers, yet none of them were in the same class.”[ix]

Once the atheist’s ultimate assumption of materialism is exposed, then the claim that atheism is not a worldview in itself becomes a tea-time chuckle. It only removes the philosophical argument one step. The theist may simply reply, “Ok, supposing I grant your definition of atheism, please tell me why you adhere to this definition.” If pushed to reveal the standard by which he judges that atheism is the norm, the atheist will ultimately have to reveal his materialism at its root. If he does not, then he proves he either has little philosophical training, or is not really interested in serious debate. Of course he (or she) will try desperately hard not to admit their materialism, for it signals the philosophical funeral for atheism. You will more likely hear diversions like Dawkins’s: “I shall suggest that the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other.”[x]

“Like any other”? What does that mean? Push the atheist further, and get him to answer this question. If he is honest and consistent with his materialism, he will admit that he will only accept as “proof” finite, measurable, material evidences, and, of course, anything that is only finite and material is automatically disqualified for consideration as God.

This is the evasive failure of the materialistic worldview to honestly grapple the existence of God — and yet, this is the standard by which modern atheists are trying to set themselves up as the court which is to decide the matter. Once materialism is assumed up front, there is no sense in debating. In order to accept this as grounds for argument, the theist must methodologically surrender at the outset. Instead, he should point out the underlying assumption, and then combat that assumption, not just the mere word-cloak of the name “atheism,” at least not until that atheism is fully understood.

The God of Tea

It is time for a little more than a sip: here’s a hot dose of reality. Russell’s tea pot argument holds no water at all. It misses the point as widely as it is silly. It may sound at first like it proves a point, but it is intellectual Earl Grey: bland and unexciting.

Russell’s argument was meant to address an issue called the “burden of proof.” If the terms of proof are set as materialistic categories, then the best God you could ever “prove” the existence of would be a materialistic one. As I have written elsewhere, this kind of limitation imposed by unbelief is proof that if you set your bar low enough, you can achieve any philosophical goal.[xi] This procedure simply will not do. It may comfort some atheists while they huddle beneath its perceived philosophical shelter, and it may free us from the fierce cosmic tyranny of orbital teapots, but it says absolutely nothing about the Triune God of Christianity.

This refutation applies equally to a related argument that the modern atheists like to use. They claim that no one believes in the gods of ancient mythology: all (or most) people are, therefore, “atheists” with regard to these gods. The atheists, including Dawkins, boast that they just go “one God further.”[xii] This rhetorical saccharin vaporizes in the boil of real philosophy, and it doesn’t sweeten a thing. It is mere steam from the spout of Russell’s tea pot. It simply places the Christian God in the same category as “Zeus, Apollo, Amon Ra, Mithras, Baal, Thor, Wotan, the Golden Calf and the Flying Spaghetti Monster,”[xiii] and is thus a categorical and definitional mistake. The object in question requires proof that is commensurate with the nature of the thing in question.

Thus the existence of the God of Christianity cannot be determined by gratuitous parallels to material objects like dizzy tea pots or frightening pasta, and, while we do not have time here to line them all up, the Christian God is also qualitatively and categorically different than any of the pagan gods one can list. We may rightly be “atheists” with regard to ninety-nine fables, and yet completely unjustified in simply going one step further, because that step is qualitatively different than all the others. If you are ninety-nine and a half paces from the edge of a cliff, and stride off the first nine-nine with confidence, would you, therefore, based on mere prior experience, simply take that next step? Or would you take a long hard look at the abyss before you, and consider how different one “leap” of faith can be from another?

It will take more than an attempt to straw-man the definition of God into something farcical and material, and then pretend you’ve ousted God from the universe. We can call this the “straw-god” fallacy. The real philosophical challenge is to disprove an all-powerful God Who created the material universe, upholds it, and thus transcends the material universe. Such a God defies any attempt to measure Him by finite standards,[xiv] or call Him to any finite bar of judgment. For Him to stoop to meet such a standard would be for Him to deny both His Sovereignty and His own existence. The very act of submitting Himself for verification implies that someone else is the ultimate Judge and the ultimate standard.

So, I will hear no more about tea pots. I will consider only arguments that tackle the existence of the kind of God who created tea, and the rest of the world for that matter. Once atheists start to become honest about this issue, then the “burden of proof” will be re-established a bit more squarely, and the debate over God will move from the atheist’s comfortable tea-room of materialism, to the transcendental question that it is.

What does “Probable” Mean?

Dawkins, following Russell, argues that since God is allegedly like this teapot, then even though you can’t disprove His existence, it is still much less likely than it is probable. Dawkins says, “[A]vailable evidence and reason may yield a probability far from 50 per cent.”[xv] We have already seen the fallacy behind Russell’s teapot, which Dawkins is starting with here, so how does the critique of that teapot apply to Dawkins’s conclusion about probability?
Simple. Dawkins’s view of probability is limited and ruled, just like his definition and classification of God, by his materialistic assumptions. It only stands to reason that if you presume a materialistic world at the outset, then the most probable occurrence in that world can only be a materialistic occurrence. But that begs the very question under debate, doesn’t it? Again, Dawkins has merely defined God out of his mental world with mere words. It makes for a nice little chat over tea with an old chap, but not very careful thinking at all.

Rather, probability is something quite different in an materialist universe than it is in a Biblical universe. If the atheist is not allowed to impose his materialistic beliefs on the question of God, then he will have to take seriously the possibility that something other than a materialistic explanation is the most probable one. As Jesus said, “With God, all things are possible” (Matt. 19:26; Luke 18:27). Obviously, if God is denied from the outset, then an explanation that involves God will be not only unlikely, but impossible. But if the atheist’s gratuitous assumptions are kept from ruling the thinking, then it could very well be that the most probable answer is one which involves a supernatural God, and we will have to find a different way of approaching the question than through that very limited range of evidence that we can see, touch, smell, etc.

If the Christian makes the mistake of shifting into the arena of materialistic probability, then they have already subjected the idea of God to a category which denies the very possibility of His existence. Probability, as the scientist calculates it, deals only with empirical, sensory, phenomena. God by definition does not fit into this mold, so talking about Him in such a way which limits Him in those terms, denies Him at the outset. No wonder Russell, Dawkins, and other atheists love to talk about God in such a way. Probability is the devil’s ill-fated prayer, and Dawkins, the self-dubbed “Devil’s Chaplain,” kneels at its mention, chants it in rhythm, and crosses himself with its capital “P.”

Conclusion

Such is the recurring banality of atheism, especially the popular kind represented by Dawkins and others who repeat Russell: they can’t stand God, and so they try to define Him away with mere words. They try to reduce Him to something as superfluous as a celestial tea pot. Minimize Him, scrutinize Him, box Him in, trivialize Him — do whatever they can to suppress the knowledge of Him. They want to put Him in a bottle, like “I dream of genie.” Problem is, the God described in the Bible and throughout Christian tradition is no such character. The attributes ascribed to the Triune God of Scripture require the would-be critic to deal with God as God, and as nothing else. You cannot liken Him to some orbital fantasy, then critique that fantasy, and then pretend you’ve said anything at all meaningful about the God of Scripture. Yet this is exactly the bait-and-switch game that Dawkins plays.

This is just one more reason why, in the end, atheism should not be taken seriously as an intellectual system. It is not very serious thought at all. It is well-trained verbiage, selective propaganda, and well-funded marketing. It is not serious philosophy. It is a philosophical tempest in a teapot.

End Notes:
[i]. Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 2006) 51.
[ii]. Dawkins, 53.
[iii]. Quoted in Dawkins, 52.
[iv]. See the chapter “The Higher Sodomy,” in Richard Deacon, The Cambridge Apostles: A History of Cambridge University’s Elite Intellectual Secret Society (New York: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1985) 55-68, though Deacon notes that Russell himself was heterosexual (62).
[v]. Deacon, 71.
[vi]. Deacon, 70.
[vii]. Quoted in Deacon, 69.
[viii]. Deacon, 70.
[ix]. Deacon, 70.
[x]. Dawkins, 50. Italics mine.
[xi]. Joel McDurmon, Manifested in the Flesh (Powder Springs, GA: American Vision, 2007) 115.
[xii]. Dawkins, 53.
[xiii]. Dawkins, 53.
[xiv]. I realize that Christian theology would make a qualification of this statement due to Christ, the Incarnation of God.
[xv]. Dawkins, 50.

Jerry Falwell, RIP.

Breaking news story out on CBN:

"The Rev. Jerry Falwell, who founded the Moral Majority and built the religious right into a political force, died Tuesday shortly after being found unconscious in his office at Liberty University, a school executive said. He was 73."

http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/158097.aspx

As founder of the Moral Majority and force behind the "religious right," Falwell has surely pushed back and impeded the forces of Village Atheists everywhere.

I suspect his death will be treated by both the Right and the Left as a landmark for the future of American religion.

May God rest his long-embattled but victorious soul.

Room for Comfort

A few quick notes on the recent Comfort/Cameron vs. "Rational Responders" debate:

First, Comfort and Co. were a bit careless in stating their procedure, namely, that they could "prove that God exists, scientifically, absolutely, without mentioning faith or even the Bible." Their three arguments by themselves (design, conscience, and experience) did not necessarily need references to faith or the Bible, but Comfort made the mistake of referring to such. I understand what he was trying to do in framing the debate up front: you don't necessarily have to explicitly mention faith or the Bible, even though you will have to use Biblical concepts. Easy enough. But Comfort crossed his own line by using the "Ten Commandments" as the moral force behind conscience. He could easily have referred to our moral intuition in general.

However, does this mean he lost the debate? Hardly. What Comfort did not do, and it is being implied that he did, was to appeal to the Bible or faith as an authority. Comfort did not argue anything like, "The Bible says, therefore . . ." I'd say that considering the argument Comfort was trying to make, if he would have not referenced the Bible, Sapient would have had no real complaint. Whether atheists like it or not, even if we don't appeal to the authority of the Bible, the Bible still exists as a historical and very influential scientific piece of evidence. Comfort was on solid ground to refer to it's message as a piece of scientific data.

Secondly, despite the fact that there is still room for Comfort's argument, the debate as a whole shows the clear inferiority of the older methods of argument for the existence of God. No argument that assumes the believer and unbeliever are standing on neutral intellectual "reason" will ever be effective. Theistic arguments must transcend man, and consider the preconditions for argument, morality, etc., to begin with. Else, all we will have is a worldview yo-yo --- being jerked back and forth, slung around in circles, and always returning where we started, only dizzier. Christian apologists such as Comfort and Cameron need to read more about transcendental argumentation, such as that promoted by Van Til, Bahnsen, Frame, or Plantinga.

Finally, the atheist blogosphere is whirling with complaints and insults following the debate. One I find hilarious is from Brian Flemming's blog, where he complains in a footnote about journalists not taking Rational Response Squad leader Brian "Sapient"s name seriously. No wonder. Anyone who gives himself a media-name "Sapient" is asking for trouble. Read the latin, Flemming! It means "wise." And that arrogant self-appointed appelative should prompt everyone to another appeal to the Bible: "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools" (Romans 1:22).

One More Village Atheist

There's a great example of the angry "village atheist" posted on Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron's "Way of the Master" website. After the debate, the atheist antagonist Brian Sapient is caught on camera in a tantrum against Todd Friel. The video is on their front page:

http://www.wayofthemasterradio.com/

See especially the last thirty seconds or so.

Another confirmation that the recent push of popular atheism is nothing more than The Return of the Village Atheist.

A Booger of an Atheist

Sam Harris, in one of his speeches, complained as usual about the public perception of atheists. Related to statistics that place atheists as a group well below even the public acceptance of homosexuals and Muslims in American culture, Harris added that finding out you have an atheist next door is perceived to be worse than discovering even a sex offender there. The latter can only harm the body, the atheist could damn your child's soul.

Well, let's not allow the atheists to play such sympathy cards for themselves. As I document in Return of the Village Atheist, atheists have earned their reputation in history. Futhermore, I don't know anyone who would make the "worse than a sex offender claim," though I guess it is possible.

Rather, I think that the revulsion you get from finding out that your neighbor is an atheist is more like discovering that the guy in the car next to you has his finger in his nose up to his elbow. Moreover, it's like knowing that guy, due to his naturalistic nasal distraction, is about to crash head-on to his own demise. Atheists are self-consciously self-absorbed (epistemologically speaking), and refuse to see the highway of reality.

There's just something viscerally repugnant about someone who's great concern in life is to do away with any concept of God. Harris as others love to play the sympathy card, but atheists have always tried to do so: during the French Revolution, and even Karl Marx, as I write in the book. But a wolrdview like atheism that destroys the foundations of love and morality deserves no sympathy, epsecially when it's proponents are the ones driving the strife to begin with.

"Surely . . . the wringing of the nose bringeth forth blood: so the forcing of wrath bringeth forth strife." (Proverbs 30:33)

One Steeler and a Million Stealers

By Joel McDurmon
6/28/2006

For some unknown and probably irrational reason I have been a Pittsburgh Steelers fan since I was a boy. The Steelers seem to epitomize toughness and consistency when it comes to professional football. Even though I grew up in Arkansas, I have always watched them with some interest. That's one reason it crushed me to hear about Ben Roethlisberger’s motorcycle wreck on June 12th—a wreck that left him in seven hours of surgery. My heart and prayers go out to him and his family, as well as to the poor lady driving the car that collided with him.

What sickened me even more, however, was that within hours, the Statist news media had “experts” exploiting the accident for political leverage. One woman interviewed on ABC News, I didn't catch her name and don't care to, tried to make helmet laws a public health issue. She argued that since more than half of motorcycle riders don't have private health insurance, then not having helmet laws was a matter of tax dollars. Well, as long as health insurance is a public matter, she has a point. As long as people rely on the state to take care of their persons, then the state should logically call the shots when it comes to prevention. But do we have to settle for this?

I have a better remedy: get rid of public health insurance as well. If we want freedom, then fight for it consistently. People who ride motorcycles—I used to—will tell you that the feeling of freedom it gives is unmatched. But if you enjoy that feeling on the one hand, and then rely on socialist health care schemes on the other, then you are living an illusion. Of course, nothing is more American than open road and Harley Davidson, except for the illusion of freedom.

The whole tactic of using such a tragedy as a political launch pad relates exactly to what Ann Coulter has said in her latest book Godless. She recognized the leftist doctrine of infallibility: they use untouchable suffering people to promote their agendas in the public square, and conservatives can’t answer without looking heartless. But Coulter only has half the story. It is not a Leftist tactic; it’s a Statist tactic. The Right does the same thing. How do you think the Patriot Act got pushed through Congress in a week? It has always been—from ancient times on—the method of the State to use tragedy and calamity to its advantage. In order to control a group you need them to think in unison, and the easiest way to get a group to think (or not think) in unison is to use fear or guilt. When we fall for such shameless reactionism, we sell our freedom for the Statist deception of safety and peace.

The Roethlisberger incident is just the latest case, and within hours the media had rounded up enough mouths to make a political segment of it. Let’s hope they don't convince the young Super Bowl champion to use his stardom as a platform for petitioning Congress for more Statist coercion and tyranny. Like so many stars do these days. One wonders why they don't start private foundations with their own money.

It's funny that the Statists on both sides will send young men into their wars claiming, “Freedom has a price,” but refuse to see that price when it's paid in the private world. What happened to Big Ben is truly horrible; but it is the true price of freedom. Let the State pay that price for you, and you lose the freedom as well. Good luck and keep fighting, Ben.