Last year, on the day after the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Pope Benedict XVI spoke at Regensberg University, on the subject of Christian truth, and of Christian dialogue with other faiths, especially Islam. Although there has been plenty of media coverage of the Pope's remarks, and of the reaction by Rage Boy and other Islamists, one part of the story has been conspicuously absent: the text from which the Pope’s remarks were taken. So this article supplies the missing context.
There, Manuel met a very learned, older Persian gentleman, who asked Manuel to discuss with him the comparative merits of Islam and Christianity. The Persian, who perhaps was a professor, explained that he had already learned much about Christianity, but he wished to discuss the topic with a genuine advocate of Christianity, rather than with a Muslim giving an incomplete defense of the Christian faith.
So for 26 nights, the pair debated. The discussions were recorded by some members of Manuel’s court, probably to the benefit of their prince. The full dialogues have been recorded in Greek, and the dialogue of the seventh night has been translated into French, presumably because of its significance. It was from the 1966 French edition, translated and edited by Theodore Khoury, that Benedict XVI quoted, Entretiens Avec un Musluman: 7e Controverse (Interviews with a Muslim: 7th Controversy). No edition presently exists in English. (The French translation of the dialogue itself, without Khoury's extensive analysis, is here.)
The dialogues were complicated because Manuel and the Persian did not speak other’s language, nor did anyone in their retinues. So statements had to be translated from Greek to Turkish, and then from Turkish to Persian. (Or translated in other direction.)
One notable feature of the dialogue between Manuel and the Persian is that neither side relied on scriptural proof-texts. Although the 20th-century editor Khoury pronounces the interviews a failure because neither side could ultimately enter into the mental world of the other, the dialogues strike me as a heroic effort by both parties to overcome their linguistic and cultural differences, and to engage in a sincere discussion of the most fundamental issues of life, with neither side relying on proof-texts which the other side could not accept.
The broad topic of the 7th Controversy is the relative merits of the Christian and Islamic Laws. The dialogues took place during a crisis of confidence of Orthodox Christianity, for the Byzantines, like the ancient Israelites (and the Muslims), believed that God bestowed military success upon the righteous. At the time, the Islamic Ottomans were plainly ascendant over the Byzantines.
In small details, we see differences between medieval Persian-Turkish Islam, and the more austere contemporary Arab extremist versions. According to the Persian, paradise is replete not only with young women, but also with dogs (presumably hunting dogs). In contrast, modern Islamo-fascists abhor even guide dogs for the blind as unclean, and dogs are banned from "Saudi" Arabia.
Early in the dialogue, Manuel raises the issue of religious conversion by force. Under Islamic practice, conquered "people of the book", that is, Christians and Jews, were allowed to retain their religion, in exchange for submission as second-class citizens ("dhimmis")—required to pay punitive taxes, forbidden possess arms, and reduced to complete social inferiority to Muslims, including being prohibited from defending themselves against violent criminal attacks by Muslims.
Adherents of other religions, such as Hindus, Buddhists, Zoroastrians, or pagan sects, fared much worse; their choice was conversion to Islam, or slavery.
Near the beginning of the 7th Controversy, Manuel, as quoted by Benedict XVI asks, "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." (The editor added a citation to Sura 9 of the Koran.)
Benedict elaborated:
The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God", he says, "is not pleased by blood — and not acting reasonably is contrary to God’s nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats… To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death…"
The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: "For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality." Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Muslim R[oger] Arnaldez, who points out that [the famous Muslim philosopher] Ibn Hazn went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God's will, we would even have to practice idolatry.
An October 2006 joint letter of 38 leading Muslim scholars and clerics, in response to the Regensberg speech, denied that conversion by the sword is a tenet is Islam. (The issue depends on whether Koran 2:256, "There is no compulsion in religion," is abrogated by later verses.) As for the charge that Mohammad had introduced nothing new that was good, the scholars responded that Mohammad never claimed to be declaring novel doctrines.
Likewise, the educated Persian of 1391 did not attempt to defend the irrational doctrine of conversion by the sword.
Educated though he was, the Persian perhaps did not think of the specific counter-arguments which the 38 scholars of 2006 deployed. So there followed a long pause. Manuel's translator, a Muslim with Christian parents, seemed to Manuel to be discretely pleased with the speech, and he quietly warned the educated Persian that if he could not reply, the Muslims would have to concede victory in the debate to the Christians.
Finally, the Persian replied. He did not directly respond to Manuel's points. Instead, he changed the topic by arguing that the Christian law, while admirable, was inhumane.
In particular, the Persian listed the seemingly extreme demands of the Sermon on the Mount (love your enemies, do not resist evil, and so on), along with a few other extreme statements of Jesus (e.g., to follow me, you must hate your parents). Perhaps a man made of diamonds could comply with these extreme precepts, but real human could not, said the Persian. At length he denounced the Christian preference for lifelong virginity. It was contrary to human nature, and contrary to the way that God had created the world in Genesis (with two sexes who were meant to couple). The ultimate result would be the extinction of human race. Islamic Law, in contrast, was moderate, in accordance with human nature, and an example of the virtuous Golden Mean. (The Persian was apparently well-acquainted with the principle from Greek and Latin philosophy.)
Manuel answered that, first of all, extraordinary things are possible for humans, with God’s help. God can provide every person with the will and the means to achieve everything necessary to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Moreover, the items listed by Manuel were not absolute rules; rather, they were exhortations and advice, or forms of spiritual combat, which were for people most perfected in the faith.
In response to a follow-up question from the Persian, Manuel delivered a beautiful, but overly long disquisition on the above point, explaining that Christianity had room for many sorts of people; one did not have to imitate the early Christians by practicing lifelong virginity and poverty. However, the greatest rewards in Heaven were for those who did, for they became the children of God.
As the dialogue continued through the night, the Persian brought the discussion back to a comparison of the Islamic and Christian laws, and challenged Manuel to prove the Islamic law inferior. Manuel resorted to a traditional Greek argument against Islam:
Islam claims that the Mosaic Law was good, the Christian Law better, and the Islamic Law the best of all, perfecting the Christian Law. Yet Mohammed revived parts of the Mosaic Law that Christianity had abolished, such as the prohibition on eating pork, and the requirement that if a husband dies without having given his wife a child, one of the husband’s brothers must marry the widow. Thus, Islam was illogical in proclaiming the superiority of Christian Law to Mosaic Law, while reversing Christian abrogations of Mosaic Law.
The Persian had no response except to affirm the superiority of Islamic Law, and request that Manuel continue his arguments. Manuel did so, adding circumcision to the list of Mosaic Laws which were eliminated by Christianity but revived by Islamic Law.
The Persians talked among themselves at great length. Then, the Persian politely said that the night’s discussions should conclude, because Manuel was supposed to go hunting in morning with Bajazet, and Manuel was already cold, so Manuel should have a chance to rest and get warm.
Was the Persian able to provide good counter-arguments when the interviews resumed the next evening? I do not know. I am not aware of any English or French translations of the 8th Controversy.
The 7th Controversy, as part of the 26 Interviews with a Muslim, is an admirable testament to the ability of the best minds of the 14th century to engage in serious interfaith dialogue. Both sides believed that religious truth is real, and not relative; both sides frankly presented their best arguments, based on reason and human experience. Neither side shied away from frank criticisms of the other, and neither side relied on its own scripture to trumpet its superiority over people who did not believe in that scripture.
Notwithstanding Rage Boy and similar hate-filled Islamist cretins, and notwithstanding hate-filled Christians and Jews, many millions of adherents of the Abrahamic faiths are ready to engage each other in sincere dialogue, as did the Emperor Manuel and the educated Persian. The dialogue cannot reasonably result in the conclusion that "all religions are equally true," for all of the three faiths contain statements of theological fact that are incompatible with the notion that any religion is as good as any other.
Today, the ascendancy of post-modernism and political correctness in much of the Judeo-Christian world (terrified of asserting that absolute theological truths exist, and terrified of reason itself) and of Islamofascism in much of the Muslim world (likewise terrified of reason itself) stifles meaningful interfaith dialogue. The best response to Manuel II Paleologue, the educated Persian, Pope Benedict XVI, and the 38 Muslim scholars, would be to follow their example by engaging in hard-headed and soft-hearted interfaith dialogues. For surely rational discussion about God is itself a type of homage to God.
It certainly can, if the ultimate conclusion is that the truth value of all religious is equally zero. That probably is not the sort of "absolute theological truth" that you would prefer to acknowledge, but everything we've learned since the fourteenth century points to it as the most plausible conclusion.
[DK: It's pretty unrealistic to expect that serious interfaith dialogue among, for example, a Conservative Jew, a Roman Catholic, and a Sunni Muslim, is going to result in all three of them concluding that all their faiths are false, and that atheism is true.]
um, not really. some would argue that quantum physics and other neato keen discoveries about the true mystery of the universe, of life, and of consciousness imo suggest there might be a bit more to life than meets the eye (of the simple materialist).
some guy got it right a long time ago... "there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy"... or something.
[DK: I would also say that since the 14th century, we've acquired vastly more historical knowledge about the early centuries of all three Abrahamic religions, which makes it much easier for people to make informed decisions about many of the claims of those religions.]
That's fine but the fundamental mistake of most theists is to confuse the idea that there might be something out there that they don't understand or is even bigger than them with the claim that there is this specific thing out there. Heck, even believing in god alone (just as a powerful being who created the world) isn't so unreasonable where things run off the rails is that everyone assumes they know a hoard of facts about god's nature (he is good, he doesn't lie, he intervenes with worldly miracles, he is not testing us to be logical rather than faithful etc.. etc..)
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As far as this dialog goes I have trouble believing that any two college educated individuals in modern times would have so much trouble defending their beliefs.
I mean let's take for a start the argument about islamic religion reviving laws from the mosaic code. That doesn't even suggest that on the whole the mosaic code had to be better than the christian code just that some of their laws where a good idea.
Ultimately debates over religious dogma are kinda silly because the only point worth debating is whether people should have any confidence in the fundamental revelation (should we believe mohammed was a prophet or a crazy dude) and once you move beyond that it can be used to justify anything.
And the easy atheist answer, "a pox on all your houses," is no answer at all to the world's problems. The hard atheist answer - to enter the debate and make logical and complex arguments, is as beyond the average atheist as it is beyond the average Christian, Jew, or Muslim.
True,
The arguments about the Jewish Christian and Islamic laws are based upon the the assumptions of the Islamic faith, ie.(Mosaic law good, Christian law better, Islamic law best. This is reasoned by the Islamic understanding of progressively perfected revelation ending with Mohammad. The validity rests not in proving that Christian laws are superior or even saying that the Mosaic law was a failure, but only in saying that the theory of progressively perfect revelation is inconsistent with the law taking a detour through Christian law on the way to Islamic law if the Mosaic law had something correct in the first place.
Actually, Truepath, that's also essentially the same mistake atheists make -- assuming that there is nothing out there.
It is called "faith" for a reason -- it cannot be proved or disproved. It is a choice. The fundamental laws of physics are reduced to mathmatical formulas. Math is not moral, immoral or amoral -- it is simply math.
There is no way to derive any moral or ethical code from math. You must inject assumptions about morality and ethics [And, no, I don't believe in "natural law", because it cannot be derived from the laws of physics without injecting assumptions].
So, the choice boils down to believe or not to believe, or to avoid confronting that fundamental question.
The logical course of action for a non-believer is to get, by whatever means, all he/she can for him/herself, and have no concern for anyone else, past, present or future -- since this is all there is. Of course, the non-believer has to worry that "maybe I'm wrong about that after-life thingy."
For the believer, the choice is to attempt to each day live a life that is closer to the ideals of his/her faith. And, if he/she is wrong about that after-life thingy, he/she will never know.
Agnostics get the worst of both approaches -- "Should I really go for hedonism and selfishness? But, am I a better or happer person for that? And, should I or shouldn't I worry about that after-life thingy? Maybe I should just try not to think about it?"
It's not a bad article, but I have to raise an objection about how well it provides an accurate context for the discussion. "Accordingly, Manuel was obliged in the early 1391 pay tribute at the court of the Ottoman Sultan Bajazet I." The full context is that Manuel was a hostage in the Ottoman court. During his time as a hostage he was forced, among other things, to take up arms against his father's empire. Also, the only reason his time as a hostage was so short is that he fled the Ottoman court upon hearing of his father's death.
This is the common mistake theists make-- assuming that atheists' non-belief in an unprovable proposition is epistemically equivalent to the theist's affirmative belief in some unprovable entity. It's simply a matter of burdens of proof-- I'm entitled to refrain from believing in God until you give me some good reason to accept your assertion that God does exist. For a long time, theism seemed a plausible explanation for many observed phenomena-- the gaps in our knowledge were so large that God could easily fit in them. That is no longer the case, and as the expanding scope of human knowledge has provided naturalistic explanations for such phenomena that don't rely on the intervention of a supernatural agent, the plausibility of any postulated divine agent has accordingly constricted.
The rest of your post is pure nonsense. The idea that holding a particular empirical belief may make you happy, or make you live a better life, is simply not a logical basis for adopting that belief (though it may be a powerful irrational incentive to do so). Even assuming for the moment that atheism/agnosticism leads to selfishness and hedonism and suicide and whatever else the alarmist theist screed du jour is, none of that provides any rational foundation for accepting the premise of God's existence.
You can choose to believe that our laws of physics and language of math help to accurately express the reality that we live in and can measure. Indeed, the atheist can understand that there is a fixed amount of space or materials on this world, and so should live a conscientious life that avoids oppressing other people with their own choices or greed.
Because science can measure pain, I try not to harm living animals. Because math tells me it is more efficient to walk a mile than gas up the car for a short commute, I make an ethical choice. Math does not have morality, but it is a language that can express the cost of a choice. You develop your own moral or ethical code by understanding the cost of a choice. It could be "if I steal, I don't go to Heaven" or "if I steal, that shopkeeper goes out of business" and have the same external effect on the world.
Religion tells you the cost of every choice and leaves little to the imagination. Science and math tell you the cost of the choice as they understand it today, and leaves the door open to future impact analysis.
I enjoy the life I live. Science and math allow me to measure the cost of my decisions, and the potential future impact of those decisions. This allows me to maximize decisions that bring me pleasure and happiness. Maybe the guy next to me enjoys hurting other things, and uses science to further that end. But you cannot say that knowledge without faith does not create any sort of morality or ethics. How does deity worship create that code?
Jesus's lessons work perfectly fine as a moral and ethical code if you take the God and Father out of it. You don't need to believe in a religion to perform acts of kindness on the world.
I don't understand the scare quotes. Do you also talk about "the 'Hashemite' Kingdom of Jordan"? Or "the Union of 'Soviet' Socialist Republics"?
[DK: I think it's ridiculous and improper for a ruling family to name a country after itself. Imagine if the U.K. were "the Windsor United Kingdom." One difference between Saudi Arabia and Jordan is that for the latter, we all call the country "Jordan" whereas for the former, the rulers have conflated their own name with the country's name, in popular Western usage. Hence the need for scare quotes to illustrate the illegitimacy of the name. If lots of Westerners used the official name of Jordan, then it would be equally appropriate to put "Hashemite" in scare quotes. I had never thought about scare quotes for the USSR, but if the evil empire were still around, it might a good idea to put scare quotes on "Soviet" and "Socialist", since the country was not actually run by workers' councils, and since the economic program was closer to kleptocracy than to socialism. A similar point applies to the various tyrannies which falsely incorporate "people's", "democratic" and/or "republic" into their name. Like the "People's Republic" of China.]
Actually, if Hayek is right, no workable morality can derive from reason. For the simple fact that the complexities of organizing a functioning human society are beyond the capacity of any human or group of humans.
In his view, only evolution can create a workable morality - through experimentation and failure. Myths propagate these evolved moralities. Or religion, if you prefer. But attempts to replace them with reasoned moralities are doomed to fail.
Who the hell is Michael?
[DK: I corrected it to "Manuel." Thanks for spotting it.]
Wow, you can't contradict economics any more than that. We are utility maximizers. Choosing something that does not maximize one's utility can only be viewed as wrong. If religion does make you happy, or have you live a better life, it seems that atheism diminishes one's humanity.
If you do not understand this, you are not an atheist.
The point was that even if believing something makes you happy, that fact by itself does not make the belief true. At least not in the sense that the word "true" is normally used.
You are assuming these terms have hard definitions when they do not and their context has some absolute reference. Some dictionary's say agnosticism implicitly includes the assumption that nothing can be known about the existence of a god, when that is a presumption as theistic as any. And there is relative atheism - though I don't yet know if there was a universal creator or not, (we might be making our own universes soon according to some) that still doesn't change its just as likely that I'm god and forgot as it is that Jehovah, Odin, Allah or any of the other magical omnipotent sky fathers created and manage the universe, i.e. the chance of any of them is virtually nil.
The philosopher Bertrand Russell called himself a 'teacup' atheist - there may be a tea cup orbiting between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter but there is so little information to indicated it that its best to act as if there isn't. Is that still an agnostic as far as you're concerned?
Translated to English
Off-topic: I have found their Chinese->English very valuable.
We have a Winner! The most amusing bit is the various collection of humanist/atheist/materialist/agnostic believers claim logic and reason for their authority and then make gross logical errors. (Not saying the others don't, but that isn't the source of their authority.)
Simple thought, if you think Mark Twain had a relevant and timely definition of faith, how does this make anything other than too ignorant to have an opinion?
The two metaphors that chiefly back up this concept are the clockmaker's analogy of the universe and argument that everything came from something. The clockmakers' analogy states that the universe is a mechanical construct that obeys physical and mathematical rules, similar to a pocketwatch. If you saw a fully assembled pocketwatch on the ground would you assume that the pieces happened to fall to the ground in such a way that it worked perfectly; or would you reason someone put it together? Clearly the more reasonable assertation is someone assembled it. It could have randomly fallen into place, but it is not likely. Therefore, is it more likely the universe was assembled by something that created the big bang or that it was a mathematical anomaly? If so, what then created the math? The second argument looks at the fact that everything came from something. You had a mother, she had a mother, etc. Astronomically as well, the earth and sun all had to come from somewhere. Further, if you go all the way up the chain, you reach something, and I like to label this entity God.
I think that you can rationally discuss your beliefs like this all the way down to very particular ones such as beliefs about communion, etc. but wow that would take a long time. The world is a complex place, and so therefore are people's beliefs about it since the reasons can be complex as well. However, these all can be enumerated and compared in a valutative way. Of course, people will always have different opinions on the weight of certain arguments based on their views and world experience, but they always have a reason for them, even if that reason is as simple as someone told them it was true (which is a complex argument in itself as to why they would believe that person). However, bottom line, we should always be asking why, and should never accept partyline answers about these matters, even from other faiths.
I wonder if people making this argument are doing so in good faith at times. It comes up so frequently, and is simply incorrect.
As one example, we have good reason to believe that in many species, altruism arises because it provides evolutionary advantage, even if it fails to protect the practitioner or provide it the opportunity to produce offspring. This is a scientific approach.
Humility, as anyone who has studied a difficult profession should have had ample opportunity to learn, improves one's ability to learn. This is an extremely simplistic humanistic approach.
Cooperation with those around you improves one's options in life, avoids discomfort, and generally leads to better outcomes. This is an extremely simplistic version of a utilitarian/natural law hybrid approach.
Arguing that athiesm requires sociopathy as a natural outcome due to lack of moral grounding is not a serious argument.
This is only true in a narrow sense that I suspect you won't like. Like the difference between believing that there's a God and believing that there's a specific God who is good, tells the truth, produces miracles, etc., there's a difference between believing in an afterlife and believing in a specific one. Sure, for all I know there could be an afterlife. But there could be an afterlife where all good people go to heaven--or one where all good people go to Hell and all evil people go to Heaven--or where only atheists go to heaven--or where left-handers all go to Hell--or where killing the innocent gets you 72 virgins--or where you get to play a chess match against Death and you go to heaven if you win. But I don't go around worrying that I should improve my chess ranking because it might help me get into heaven.
I may need to worry about whether there is an afterlife, but worrying about whether any specific act improves my position there is utterly pointless. After all, I don't know anything about it; *any* activity could help or hurt my position there.
On the other hand, if you really mean "you should worry about the particular things my religion says affects the afterlife," then no. An atheist has no particular reason to worry about your religion's afterlife as opposed to someone else's, or as opposed to some equally plausible possibility that no religion happens to be using right now.
It would be unreasonable to expect even a religion writer at the NYT to recognize the full significance of what the pope is saying here. Duns Scotus was one of the most eminent thinkers of the Middle Ages. He was known as the Doctor Subtilis, or Subtle Doctor, for the acuteness of his reasoning, and his thought has had a significant influence even to the present day (for example, John Henry Newman was a Scotist, a topic that is dealt with in the wonderful book, The Keen Delight). Duns was a Franciscan and is still held in high esteem by that order, one of the most important orders in the Church. Yet Benedict is saying that this great thinker's characteristic position of voluntarism
Regarding this Ibn Hazn, who takes a characteristic line of Islamic thought to an extreme, Benedict quotes "the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that:
In effect, Benedict is suggesting that there is room for dialogue between Christianity and Islam because a very prominent line of Christian thought has gone off the rails in exactly the same way-or at least in a very similar way-as the traditions that have been criticized as most extreme in Islamic thought, and which are probably rejected by the majority of Muslims. Moreover, by acknowledging the role that a prominent theologian played in propagating ideas that have very dangerous tendencies, Benedict is acknowledging that the Church shares some degree of responsibility for the spiritual crisis of the West. He is truly issuing an invitation to a reasoned dialogue both to the world of Islam but also to those in the secular West who are concerned for the future. This subtlety, of course, was entirely lost on the NYT.
For my part, I welcome Benedict's call to recover the intellectualism of Thomas Aquinas. It is precisely Thomas' reasoned intellectualism that offers a common ground for dialogue among Christians, Muslims and Jews--and, yes, with secular people of good will as well.
Debating the line between atheism and agnosticism is about the most boring and fruitless line of discussion that I can conceive-- the modern secularist equivalent of angels dancing on a pin. The distinction between "active disbelief" and "lack of belief" is a purely semantic one when burdens of proof are taken into account. I find that theists have failed to satisfy their burden of proof to bring forth some affirmative evidence in favor of the existence of God, and therefore I rationally disbelieve in the Judeo-Christian God in the same way I disbelieve in Zeus and Martians, and for the same reasons. If you prefer to think that I'm an "agnostic" about Zeus and Martians, feel free-- this is a point on which labels to more to obscure reason than to elucidate it.
No one believes in Martians, and we know with scientific certainty they do not exist. I presume *that* is why you disbelieve thier existence (and that you have no uncertainty on the issue).
That's different than your view that no one has proven God exists, so you'll presume for now he does not.
Just think of things this way, and I think you'll see you misunderstand what agnoticism means: the line between agnosticism and atheism is essentially the same as the line between agnosticism and theism. It's true that it blurs at some point (when someone has a fair amount of active belief/disbelief but is still uncertain), but if the difficulty of drawing the line leads to conclude that no line exists, then don't you have to lump atheism, agnosticism and theism together?
I don't understand the basis of your assertion that my understanding would require eliminating the line between theists and non-theists. Theists tend to believe either 1) that empirical (i.e., scientific) evidence for the existence of God is unnecessary because faith is sufficient to justify that belief, or 2) the available empirical evidence supports the conclusion that God exists. Non-theists reject those propositions. I do, as noted above, resist the suggestion that a meaningful distinction exists in the non-theist camp between popularly-defined atheists and popularly-defined agnostics. Some strains of agnosticism argue that the question of God is not only unsettled on an empirical basis but literally unknowable; I question whether that is really a qualitatively different perspective than the atheist perspective I have described here as well, but it seems at least arguably more so than the semantic distinctions you're trying to impose.
Guest101 wrote:
This is the common mistake theists make-- assuming that atheists' non-belief in an unprovable proposition is epistemically equivalent to the theist's affirmative belief in some unprovable entity. It's simply a matter of burdens of proof-- I'm entitled to refrain from believing in God until you give me some good reason to accept your assertion that God does exist.
and,
Theists tend to believe either 1) that empirical (i.e., scientific) evidence for the existence of God is unnecessary because faith is sufficient to justify that belief, or 2) the available empirical evidence supports the conclusion that God exists.
I disagree with both assertions. “Faith” is belief. Whether you choose to believe there is something or believe there is nothing, there is no proof. I believe you fail to understand the differences between “faith” (belief when there can be no proof), “assumption” (belief until facts can be established so that the assumption is affirmed, modified or refuted), and “proof” (facts established with sufficient support). No one bears any burden of proof to prove to you the existence or not of a deity. It is your personal decision. The decision affects your outlook and actions, and so has consequences.
e wrote:
Be careful equating atheism with hedonism or immorality. Morality can derive from both reason and mythology.
I don’t. However, a short comment does not lend itself to fine distinctions. Hedonism is certainly a foreseeable result, but not the only one. For example, atheism can also lead to the Objectivist point of view. If you don’t wish to read all of “Atlas Shrugged”, just read John Galt’s speech and skip the other several hundred pages, and then compare that to your definition of hedonism. And, I don’t believe that “hedonism” is limited to “Drugs, sex and Rock and Roll” – although that is a popular characterization. Hedonism is essentially pursuit of personal pleasure for its own sake. If growing flowers or helping old ladies safely cross the street provides someone personal pleasure, and that is why that person does such things, then those are examples of hedonism.
I do believe that atheism requires amorality. Whatever such person’s beliefs about “good” or “bad”, those beliefs are personal determinations. This is different from morality or immorality, which is based on the concept that there is “good” and “evil” that do not depend either on personal determinations or social norms.
To derive morality even in part from mythology, you have incorporated the underlying assumptions of faith on which such mythology is based.
And, while I generally agree with Jeff Dege’s response (no workable morality can derive from reason), I do so for somewhat different reasons. Historically, resort to “reason” provides no basis to conclude that morality can be derived from reason. The Age of Reason was a popular understanding of the late 19th/early 20th century European and American intellectual thought. It ran into the hard wall of the realities of WW I. The political and military leaders of both sides were educated as men of reason. While it may be true that the Czar believed he ruled by divine right, the Russian aristocracy was fluent in French (some of them could not even speak Russian) and had been educated in France, or learned from French teachers or tutors imported to Russia. The only time the slaughter was suspended was the Christmas truce of 1914. On the Western Front, various units decided on their own to stop, at least temporarily, killing each other while they observed and shared their mutual faith. The military and political leadership of both sides, all men of reason, ensured that the truce was ended and never re-occurred. See “Silent Night” by Stanley Weintraub.
There are many other examples of the truism that as to reason and science “We do things because we can, and not because they are right or wrong.”
And, I am not contending that faith will necessarily prevent genocide. Utopian societies, which seek to develop some sort of new human consciousness based on some egalitarian ideal, not infrequently engage in genocide. In the 1930s, the leaders of the USSR, a nation whose ideals were based on the Marist belief of developing a “Communist Man”, showed little hesitation in executing thousands, sending thousands of other to gulags, and in causing massive starvation in the Ukraine. More recently, although on a much smaller scale, the Rev. Jim Jones ordered his followers to kill Cong. Ryan and his party, and then kill their children and themselves.
Orielbean wrote:
Jesus's lessons work perfectly fine as a moral and ethical code if you take the God and Father out of it.
I assume that you are referring to Sunday School Jesus – the guy who said to bring the children to him, said to turn the other cheek, turned water into wine, and feed the multitudes with only a few fishes. There is also the Jesus of Luke 12:49 to 53 (among other examples) who said:
“I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled! . . . Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division; . . .”
You can look up and read the rest of it. There’s not much “Peace on earth, goodwill to men” in it, and similar passages. Understandably, Sunday School teachers don’t tell the kids that Jesus intends to incinerate them – that would probably upset them and their parents.
The Gospels, including the Gnostic Gospels, the Qur’an, Jewish Prophets, and most Eastern religions set strict codes of conduct and, while recognizing an “imperfect man”, contend that people should strive towards perfection although there is no hope of reaching that goal.
TZ wrote:
However, bottom line, we should always be asking why, and should never accept partyline answers about these matters, even from other faiths.
I wish I had expressed myself nearly as well.
fishbane wrote:
Arguing that athiesm requires sociopathy as a natural outcome due to lack of moral grounding is not a serious argument.
I do not think that anyone made that assertion. Rather, you appear to conflate very different concepts. There is no doubt that the environment in which one is raised, including the “moral grounding”, influences whether someone becomes a sociopath – using the DSM-IV criteria. Still, there are many examples of people raised in very “moral” homes who become sociopaths, and also many examples of people raised in horrible homes who become very “moral” people. Obviously sociopathy has a strong genetic component. The concepts of faith – belief there is something or nothing, neither conclusion being subject to proof – is wholly different from determining the effects of nature and nurture.
Some comments appear to contest the idea that belief in “morality” – the idea that there is good and evil not dependent on personal beliefs or social norms – is not relevant to whether someone becomes depressed or not. Generalizations about human emotions are chancy at best. Psychology is a “soft science”and there are always examples and counter-examples. Still, I submit that J. Robert Oppenheimer life is an excellent example for consideration. Oppie was one of the most brilliant scientists. He was well grounded in the concept of secular ethics – having attended the Ethical Culture School – which stressed consideration of ethical issues within a secular framework. However, while he considered it to be “moral” to use the A-Bomb against the Nazis, he had serious questions about the morality of using it against the Japanese and was deeply depressed due to the role he played in that. That he was ethnically Jewish, had cousins in Germany, worked with many from Europe who had experienced Nazi persecution, and feared that the Nazis would develop atomic weapons are not moral considerations – although they were valid considerations. However, given the slaughter of some 100,000 civilians by the Japanese defenders of Manila, and what occurred on Tarawa, Iwo Jima and Okinawa – 98% or more of the Japanese military personnel fighting to the death or committing suicide, and 90% or more of the civilians either being killed, or voluntarily or at bayonet point committing suicide – using A-Bombs to finally force Japan to surrender without invasion and deaths of nearly all of the Japanese, is not an immoral conclusion. Similarly, in 1946 he was a leading advocate of all nations partially renouncing sovereignty so that all nuclear resources, research and development, military and civilian, were under UN control, but by 1947 had joined the Atomic Energy Commission and saw his mission as helping the US develop more and bigger nuclear weapons. He suffered much depression as his positions changed. A plausible conclusion is that while there is no doubt that he tried to be an ethical person, his secular ethical philosophy did not provide him an anchor for his belief system, and this caused him much anguish.
Specifically, fishbane, was Oppenheimer an atheist? I cannot say with certainty. Because J. Edgar Hoover took a personal interest in him, he may be the most wire-tapped and observed man in US history. The FBI accumulated thousands of pages in his file. His references to religion and faith are passing, at most. He may well have been an atheist, but certainly was no sociopath.
I thank all of you for most thought provoking observations and arguments. The Socratic method has merits.