The Human Question

I listened to the unedited video of Dawkins' interview of McGrath for the former's BBC TV series titled "The Root of all Evil" or something like that.  They were most courteous to each other, and very careful in what they said.  They DID ask good questions as well as come up with interesting answers.  I really like McGrath, although I think that he sometimes kind of beats around the bush ... perhaps because the more direct, and more helpful answer hasn't come to his mind yet and he's buying time.  But in any case, he makes many excellent points, and is not to be matched for thoughtfulness. One answer that he gave was on target as far as it went but I think a bit incomplete.  Dawkins asked (and I paraphrase), if a whole village with the exception of one child was killed by tsunami or the like, would you thank God for saving the child?  McGrath said yes, thereby avoiding the move of resolving the problem of evil by settling for the God of the deists.  ...

To propose as RD does that religion is a kind of "bad virus" (memetically speaking, of course) requires that one grant that there could be "good viruses" as well. But such viruses are judged good or bad only in light of how they affect the well-being of the affected organism(s). So in speaking of bad viruses RD is to bring memetics into conflict with his genetics (that is, with SelfishGeneTheory). For according to the latter, everything that an organism does is to be evaluated as if it existed ultimately for the sake of enabling the gene to duplicate itself. When memes, as viruses, are judged as good or bad, however, they are evaluated not on the basis of how they affect the reproductive success of their possessors, but on on the basis of how they affect their possessors' experience well-being. To speak of good and bad viruses, therefore, is to depart from natural science and enter into the realm of ethics. One may object to the above analysis by claiming that...

I am not on the ID bandwagon, but when someone like RD says that the teaching of it is harmful to the education of children, I am tempted to change the subject just a little and point out that RD does at least as much damage with his announcing that science undermines belief in God. For doing so makes science into something that it is not. It makes science look like a threat to theism when it is not, and that certainly does not motivate parents to promote the study of science. When talking about what science teaches us, he should stick to the sorts of facts that can be established through research in scientific journals.

The hypothesis that we act naturally so as to preserve genotype is very consistent with the data. For example, the way men are more likely to be attracted to many partners and women more likely to just one... and other ways as well that escape my mind... but lots of them are so-called altruistic behaviors. RD distinguishes between the motivation we're aware of and the past processes that explain the origin of that motivation. Good point. But I'm afraid some folks don't keep this distinction in mind when they talk as if evolutionary advantage (what I call genotype preservation) explained everything. It is a mistake to take as demonstrated the claim that the behaviors in question are genuinely explained by genotype preservation. In fact, in order for it to be a scientific theory, one has to put forward an experiment with a predication of some sort (a retrodiction will do). Not seeking to disprove utterly this hypothesis, and not being a scientist, I propose the follo...

I just learned (from D D'Souza) that Dawkins is the source of the "invisible spaghetti monster" version of the objection that theism is unverifiable. What this example actually shows, however, is that the one who proposes it is thoroughly ignorant of the history of philosophy. A similar display of ignorance is pointed out by Dawkins himself in his Greatest Show on Earth. He objects to those who object to the purported lack of links in the evolutionary record by saying, "Where is the fossil for a ..... [here I forget, but it is a hybrid name, like "chimp sapiens" or something like that]. Dawkins points out how the very act of positing such an objection is a ridiculous display of ignorance. And he does so by proposing hilarious intermediate species, mixing plant and animals in his names. He is right to the silliness of his creationist opponents, but a very similar criticism could be made of his recourse to the "invisible spaghetti monster"...

After going through both a book each by Pinker and Dawkins, I note that neither of them talks about emergent properties. Any materialist who notes emerging properties is like the scribe whom Jesus said "was not far from the kingdom of God." In other words, it leads one out of reductionism, and in my opinion, is the first step in a path away from materialism. Apparently Pinker and Dawkins don't want to go in that directions, so they are careful not to take the first step.

Beliefnet has published an interview by Laura Sheahan with biologist Richard Dawkins, who employs evolution in support of atheism. In the second part of the interview, Sheahan says to Dawkins: "You criticize intelligent design, saying that 'the theistic answer'--pointing to God as designer--'is deeply unsatisfying'--presumably you mean on a logical, scientific level." Dawkins then replies to the interviewer: "Yes, because it doesn't explain where the designer comes from. If they're going to emphasize the statistical improbability of biological organs—'these are so complicated, how could they have evolved?'--well, if they're so complicated, how could they possibly have been designed? Because the designer would have to be even more complicated." My reply: Dawkins does not explain WHY the designer of biological organs would have to be more complicated than the organs he designs. He does not think that such an explanation is...