Burden of proof

Does the sandwich exist?

I can see it in front of me. "The sandwich exists," I'm told. And there it is. While I'm looking at it I might want to consider the possibility that despite what I see, and what I'm told, the sandwich does not, in fact, exist.

On the whole, though, I believe the sandwich exists.

But what if, while I sit here looking at it, someone comes along and tells me that the sandwich does not exist? I point at the sandwich, but this person vehemently denies the existence of the sandwich. I shake my head and say, "I believe the sandwich exists." I can see it, touch it, smell it, even eat it (though this last option will, I can tell, have implications for the continued existence of the sandwich). This person — this sandwich denier — then proceeds to explain to me that the sandwich does not exist, and proves it by gesturing a hand through what I thought was the sandwich. The sandwich, it turns out, is not a sandwich but a hologram. I have to concede, therefore, that the sandwich that I thought existed does not, in fact, exist.

Hold on a minute! It may be a hologram, but it's a hologram of a sandwich. The sandwich itself must exist somewhere, for this holographic projection of it to be here. Not so, explains the sandwich denier. The hologram was made by a clever graphic artist with access to some impressive aromagraphic technology. The sandwich itself does not exist.

Whether I cease to believe in the existence of the sandwich as a result of this exchange is neither here nor there. The point is, I had very good evidence that the sandwich did, in fact, exist. The sandwich denier wanted to convince me that it didn't exist, and shouldered the burden of proof to do so.

Let's take another example. Does God exist?

I don't see him. I don't experience any of those things theists describe as revelation. I look at the natural world and see the results of unguided natural processes. There are many things about the world I don't understand and can't explain, but none of these mysteries is made clearer by the suggestion that God had a part in them. In most cases the addition of a deity/creator only adds paradox and makes things more difficult to explain.

Nevertheless, while I'm looking at the natural world I might want to consider the possibility that despite the lack of evidence for his existence, God does, in fact, exist. Anyone wishing to convince me that God exists would need to provide the evidence that so far I haven't encountered. But in the absence of such evidence I feel no obligation to provide counter evidence. Unlike the sandwich that sits in front of me — apparently physical evidence of its own existence — God is not manifest in any comparable way, and therefore does not need to be disproved.

On the whole, therefore, I don't believe God exists.

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So what was I feeling when I touched the sandwich? Was my cognition, and my reporting of it, biased by my presupposition about the existence of the sandwich...?

Atheism 2.0 — fundamentally misconceived

Alain de Botton wants to take what he sees as the "good" things of religion and borrow them for atheism. He particularly likes religious buildings, which he seems to think provide examples of something that "atheism" — as some kind of movement — could usefully build. The problem with this approach is that it appears to accept the notion that atheism as a "thing" is in the same category as that other thing — religion.

It's not. According to Dictionary.com the definition of religion is this:

a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

Atheism on the other hand is not that. It's not a set of beliefs, it's the absence of belief in a god or gods. It involves no devotional or ritual observances, and says nothing at all about a moral code. Whatever religion is, atheism is not that.

Alain de Botton seems to regret that atheism is not that, and while he wouldn't accept the superhuman agency he seems to want to co-opt some of the "devotional and ritual observances".

On Justin Brierley's Unbelievable? radio programme today Alain de Botton stated that he doesn't really care for the nitty gritty details of science, and it seems that this barely concealed disdain for the hard facts of reality could be at the root of his less-than-rigorous approach to truth — an approach that sets him apart from other philosophers such as Daniel Dennett and A. C. Grayling. And of course Alain de Botton is far too nice to come out with full-blown condemnation of religious belief like Richard Dawkins and his ilk are wont to do. (His niceness was on full display in his conversation with James Orr today, but he was, almost literally, on his own ground.)

Alain de Botton already appears to be borrowing aspects of religion, such as the insistence that an absence of religion will inevitably leave a void requiring to be filled. This is not so, in the same way that removing a cancerous tumour from the body does not require something in its place.

His idea that there ought to be a community for atheists seems to me — someone who has not read his book — to be fundamentally misguided. There is already a community for atheists and people of a secular humanist turn of worldview; it's called humanity. We secular humanists (I count myself among them) can do what others do when when they don't go to church, such as attend or partake in sports, go down the pub, go to the movies, theatre, sightseeing, evening classes, quiz nights, museums, art galleries — or even skeptics conferences if we are so inclined.

All of these are communities of different kinds; pick one (or more) as you like. There's no need for something to serve as an ersatz church.

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Alain de Botton gave a TED talk recently on the theme of his book:

Illustrating a bad influence in American politics — BBC Radio 4

Beyond Belief, BBC Radio 4's discussion programme about faith matters, was this week about the Republican nomination for US presidential candidate. Here's the blurb from the Radio 4 website:

What role does religion play in the race for the Republican nomination for the White House?

Ernie Rea is joined by Bob Vander Plaats, head of "The Family Leader" pressure group, Boo Tyson from "Coalition Mainstream" and Dr Alexander Smith from Huddersfield University. Together they assess the influence of the Religious Right on Republican politics, and whether Americans might be ready for a Mormon president.

Some of the talk was sensible, and some was just idiotic. The dire straits of America's so-called "separation of church and state" was amply illustrated by this final exchange in the programme's closing minute, when host Ernie Rae asked each of his guests the same question:

ERNIE RAE: Do you think that a publicly declared atheist could win the presidency at this point in time?

BOO TYSON: No. No I don't, and I think you would be hard pressed to win "dog-catcher" for County Commissioner, much less be the president of the United States, who takes an oath with "under God" in it, and on a Bible.

ALEXANDER SMITH: I suspect not. No. And in fact interestingly, I mean, Ron Paul, who we haven't talked about in this discussion, is probably the closest candidate you could come to who might be described as something of an agnostic. But you know, he's trailing well behind, and obviously isn't much of a prospect.

BOB VANDER PLAATS: I certainly hope not. For us to say that an atheist could lead this country, I sure hope we're not at that point. If we are, I believe God would have every right to remove his blessing from this country.

That last response is precisely what's wrong with religious influence in American politics.

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The audio of this programme is available for streaming until the end of the century (or thereabouts):
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b01blgp2

Adam Rutherford and the creation of life

Tomorrow evening I'll be at the annual Darwin Day Lecture held by the British Humanist Association. This year it will be delivered by Adam Rutherford:

I attended last year's lecture by Armand Leroi, which was excellent, so I'm looking forward to hearing what, if anything, Adam Rutherford has to say about "Creation". He's known to be provocative when it comes to matters of religious faith, so depending on the audience make-up the Q&A (if there is one) could be lively.

The claims of religious faith are not exempt

The HOTS Bath advertising nonsense seems to have shaken out those wedded to religious privilege. Hayley Stevens has done us all a favour in highlighting it with her ASA complaint.

Brendan O'Neill at the Telegraph seems to be one of the more belligerent fulminators against the ASA's ruling:

This is an outrageous attack on freedom of religion, on the basic right of people to express central tenets of their faith.

Central tenets such as, for instance, homosexuality is an abomination? Or those who don't believe in Jesus/God are destined for "eternal conscious torment"? Or that contraception is an evil worse than AIDS? Granted, these aren't exactly touted around as attractive propositions you might want to try out on the streets around Bath Abbey, but they are as without factual basis as anything promoted by snake-oil salesmen.

You have a recently deceased relative? A central tenet of some religious faith is that God can bring a dead person back to life. Should we allow a religious group to make such a specific claim on the streets of Bath, or anywhere else for that matter? We should not. But by law we must. The ASA covers published advertising only, so any oral claims of resurrection made on the streets are beyond its remit. But apparently HOTS Bath did claim, in their leaflets and on their website, that serious illness can be alleviated by prayer. This is a medical claim, and they provide no acceptable evidence to support it. The ASA was right, therefore, to put a stop to it.

O'Neill is simply illustrating the undeserved privilege religious faith has enjoyed for so long — a privilege built into UK political culture — and which religion in general will try to hang on to for as long as it can.

Elsewhere in the Telegraph Tom Chivers gives the side of sanity:

This isn't an outrageous attack on religion. People are still allowed to believe, and state that they believe, in obvious nonsense like faith healing. But advertising laws can't be redrawn just because someone decides their product is religious; if they make actual empirical medical claims, then they need to be able to provide actual empirical medical evidence.

Personally I'd like to see some actual empirical evidence for religious faith's other claims too.

(Via HumanistLife.)

Burnee links for Sunday

In Antithesis, Vol 2, No. 1
Choosing Hats has published another issue of its apologetics journal. I read Stephen Rodgers' article "The New Atheism, Fast Company, and the Integrity of Doubt". Despite the obscure title the article is engagingly written (if a bit wordy at times — and Rodgers has a fondness for footnotes that leak all over the feet of adjacent pages) but there's little of substance there. Basically his thesis is, "New Atheism? Pfft! We've seen it all before." So that's it folks: to rebut the "Four Horsemen" all you need to do is claim you already have. I do object, however, to Rodgers' maligning the honesty of Sam Harris. Stooping to such low tactics reveals the underlying desperation of the apologetic method.

“It’s Part of their Culture” - Reading Nick Cohen in the light of the Jaipur affair - Richard Dawkins - RD.net - RichardDawkins.net
Some "cultures", however, are inherently bad.

UK Advertising Standards Authority try and stop Healing on the Streets | News | Bible Reflections | prayer, healing
HOTS Bath still not getting it.

Anoka, our little blight on the prairie | Pharyngula
Hard to take. But these kids have been ill-served. Children are the future of humanity — don't neglect them.

New Rule: Atheism is not a religion! Unbaptizes Mitt Romney's Dead Father-In-Law! - YouTube
Bill Maher nails Mormon ludicrousness (ludicrity? ludicrosity? whatever...)

The Road to Hell

"What About Those Who Have Never Heard the Gospel?"

This is the title of chapter 40 of Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God, and once again it's a chapter that seems to be in the wrong section. I'm currently reading the section titled The Question of Jesus, and this chapter should clearly be in the final section, The Question of the Bible — it is, after all, about the Gospel. True, Michael R. Licona is following on from his previous chapter about whether Jesus is the only path to God, but it nevertheless seems out of place.

That said, this chapter reveals more of the quagmire that Christians stir up for themselves when they insist on taking the Bible as written (or inspired) by the all-powerful creator of the universe. The essence of Licona's thesis here is that there are two types of revelation from God: general revelation and special revelation. (Unbidden, an image of God looking remarkably like Albert Einstein springs to mind.) General revelation is a knowledge of God apparent in Creation (with, naturally, a capital 'C'), and special revelation is a knowledge of God made available through the Gospel. If you reject either of these revelations you're damned to Hell.

According to Romans chapter one, God has made some of his invisible attributes known through the world in which we live. The stars, the sun, the moon, the ocean, and many other wonders of nature were not the work of a bull, a horse, a calf, or a man. These are the products of a cosmic designer of immense intelligence. In Romans chapter 2, Paul tells us that God has instilled basic knowledge of his moral laws in our conscience, so that, instinctively, we know that actions such as rape, murder, stealing, and falsehood are immoral. We all are accountable to God for immoral actions we have committed of varying degrees. Theologians refer to this type of knowledge as general revelation. In other words, given our universe and our conscience, we should be aware that a God of some sort exists and that we have failed to live up to his moral law.

I don't accept the notion that "the world in which we live" is the product of "a cosmic designer of immense intelligence". For me, the evidence for such designer simply isn't as compelling as the evidence for the alternative hypothesis — that the world in which we live is the result of natural processes, without the intervention of a supernatural agent. Therefore, according to Licona, I'm damned even if I never encounter the Gospel.

According to Licona, those who do accept the idea of a cosmic designer, but — for whatever reason — believe that the designer is some deity other than Jesus/God fall into one of two categories: those who have never encountered the Gospel, and those who have. The first category are granted salvation by virtue of their honest, blameless ignorance; the second — sorry, you got the wrong god, despite being shown the right one, so to Hell with your sinful soul.

Several times Licona admits that the Bible doesn't have specific answers to particular questions, and resorts to what he calls speculation. This, it appears, is a code-word for what Christians seem to do quite a lot in their "interpretation" of scripture — that is, they simply make stuff up.

Let’s summarize. We’ve faced the difficult questions pertaining to the fate of those who die without ever having heard the gospel as well as that of babies and the mentally handicapped who lack the mental capacity to understand the gospel. Since the Bible does not directly address either of these questions, speculation pertaining to possible solutions is our only course of action. However, we may look at other situations in which God has acted and get a glimpse into his character. We observed two divine principles: (1) God judges us according to our response to the knowledge about him we are given. At minimal, this knowledge consists of the fact that there is a Creator to whom we will stand accountable for our moral failures. (2) God does not hold accountable those who lack the mental capacity to choose between good and evil.

Licona's two divine principles each appear to be fundamentally problematic: (1) that there is a  Creator is not a fact but a Christian presupposition unsupported by compelling evidence, and (2) according to Genesis God does indeed hold accountable those who lack the mental capacity to choose between good and evil. Adam and Eve were specifically denied the knowledge of good and evil, yet according to the story God still held them accountable, to the extent that their "sin" is visited on every single human being since.

My own take on this "problem" is that it isn't a problem at all, but merely one more part of the obfuscation necessary in attempting to resolve something that doesn't make sense in the first place.

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4truth.net:
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbjesus.aspx?pageid=8589952889