One can in fact make a good case that, contrary to Wright's claim, ethics went downhill as religion evolved--specifically, that it declined in the transition from polytheism to monotheism. Hume insisted upon this, expounding admiringly on "the tolerating spirit of idolaters." He maintained that a plurality of gods led to social and intellectual pluralism, whereas the belief in a single god led to exclusiveness and intolerance. "The intolerance of almost all religions, which have maintained the unity of God, is as remarkable as the contrary principle of polytheism," he wrote in The Natural History of Religion. And he added pungently that "if, among Christians, the English and Dutch have embraced the principles of toleration, this singularity has proceeded from the steady resolution of the civil magistrate, in opposition to the continued efforts of priests and bigots." This is sound intellectual and religious history, belying Wright's view of theology's linear march toward goodness and light.
There have been two periods in Western history when large groups of people made serious and concerted attempts to improve ethics--and contra Wright, those changes involved not religion, but secular reason. The first period began in Athens in the fifth century B.C.E. and continued to first-century Rome. This was the time of Socrates and Aristotle, Cicero and Marcus Aurelius, the Stoics and the Epicureans, when philosophers and citizens hashed out and codified their moral responsibility toward each other and society. The medieval era of religion certainly included sophisticated discussions of moral philosophy, but it was not until fifteen hundred years later, when the grip of the church was broken, that the second period began, as the thinkers of the Enlightenment introduced the strong idea of human liberty, and chose to ground authority on rationality rather than dogma. It is not at all clear that the intervening period, with its feudalism, sacred despotism, and religious persecution, was in any way an improvement over the earlier societies of classical Greece and Athens. As for tolerance in our own progressive time: there is the Holocaust, Stalin's purges and slaughters, Mao's bloody reign of terror, the massacres in Darfur, Rwanda, and Cambodia, and the ethnic and religious savagery in Northern Ireland and Bosnia and Sri Lanka to remind us that spectacular intolerance is still with us. I do not see how a progressivist view of human moral development can survive all this terrible knowledge.
As for individual morality: is the average inhabitant of New York, Tehran, or Tel Aviv less likely to steal, cheat, or be unpleasant to his fellows than were his counterparts in ancient Greece or medieval France? Has human nature changed so much in just a few centuries? Well, we in the West may appear to be more law-abiding, but that may merely reflect the greater ability of modern societies to detect and to punish crime. Wright preaches that faith has lifted individuals to higher and higher levels of tolerance and morality, as if this good news were so obvious that we need not even consider the evidence.
Wright seems to think--and his argument requires him to think--that religion is an important source, perhaps the most important source, of morality. This is one of the most widely held views in religious America. Without the moral bedrock of God, so the argument goes, what reason do we have to be good? Conservative commentators hammer this point relentlessly. Ann Coulter asserts that those who accept Darwinian evolution feel that it "lets them off the hook morally. Do whatever you feel like doing--screw your secretary, kill Grandma, abort your defective child--Darwin says it will benefit humanity!" Two months ago an American atheist organization was loudly criticized for putting posters on Chicago buses with the slogan "You can be good without God," despite the obvious truth of this message. Surely some atheists are decent people!
Wright sees faith as a moral lever: "Certainly there has been a kind of net moral progress in human history.... And certainly religion has played a role in this progress." But how much of a role? And if not a decisive role, then what is left of Wright's belief in the beneficent power of religion? And what role did religion play in the history of human immorality? A little reflection shows that the career of religion in the history of morality is mixed, or worse. There are certainly fine ethical teachings in all the faiths. But since the fourth century B.C.E., philosophers have shown convincingly that our considerations of what is moral or immoral cannot be derived from religion. In Plato's Euthyphro, Socrates argues that the statement "God is good" has meaning only if we have a standard of good that is independent of God. If it were otherwise, anything that God sanctioned would be good by definition. This would include, in the case of Abraham, the readiness to murder, and in the case of Jephthah the actual murder of, one's children. The distinction between religion and morality was recognized by rational theologians in all the monotheistic faiths, even if their views did not always carry the day. Aquinas wrote that "right is not right because God wills it, but God wills it because it is right. " If this is true, then we need to look elsewhere to determine what is right--and religion may be viewed not as the origin of morality, but a vehicle for conveying moral values or feelings that arise elsewhere.
Certainly the moral standards of the West in our time cannot have derived from Scripture, for neither Jews nor Christians sanction slavery, pillage, mass murder, or the death penalty for adultery, homosexuality, and working on the Sabbath--cruelties that are justified in the Old Testament as having God's approval. Instead, contemporary Christian believers cherry-pick their morals from the Bible, discarding much of the Old Testament but keeping the Sermon on the Mount. The faithful accept only those religious "ethics" in tune with a prior morality. This is certainly moral progress, but it does not support a view of religion as the warrant for morality.
If religion promotes morality, moreover, we can confidently predict that atheists will be less moral than believers. But the prediction fails. Consider a statistic: atheists constitute roughly 10 percent of the American population, but only 0.2 percent of our prison population. Now there are confounding factors, such as socio-economic status, at work here, but these data are clearly in the wrong direction. And consider that atheistic Europe, rather than being a hotbed of barbarism and immorality, is at least as moral as America. In his book Society Without God, the sociologist Phillip Zuckerman shows that Sweden and Denmark, two of the most atheistic countries in the world, are also two of the most moral, at least in terms of their lack of crime, high levels of government aid for the disadvantaged, and large amounts of per capita aid to other countries. There is certainly no evidence that many atheists have a qualitatively different type of morality than many believers. A survey by the biologist Marc Hauser and the philosopher Peter Singer showed that believers of many faiths did not differ from one another, or from atheists, in how they resolved hypothetical moral dilemmas.
Finally, consider what most of us agree are real improvements in ethics over the last several centuries: the idea of democracy; the elimination of more horrible punishments; the adoption of equal rights for racial and ethnic minorities, homosexuals, and women; the disappearance of slavery; the improved treatment of animals; and the increasing view that adult sexuality is a private matter. In each case, the impetus for change came overwhelmingly from secular views. Religion either played no role, or it played a small role, or it opposed the moral innovations, or it came aboard only when change was underway. (It is true that the American civil rights movement was supported by many churches, but we should also recall that in earlier times the faithful cited the Bible as support for slavery.) If a part of the world has improved morally, this change may have occurred not because of religion, but in spite of it.
V.
If Wright is wrong about the source of moral progress, where did it come from? This is a hard question with no shortage of answers, but some are more believable than Wright's. Peter Singer has proposed, for example, that a rudimentary form of altruistic morality evolved--as it could only have evolved--in small ancestral groups of hunter-gatherers. (Since altruism involves self-sacrifice, genes for the behavior can be favored only if they arise in groups of people who interact with their relatives--and hence carry similar genes--or in groups of people who repeatedly encounter the same nonrelatives, and hence have the chance for their sacrifices to be repaid.) As human populations grew and interacted, people began to realize that it was unacceptable to claim that anyone was morally entitled to better treatment than anyone else. And so, inspired by reason, a form of the golden rule developed and spread throughout the world. The Finnish philosopher Edvard Westermarck floated a similar idea, but claimed that the growth of morality was due not to reason but to a natural expansion of altruism that originated in small communities. (Neither of these theories demands that altruism be a genetically evolved phenomenon.)
Singer's and Westermarck's ideas may be wrong, but at least they require only a few reasonable assumptions: population growth, altruism, rationality. In floating the idea not only of a deity, but of one who uses arcane ways to perfect his creatures, Wright's theory is far less parsimonious, riddled as it is with unproven and occult assumptions. The deity enters into Wright's elaborate confection in several ways. Wright suggests that the moral sentiments themselves may have come from an evolutionary process guided by God. He also suggests that God may have created that whole process from scratch:
It is this moral order that, to the believer, is grounds for suspecting that the system of evolution by natural selection itself demands a special creative explanation.... And if the believer, having concluded that the moral order suggests the existence of some as-yet-unknown source of creativity that set natural selection in motion, decides to call that source "God," well, that's the believer's business. After all, physicists got to choose the word "electron."
In statements such as this, Wright, for all his reverence for Darwin, does nothing less than reject the modern scientific view of evolution, according to which it is a purely naturalistic process without a specified direction. How else can you explain the fact that more than 99 percent of all species that ever lived became extinct without leaving descendants, or that species can become either simpler or more complex when it is adaptive for them to change? Whatever view of progress one maintains, there are some evolutionary lineages that grossly violate it.
Wright rejects, or rather ignores, the copious evidence that natural selection is simply the inevitable result of random mutations that cause some individuals to be better adapted than others. Instead he propounds a genial form of intelligent design. This is creationism for liberals. While biblical literalists discern the hand of God in features such as eyes or wings, Wright finds it in the process of evolution itself--and in human history. Darwin strongly disavowed such attempts to envision God directing evolution. As he wrote to the geologist Charles Lyell,
I entirely reject, as in my judgment quite unnecessary, any subsequent addition "of new powers and attributes and forces," or of any "principle of improvement" except in so far as every character which is naturally selected or preserved is in some way an advantage or improvement, otherwise it would not have been selected. If I were convinced that I required such additions to the theory of natural selection, I would reject it as rubbish ... I would give absolutely nothing for the theory of Natural Selection, if it requires miraculous additions at any one stage of descent.
One of Wright's most surprising claims is that science does not differ significantly from religion:
Yet what exactly is the difference between [physicists'] belief in electrons and the logic of belief in God? They perceive patterns in the physical world--such as the behavior of electricity--and posit a source of these patterns and call that source the "electron." A believer in God perceives patterns in the moral world (or, at least, moral patterns in the physical world) and posits a source of these patterns and calls that source "God."
This is bizarre--another version of the mischievous postmodern view of science as merely an expression of desire or need. Does Wright really not grasp that science, unlike religion, posits testable explanations for the world, explanations that are discarded if they fail to comport with the facts? Is he unaware that, unlike religious explanations, scientific explanations are validated by public agreement among people from every faith and culture? On one hand we have Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and the whole panoply of faiths with their irresolvably conflicting claims, and on the other hand we have science, and only one brand of science. Independent scientific observers can decide whether electrons are real, but there is no way to decide whether Jesus was the Son of God or Muhammad was the Prophet.
By this point Wright has left all intellectual seriousness behind. In his book's peroration, he rhapsodizes that everything points to the divine: God designed natural selection, which inevitably produced love and altruism in humans, and then God tweaked human societies so that their technologies interacted in a non-zero-sum-way, leading in turn to the continual refinement of theology in favor of greater brotherly love. And that increase in love, says Wright, constitutes nothing less than a kind of evidence for the existence of God:
The god I've been describing is a god in quotation marks, a god that exists in people's heads.... To the extent that "god" grows, that is evidence--maybe not massive evidence but some evidence--of higher purpose. Which raises this question: If "God" indeed grows, and grows with stubborn persistence, does this mean that we can start thinking about taking the quotation marks off? That is: If the human conception of god features moral growth, and if this reflects corresponding moral growth on the part of humanity itself, and if humanity's moral growth flows from basic dynamics underlying history, and if we conclude that this growth is therefore evidence of "higher purpose," does this amount to evidence of an actual god?
....
Maybe the growth of "God" signifies the existence of God. That is: if history naturally pushes people toward moral improvement, toward moral truth, and their God, as they conceive their God, grows accordingly, becoming morally richer, than maybe this growth is evidence of some higher purpose, and maybe--conceivably--the source of that purpose is worthy of the name divinity.
Maybe, maybe, maybe. It is remarkable that a book called The Evolution of God can be so pusillanimous, so dodgy, about the question of whether or not there is a God. Surely the question of God's existence is the fulcrum upon which any discussion of God must rest. If the entity in his book's title does not exist, then his book is much, much less than it purports to be. But Wright is content with waffling, and with guarded speculation. When he finally comes to the big question--is there in fact a God who is pulling humanity toward morality?--he suddenly becomes humble and retiring. The existence of God, he plaintively concludes, is "a question that I'm unqualified to answer." What? With all this possible and purported evidence of divinity tugging at his sleeve, he still will not decide? Why doesn't Wright accept the thrust of his own arguments? Is he peddling a reassurance to others that does not work for himself? The whole enterprise begins to look a bit cynical.
Except for his claim that theology is malleable to social forces, which is hardly novel but never mind, there is nothing in Wright's argument that withstands close inspection--nothing in his understanding of theology, of morality and its history, of evolution, of science. There is absolutely no evidence, beyond wishful thinking, that God, if there is a God, had anything to do with setting up biological evolution or directing its operation, much less driving history toward goodness. If Wright's hypothesis were indeed a scientific one, we could say that it has been falsified: scientists, unless they want to be ridiculed, cannot afford to disregard a mountain of counterevidence. And insofar as Wright's book is an affair not of science but of edification, it is no less a failure. This long and eccentric sermon will not prepare anybody for the harshness of history, past or present. It is as wanting in a sense of tragedy as in a sense of evidence.
Jerry A. Coyne is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago and the author most recently of Why Evolution Is True (Viking).
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COMMENTS (26)
For all the apologetic excursions that Wright makes in TEOG, I would much prefer reading his analysis of history rather than the wishy-washy books of moderate/liberal theists. I'm not even gonna bother mentioning how awful books by conservative apologetics like Douglas Wilson are.
In terms of beliefs, Wright is an interesting case. He calls himself an atheist (actually, he calls his religious views as "materialist"), yet he believes in an abstract sense of direction in the universe.
Lisa Miller, annoying and wishy-washy liberal spiritualist of Newsweek fame, claims that this book will re-frame how debates on God/religion will be carried out. I for one doubt it. I think that this book will appe ... view full comment
For all the apologetic excursions that Wright makes in TEOG, I would much prefer reading his analysis of history rather than the wishy-washy books of moderate/liberal theists. I'm not even gonna bother mentioning how awful books by conservative apologetics like Douglas Wilson are.
In terms of beliefs, Wright is an interesting case. He calls himself an atheist (actually, he calls his religious views as "materialist"), yet he believes in an abstract sense of direction in the universe.
Lisa Miller, annoying and wishy-washy liberal spiritualist of Newsweek fame, claims that this book will re-frame how debates on God/religion will be carried out. I for one doubt it. I think that this book will appeal to a very specific group of liberal theists who believe in God, but as you put it, want to look "for ways to remain faithful but still feel smart". I doubt that conservative theists will want to read such a secular history of religion.
And thank you for pointing out that Wright doesn't cover Eastern religions like Hinduism or Shintoism (an obvious flaw right from the get-go). I thought that Wright covered ALL major religions in this book, but apparently, he only focuses on the Three Monotheisms. Why's that? After all, there are 900 million Hindus in the world. And, there are 380 million Buddhists? Why is Wright ignoring such a big part of history? They must have had SOME effect on history...
"Those who are Jews, and Christians, and Sabaeans--whoever believeth in Allah and the Last Day and doeth right--surely their reward is with their Lord, and there shall no fear come upon them neither shall they grieve."
I am an atheist and was giving credence and enjoying your article until you tried to twist the above. Allah simply means God and there is absolutely no meaning to the above except that Jews, Christians and others who believe in God and do right will be with their Lord. Please, please be rigorous in your work.
"Those who are Jews, and Christians, and Sabaeans--whoever believeth in Allah and the Last Day and doeth right--surely their reward is with their Lord, and there shall no fear come upon them neither shall they grieve."
I am an atheist and was giving credence and enjoying your article until you tried to twist the above. Allah simply means God and there is absolutely no meaning to the above except that Jews, Christians and others who believe in God and do right will be with their Lord. Please, please be rigorous in your work.
I don't recognize the book depicted in this review--and I wrote the book! Within a few days I'll have a reply online that documents Jerry Coyne's flagrant misrepresentations of my argument. It will be posted at www.evolutionofgod.net (which, in the meanwhile, I recommend as a place to read excerpts of the book and excerpts from less tendentious reviews).
--Bob Wright 7/28/09
I don't recognize the book depicted in this review--and I wrote the book! Within a few days I'll have a reply online that documents Jerry Coyne's flagrant misrepresentations of my argument. It will be posted at www.evolutionofgod.net (which, in the meanwhile, I recommend as a place to read excerpts of the book and excerpts from less tendentious reviews).
--Bob Wright 7/28/09
I would agree that Coyne misrepresents the book as an argument rather than a well-research history. However, I would add, in reply to Bob Wright, that you asked for it, sir, with your "I am not Jerry Coyne" afterword. I still don't understand how that was appropriate to the thesis, and I haven't been satisfied by any of your explanations for it.
I would agree that Coyne misrepresents the book as an argument rather than a well-research history. However, I would add, in reply to Bob Wright, that you asked for it, sir, with your "I am not Jerry Coyne" afterword. I still don't understand how that was appropriate to the thesis, and I haven't been satisfied by any of your explanations for it.
An excellent review! I am somewhat taken aback by Wright's defensive and vacuous "I don't recognize the book..." response to Coyne's review. I found it very revealing when Wright was interviewed by Bill Moyers on his Journal, when Moyers pointed out to him that he continuously refers to a directive power "out there" that guides evolution. Moyers asked Wright whether the guidance comes from "out there" or from "within". Wright, flummoxed, replied with, "Oh did I say out there? I find myself saying that too often." I find Wright to be muddled about his principle thesis and incapable of defending his ethereal suppositions. A writer of specious theology perhaps, but certainly an obfuscator o ... view full comment
An excellent review! I am somewhat taken aback by Wright's defensive and vacuous "I don't recognize the book..." response to Coyne's review. I found it very revealing when Wright was interviewed by Bill Moyers on his Journal, when Moyers pointed out to him that he continuously refers to a directive power "out there" that guides evolution. Moyers asked Wright whether the guidance comes from "out there" or from "within". Wright, flummoxed, replied with, "Oh did I say out there? I find myself saying that too often." I find Wright to be muddled about his principle thesis and incapable of defending his ethereal suppositions. A writer of specious theology perhaps, but certainly an obfuscator of evolutionary fact.
Mr. Wright I have read your book. I have also read Mr. Coyne's review. I recognize your book in this review. Your book is a mish-mash of ideas that you try to put together to argue that evolution (both biological and cultural) has some sort of purpose. Yet you give away the game late in the book by including some examples of highly "evolved" moralities.
These are the Egyptian religion of Osiris, which predates ALL the Abrahamic religions, and the Buddhist tradition of Ashoka the Great, which predates two out of three of the Abrahamic religions.
Can you really have meant to show that morality evolves when the best examples of religious morality you can find existed before the religions that m ... view full comment
Mr. Wright I have read your book. I have also read Mr. Coyne's review. I recognize your book in this review. Your book is a mish-mash of ideas that you try to put together to argue that evolution (both biological and cultural) has some sort of purpose. Yet you give away the game late in the book by including some examples of highly "evolved" moralities.
These are the Egyptian religion of Osiris, which predates ALL the Abrahamic religions, and the Buddhist tradition of Ashoka the Great, which predates two out of three of the Abrahamic religions.
Can you really have meant to show that morality evolves when the best examples of religious morality you can find existed before the religions that make up the body of your analysis?
I just started reading this review. In the first paragraph, Coyne states that "science has delivered two crippling blows to humanity's self-image"--the first being the overturning of the geocentric view of the universe, and the second being the theory of evolution. In the case of astronomy, it is a little troubling that Coyne is able to repeat this bit of intellectual folklore. As is well known, the "geocentric" view of the universe held in the middle ages represented the belief that Ptolemaic astronomy could be reconciled with the story of creation in Genesis. But as, for example, any reader of Dante knows, the Christian interpretation of Ptolemaic astronomy, in continuing to place the ... view full comment
I just started reading this review. In the first paragraph, Coyne states that "science has delivered two crippling blows to humanity's self-image"--the first being the overturning of the geocentric view of the universe, and the second being the theory of evolution. In the case of astronomy, it is a little troubling that Coyne is able to repeat this bit of intellectual folklore. As is well known, the "geocentric" view of the universe held in the middle ages represented the belief that Ptolemaic astronomy could be reconciled with the story of creation in Genesis. But as, for example, any reader of Dante knows, the Christian interpretation of Ptolemaic astronomy, in continuing to place the earth in what could be considered a spatial center, certainly did not place the earth in the center if by "center" we mean that which is most important and of highest value. Rather, what spatially looks like the center, in the Christian Ptolemaic view, is in fact the bottom. And at the very center, and therefore the very bottom, what we find is not earth, but hell! So it is clearly not the case that the very idea of heliocentric astronomy did anything to affect "humanity's self image." I'll have to think twice as I read all that Coyne goes on to say about a wide range of topics in the history of religions.
It looks to me like Wright is taking an old Platonic position: that the idea of God(s) is a Noble Lie, a useful and beneficial falsehood. See Plato's Republic, end of Book 3.
It looks to me like Wright is taking an old Platonic position: that the idea of God(s) is a Noble Lie, a useful and beneficial falsehood. See Plato's Republic, end of Book 3.
As a cardiologist and a physicist who has read Non Zero carefully cover to cover, I can say catagorically that Jerry A. Coyne does not understand it. His comments about Robert Wright's thought process completely misrepresent what Mr. Wright has written. I wonder if Mr. Coyne, has any education in advanced mathematics. While this is not necessary to understand Non Zero, a basic ability to understand mathematical concepts and basic statistical probabilities is necessary. Mr. Coyne does not seem to have this ability. A basic understanding of biology would also be helpful.
As a cardiologist and a physicist who has read Non Zero carefully cover to cover, I can say catagorically that Jerry A. Coyne does not understand it. His comments about Robert Wright's thought process completely misrepresent what Mr. Wright has written. I wonder if Mr. Coyne, has any education in advanced mathematics. While this is not necessary to understand Non Zero, a basic ability to understand mathematical concepts and basic statistical probabilities is necessary. Mr. Coyne does not seem to have this ability. A basic understanding of biology would also be helpful.
Coyne,
I have only read Wright's latest book, "The Evolution of God". From what I can tell, the motive of this review seems to be to be based upon a personal dislike of Robert Wright, not his ideas. Sure Wright makes a few debatable intellectual leaps, but he is honest about them. He is also very careful to play the devils advocate. You give examples to show that Wright is molding information to fit with his teleological worldview, but you are most definitely doing the same thing, fitting information to confirm your view that their is no higher purpose in the universe.
Coyne,
I have only read Wright's latest book, "The Evolution of God". From what I can tell, the motive of this review seems to be to be based upon a personal dislike of Robert Wright, not his ideas. Sure Wright makes a few debatable intellectual leaps, but he is honest about them. He is also very careful to play the devils advocate. You give examples to show that Wright is molding information to fit with his teleological worldview, but you are most definitely doing the same thing, fitting information to confirm your view that their is no higher purpose in the universe.
I haven't fully read this review because frankly I only have so much time and I would rather read Wright's book than this review. I stopped reading around the point where he calimed that Wright wrote this book to respond to crtics of Nonzero. Wright wrote the book in order to explore the question of whether Christians, Jews and Muslims could get along. At that point I got bored with the peice and realized that I had only read like 10% of it. What Robert Wrights book shows is that revealed truth is nonsense and that because it is nonsense religious adapt to circumstances so that they aren't the problem that many atheists assume them to be. Religions claim to have the truth and they claim to s ... view full comment
I haven't fully read this review because frankly I only have so much time and I would rather read Wright's book than this review. I stopped reading around the point where he calimed that Wright wrote this book to respond to crtics of Nonzero. Wright wrote the book in order to explore the question of whether Christians, Jews and Muslims could get along. At that point I got bored with the peice and realized that I had only read like 10% of it. What Robert Wrights book shows is that revealed truth is nonsense and that because it is nonsense religious adapt to circumstances so that they aren't the problem that many atheists assume them to be. Religions claim to have the truth and they claim to stick to this truth against all evidence, too many athiests believe these claims are true.
Dr. Coyne's review of Wright's book brings to mind the knee-jerk attack response of many creationists to proponents of evolution: They seize on a few minor data points that stray from an otherwise well-established curve; they unreasonably exaggerate the importance of those particular data points; then they triumphantly proclaim the other side's alleged failure. Sorry, no sale.
(I also agree with Richard Schneider MD: Perhaps Dr. Coyne simply doesn't understand Wright's thesis, possibly because of the ideological blinders he seems to be wearing.)
Dr. Coyne's review of Wright's book brings to mind the knee-jerk attack response of many creationists to proponents of evolution: They seize on a few minor data points that stray from an otherwise well-established curve; they unreasonably exaggerate the importance of those particular data points; then they triumphantly proclaim the other side's alleged failure. Sorry, no sale.
(I also agree with Richard Schneider MD: Perhaps Dr. Coyne simply doesn't understand Wright's thesis, possibly because of the ideological blinders he seems to be wearing.)
The exchange above demonstrates, exactly, why the debate between theist and atheist should continue: either one's bias-or shall I say, presumed lack of bias regarding "the God question", are revealed in the comments.
The exchange above demonstrates, exactly, why the debate between theist and atheist should continue: either one's bias-or shall I say, presumed lack of bias regarding "the God question", are revealed in the comments.
As Einstein said, "blind respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth."
As Einstein said, "blind respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth."
A remarkable thing has happened: The spirit of Karl Rove inhabited the critical faculties of the otherwise solid Jerry Coyne. Coyne's review shows that not only right-wing nut jobs resort to significant mischaracterization to demolish the arguments of their enemies.
A remarkable thing has happened: The spirit of Karl Rove inhabited the critical faculties of the otherwise solid Jerry Coyne. Coyne's review shows that not only right-wing nut jobs resort to significant mischaracterization to demolish the arguments of their enemies.
We don't need God [or religion] to encompass either a moral narrative or a "meaning of life". We just need this:
**Genetic/biological predispositions. What are these? Well, of course, no one really knows for certain but it is obvious from cross-cultural ethnological studies that all people seem to have built-in capacites to experience and express a broad range of emotional and psychological states: compassion, empathy, fear, agression. We have a survival instinct. We have sexual libidoes. We have primitive impulses that stem from the reptilian part of the brain. The naked ape parts, as it were.
**Cultural predispositions. Each of us is born into a culture that shapes and molds these bio ... view full comment
We don't need God [or religion] to encompass either a moral narrative or a "meaning of life". We just need this:
**Genetic/biological predispositions. What are these? Well, of course, no one really knows for certain but it is obvious from cross-cultural ethnological studies that all people seem to have built-in capacites to experience and express a broad range of emotional and psychological states: compassion, empathy, fear, agression. We have a survival instinct. We have sexual libidoes. We have primitive impulses that stem from the reptilian part of the brain. The naked ape parts, as it were.
**Cultural predispositions. Each of us is born into a culture that shapes and molds these biological/genetic tendencies into a veritable smorgasbord of actual brehavior patterns; for 10 to 12 years, in fact, all children in all cultures will become thoroughly indoctrinated to view right from wrong just like Mommy and Daddy do. Most will go to the grave understanding little of how this works. Even fewer will make any significant changes in it.
**Individual autonomy. Yet despite receiving all of this deeply engrained acculturation as youths, we all become adults eventually and have to make our own way into and out of the moral labyrinths. In other words, we all come to intertwine these many, many existential variables into our own individual sense of reality----encompasing, in turn, own own individual moral compass. No two are ever exactly the same.
**Rewards and punishments. These come to play a huge role in how we come to see the moral circumference of the world around us. We act so as to be rewarded by those we love and respect and admire and depend upon. We act so as to avoid sanctions from those we don't. It becomes one contingency laden psychological mishmash of ambiguous and ambivalent frames of mind.
**Political economy. Marx was right. Human social interaction revolves fundamentally around the need to sustain biological existence. We need food and water; we need a roof over our head and clothes on our backs; we need a relatively stable environment in which to reproduce; we need folks who are able to defend us from enemies---inside and out. This is why men and women have always agglomerated into communities throughout history. And that revolves ultimately around power. It matters little what you believe is right and wrong if you don't have the power to enforce and defend it. So, human moral agendas have always reflected the basic interests of those with the most political and economic power.
** Death. In order to understand why we act as we do above the ground you always have to factor in how folks regard the fact that sooner or later they are going to be six feet under it.
So, we don't need God to put together moral agendas. It's just that without God, they are all essentially interchangable. None can be defended as objectively or universally true. Instead, we always have to negociate with others to find a common ground.
Well, Wright says in his rebuttal that the review’s closing paragraphs accurately represent his position. If so, that’s pretty devastating, and tends to confirm Coyne’s overall take. Coyne quotes the following from the book in full, and Wright does not argue that the quote was taken out of context: “If ‘God’ indeed grows, and grows with stubborn persistence, does this mean that we can start thinking about taking the quotation marks off? That is: If the human conception of god features moral growth, and if this reflects corresponding moral growth on the part of humanity itself, and if humanity's moral growth flows from basic dynamics underlying history, and if we conclude that ... view full comment
Well, Wright says in his rebuttal that the review’s closing paragraphs accurately represent his position. If so, that’s pretty devastating, and tends to confirm Coyne’s overall take. Coyne quotes the following from the book in full, and Wright does not argue that the quote was taken out of context: “If ‘God’ indeed grows, and grows with stubborn persistence, does this mean that we can start thinking about taking the quotation marks off? That is: If the human conception of god features moral growth, and if this reflects corresponding moral growth on the part of humanity itself, and if humanity's moral growth flows from basic dynamics underlying history, and if we conclude that this growth is therefore evidence of ‘higher purpose,’ does this amount to evidence of an actual god?” No -- except insofar as we “conclude that this growth is therefore evidence of a ‘higher purpose.’” Sure, if we conclude that there is a god, then that would amount to evidence of an actual god. But we don’t have any basis to conclude that. Wright’s “therefore” in that sentence is pretty ridiculous – the proposition simply does not follow. Wright objects that Coyne attributes to him views he does not claim to hold, such as a belief in a god or entity or whatever that had or has as its purpose the moral progress that Wright charts. Yet, Wright seems to affirm that this passage is what he thinks and what he’s getting at. Wright wants to say that the answer to his question is yes. He wants to “start thinking about taking the quotation marks off.” That appears to be, going by Coyne’s review, the *point* of the book, more or less, and Wright’s rebuttal does not refute that. So, Coyne does Wright the disservice of taking him seriously and not letting him weasel out of his obvious implications and propositions merely because they are phrased in the form of a question. Wright also doesn’t respond to Coyne’s put-down of his absurd, and, once again, interrogative suggestion that religious faith and scientific conclusions are merely two equivalent flavors of belief – a profoundly aggravating sentiment that nobody actually believes when push comes to shove. (Is my faith that the bridge will hold merely a *different* belief from the engineer's conclusion that it will not?) Wright calls Coyne out for using arguments or evidence in his review that Wright himself highlights in his book, arguing that Coyne was making Wright appear ignorant of such arguments and evidence. If true, that is, at best, sloppy of Coyne, and he should know better – he’s making Wright and the book sound more foolish than they are. The worst part for Coyne is that it doesn’t seem as though they needed any help from him.
Is religion the most important source of morality? NO.
As Einstein may have said, "blind allegiance to religion is the greatest enemy of intelligence."
Is religion the most important source of morality? NO.
As Einstein may have said, "blind allegiance to religion is the greatest enemy of intelligence."
I stopped reading this review after the going through the cartoon description of the devastating effects of science on religion in the first paragraph. Just another confermation that nobody can be an atheist without embracing some (usually pretty shallow) theology. In the case of the science-religion debate, all atheists seems to be intellectual descendants of Anglo-American (especially Victorian) Protestantism, as if that was the gold-standard of Christianity.
Has Pascal ever been translated into English? Solovev? Rosmini? Kierkegaard?
I stopped reading this review after the going through the cartoon description of the devastating effects of science on religion in the first paragraph. Just another confermation that nobody can be an atheist without embracing some (usually pretty shallow) theology. In the case of the science-religion debate, all atheists seems to be intellectual descendants of Anglo-American (especially Victorian) Protestantism, as if that was the gold-standard of Christianity.
Has Pascal ever been translated into English? Solovev? Rosmini? Kierkegaard?
Most folks, Coyne included, become unhinged when considering the subject of God and religion. Understandable. Coyne views history during the period of the past several thousand years, when religion as we know it took hold, and then identifies the horrible events (the low hanging fruit) that support his view that God and religion are in most every way negative influences. Wright’s book, on the other hand, considers how God and religion evolved during the same period, during which hunter-gatherers evolved into tribes and then civilizations, and makes the case that God and religion has (at least sometimes) served as a bridge between them. God and religion: the source of evil (Coyne’s vi ... view full comment
Most folks, Coyne included, become unhinged when considering the subject of God and religion. Understandable. Coyne views history during the period of the past several thousand years, when religion as we know it took hold, and then identifies the horrible events (the low hanging fruit) that support his view that God and religion are in most every way negative influences. Wright’s book, on the other hand, considers how God and religion evolved during the same period, during which hunter-gatherers evolved into tribes and then civilizations, and makes the case that God and religion has (at least sometimes) served as a bridge between them. God and religion: the source of evil (Coyne’s view), or a bridge between civilizations (Wright’s view). Whatever the merits of Wright’s thesis, I believe Coyne’s real objection to Wright’s book is its underlying assumption, namely, that history (evolution) has a direction. Sure, events occur along the way that create an impression of no direction, even randomness. But even Coyne, an evolutionist, must admit that history is indeed directional.
The relationship between religion and ethics is complex. A religion claiming to be a source of ethics has one very useful feature -- like the civil law, it serves as a mechanism to convert ethical problems into legal dictates. Thus, a difficult ethical question such as "Will killing Mr. X result in the greatest good for the greatest number?" becomes the manageable religious dictate "Thous shalt not kill." Of course, the religious dictate may be arbitrary, or it may stem from a metaphysical theory which will result in ridiculous dictates. Still, some such source of simplified rules and axioms and rules seems necessary to reduce the infinite complexity of ethical considerations to a manage ... view full comment
The relationship between religion and ethics is complex. A religion claiming to be a source of ethics has one very useful feature -- like the civil law, it serves as a mechanism to convert ethical problems into legal dictates. Thus, a difficult ethical question such as "Will killing Mr. X result in the greatest good for the greatest number?" becomes the manageable religious dictate "Thous shalt not kill." Of course, the religious dictate may be arbitrary, or it may stem from a metaphysical theory which will result in ridiculous dictates. Still, some such source of simplified rules and axioms and rules seems necessary to reduce the infinite complexity of ethical considerations to a manageable set of "rules to live by."
This consideration leads to a second difficulty: doing purely secular ethics is at least as problematical as doing theology. If God does not tell us to do the right thing, why should we do the right thing (for that matter, why should we do the right thing because God tells us to -- because we will go to Hell? This is the the logic of the civil law projected on a cosmic background, but at least it is an incentive to good conduct. Purely secular reasons (as opposed to secular incentives) seem flimsy. The greatest good for the greatest number? Why should we care? Because good behavior is "civilized"? Who is to say, and why should we listen to them? Because there is a categorical imperative? Do we know there is such a thing any more than we know if God exists? And if there is, absent incentives based upon it, why should we care?
The problems is that secular reasoning is no more a necessary or a sufficient guarantor of good behaivor than theological reasoning is. And at least religious grounding for such behavior has some historical basis.
For the cynics and skeptics in the reading audience may I recommend Stephen Meyer's SIGNATURE IN THE CELL, for their inspiration, consternation, edification, and perspiration?
For the cynics and skeptics in the reading audience may I recommend Stephen Meyer's SIGNATURE IN THE CELL, for their inspiration, consternation, edification, and perspiration?
Factual error: Constantine did not convert to Christianity after fighting a battle, he converted on his death bed, not before.
Factual error: Constantine did not convert to Christianity after fighting a battle, he converted on his death bed, not before.
Morality based on religion's hope of reward or fear of punishment, isn't moral. The focus should be on the here and now. Whatever comes after, if anything, will take care of itself. I'm a practicing Jew.
Morality based on religion's hope of reward or fear of punishment, isn't moral. The focus should be on the here and now. Whatever comes after, if anything, will take care of itself. I'm a practicing Jew.
"Over its history, science has delivered two crippling blows to humanity's self-image." I assume that by 'humanity' that Mr. Coyne means 'The Church (particularly the Catholic Church). Jewish scholars tended to embrace and incorporate scientific understandings as they came into common knowledge. It is irksome to think, though, that all but Christians are not included in the term 'humanity.'
"Over its history, science has delivered two crippling blows to humanity's self-image." I assume that by 'humanity' that Mr. Coyne means 'The Church (particularly the Catholic Church). Jewish scholars tended to embrace and incorporate scientific understandings as they came into common knowledge. It is irksome to think, though, that all but Christians are not included in the term 'humanity.'
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