I'm talking about Alister McGrath, the author of the unbelievably weak polemic The Twilight of Atheism, who has resurfaced to take on his nemesis, Richard Dawkins. Jason does a good job dismantling McGrath's pathetic review of the Dawkins' The God Delusion, so all I'm going to do is posit that the editorial standards for people of faith are substantially lower than that for experts of most other fields of expertise.
I was asked to review McGrath's Twilight of Atheism a few years back for a magazine in Vancouver. I didn't get paid much for the reviews, but the editor only wanted 150 words, so it seemed a like a good way to increase the number volumes in my personal library. I turned in the most negative review I had ever written, which disappointed my editor as he said he saw no point in bringing bad books to people's attention. The review didn't run and I wasn't paid.
This annoyed me, and it was the last review I wrote for that particular publication. I tossed McGrath's book when we left Vancouver, seeing as each pound in the moving truck was costing me a dollar, and a dollar would be an excessively generous value to assign to that particular book.
The primary problem with McGrath's argument was that the nowhere in the book did the author supply a shred of evidence to support his contention that atheism is on the decline. You'd think that a book heralding the "twilight" of a particular way of thinking would at least offer some supporting evidence, especially seeing as how McGrath actually holds a PhD for research in molecular biophysics. But no.
Instead, all we get is a lot of personal anecdotes about Marxism's failings and his own path to spiritual re-awakening. I suspect he actually did do some research into how atheism is faring -- his PhD comes from Oxford, after all, so you can't write off his training as substandard -- but quickly came to realize that all the evidence shows atheism is continuing to attract adherents. As has been noted on Science Blogs many times, "non-religious" is the fastest-growing slice of the pie in America and elsewhere. The only way to salvage his thesis was to ignore the facts.
There is, however, the possibility that McGrath has forgotten what it means to craft a logical argument. In his review of The God Delusion, for example, he writes that he "gave up one belief, atheism, and embraced another, Christianity," apparently forgetting that atheism is the lack of belief, not a belief in anything.
All this suggests that Dawkins is indeed correct that holding a job as a theology professor, even at Oxford University, is no guarantee that you actually know what you're talking about.
It also make one wonder why the Daily Mail gave such a poor thinker all that space to take on Dawkins? Why indeed?
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You wrote:
There is, however, the possibility that McGrath has forgotten what it means to craft a logical argument. In his review of The God Delusion, for example, he writes that he "gave up one belief, atheism, and embraced another, Christianity," apparently forgetting that atheism is the lack of belief, not a belief in anything.
That is actually quite debatable. In my humble opinion, atheism is not only a belief, but also a belief that that is defined against another one. An atheist, as I understand it, is someone who believes that there is no God.
Agnosticism I could accept as a lack of belief.
Why do you say atheism is a lack of believe? Were you an atheist when you were one month old? Surely not!! Did you lack believe then? Of course, you weren't old enough to believe in any religious view of the world!!
We are all atheists when we are a month old. Those who believe their parents who indoctrinate them with silly supertitions become Believers. Some have enough internal strength and outside support to get rid of it and become atheists again - not believing. Others are lucky - they had good parents and remained atheists all along, not needing to go though the painful process of loosing one's cherished beliefs. So, yes, atheism is a "lack of belief", nit a "belief there is no God" - no atheist believes there is no God, every atheist understands there is no evidence for God (or unicorns, or leprechauns) so there is nothing to believe or not believe in.
This is an old one, but it is probably relevant here:
Atheism is a belief like bald is a hair color.
This is a standard definition for atheism, but atheism also includes those that not only lack belief but also go on to state a positive belief that God does not exist. Both 1) not having a belief in gods and 2) having a belief that no gods exist have traditionally been called atheism. So I don't see anything wrong with what McGrath said with regards to that. He's simply saying that he had a believe that no gods exist and now he believes in Christianity.
You said:
"It also make one wonder why the Daily Mail gave such a poor thinker all that space to take on Dawkins?"
Take into account the fact they gave favourable coverage to the "Bible Code" nutter - they were acting entirely in character.
Richard Dawkins says:
In the Belfast Telegraph:
Nigel:
It's a little odd that you accuse McGrath of making over-blown question-begging claims (yet you never give an example to discuss), when you yourself make at least two over-blown claims.
You say that: "His The Twilight of Atheism, for example, had as its main (only) thesis the ridiculous claim that everyone living in Eastern Europe was an atheist until the Berlin Wall came down, whereupon they all promptly became Christians."
Whatever people think of this book there is no way that your description is remotely accurate. In fact McGrath only refers to the Berlin Wall in the first few pages and then only as one of two markers of an historical period. Did you even read it? I don't think you did - as I don't believe anyone with more than two neutrons firing in their heads could do so and summarise the book in those terms.
You also say that: "This is the level of genius exhibited by theologians like McGrath. Little wonder that Dawkins doubts that theology is even a subject, let alone a subject worth debating." Dawkins has spent large portions of his life considering theology a subject worth debating - because he had done enough of it. Only people ignorant of theology as a discipline would even suggest such rubbish as this. Theology involves literary criticism, ethics, philosophy of religion, history and many other sub-disciplines. Would you cosndier all of this worthless?
Your last glaring over-blown statement is this:
"Just like his hero, CS Lewis, Alister McGrath has no answer to the criticisms made of religion by sober-minded atheists. The best he can come up with is: most people believe there is a God, so there must be."
Pure nonsense on stilts Nigel. Have you ever studied either of these writers? Both writers have much more to say about criticisms of religion than the crude caricature you provide. Perhaps you should educate yourself and read their works.
If you are a representative of "sober-minded atheism" then theists have nothing to worry about.
Regards,
Stephen
With reference to the other debate here I would like to ask the atheists a question:
Take the following proposition:
"There is no God"
Do you believe that to be true?
In fact, if you pay attention to theories of knowledge you will find that one of the conditions of actually knowing something to be true is that the thing in question is actually believed. So, it you are right and atheism does not involve a belief then it would seem impossible for anyone to know atheism to be true.
Stephen
Stephen is right. It's simple logic. Take any given proposition, P. To deny a proposition is to make another proposition: not-P. There's no use saying that atheists do not assert any propositions - they most assuredly do. It might be true that they LACK belief in God - but that does not mean that they lack beliefs about God, and particularly with regards to the proposition "there is a God." They deny this, and thus logically speaking they commit to a proposition that entails the denial of "there is a God." Perhaps an introductory philosophy course folks?
Dan
Exactly Dan - to reject P is to accept "not-P" - it's basic logic. So, although atheists lack a belief in God they do not lack belief in propositions with respect to God. And it is this that gives atheism its positive content. And without positive content the term "atheism" would be meaningless.
Stephen
Oh, good grief. To lack a belief in God is not to reject the proposition 'there is a God.' I ought to be amazed that anyone who didn't grasp that would sound off about 'simple logic,' but fortunately I'm sufficiently cynical to expect such inanity.
And yet you give no argument for your position. Lets talk philosophy - not gibberish, Martin.
Dan
Given that I have no idea what you look like, it'd be pretty stupid of me to believe that you have brown eyes. So, I lack that belief. Does that mean I reject the proposition "Dan has brown eyes?" Of course not.
This is a remarkably simple premise.
Martin...
Your analogy doesn't accomplish much. You lack belief that I have brown eyes, but you do not deny that I have brown eyes either. My point is that to reject P is to accept not-P. But you do not accept or reject anything about my eye colour. My point is that atheists DO accept and reject propositions with respect to the existence of God. They DO reject the proposition "there is a God." and thus they ARE logically committed to some other proposition that entails the denial of "there is a God."
To reject P is to accept not-P - whether you like it or not it IS basic logic.
Dan
I think this discussion would be much better if we all chill a bit and respectfully debate the point rather than accusing each other of being inane or speaking jibberish. I've been guilty of undue aggression too, and it's not the best way to proceed.
I think the confusion stems from how the word "atheism" is being used. It has become fashionable to collapse atheism into agnosticism, perhaps due to an increasing lack of confidence amongst atheists. But the distinction between the two should not be blurred by labelling all forms of agnosticism as "atheist" simply because there is a lack of belief in God.
Let me put the issue like this. Take the following three propositions:
(1) There is no God(s)
(2) There is a God(s)
(3) There may or may not be a God(s)
Now, my question to Martin is this: which of these propositions do you believe to be the truth? You can't say "none," because they are exhaustive of the possibilities. If you deny 1&2 you are committed to 3. If you deny 1&3 you are committed to 2. If you deny 2&3 you are committed to 1. These are all positive assertions. None of them has anything to do with a "lack of belief." You must believe one of them.
If you look at the theory of knowledge you will find that there are certain conditions that must be met before you can be said to "know" that something is the case. Despite massive epistemological differences between philosophers there is virtually universal agreement that whatever the proper conditions of knowledge are there are two fundamentals. Take any given proposition - P, and any given person - S. If S is to be said to "know" that P then:
1. he must at least belief that P
and
2. P must be true.
If you define atheism simply as a lack of any propositions or belief in any propositions then it would be impossible to know that it is true. In fact, if it has no propositional content then the very term "atheism" would become quite meaningless.
The only people I can think of that would hold neither 1, 2 or 3 are people incapable of conceptual thought - babies and the mentally retarded. Every reflective person will hold something like one of these propositions as being true.
I really don't see the big deal for atheists in agreeing to this. Although I am a theist I recognise that many atheists are rational in their believings with respect to God.
S.
Stephen:
Given the fact that Martin misunderstood the basic point that I made, do you really think he'll be capable of comprehending that post?
Sorry for being "unduly aggressive", or "disrespectful", but *points to martin* - he started it. I fight fire with fire, that's why I'm not in the fire service.
Dan
Which is precisely the point of contention in the first place; it was argued all of half a dozen comments before yours that this is not the exclusive definition of atheism. You jumped into a discussion on the meaning of atheism with a completely irrelevant digression on a basic point of logic most children can easily grasp, and ended it with a jab at others' grasp of philosophy. That you then accuse me of misunderstanding, and of 'starting it' is...amusing, to say the least.
Well, no. Compared to atheism, 'agnosticism' is practically a neologism; the notion of weak atheism was around well before Huxley's birth.
On the contrary, I'd say that collapsing agnosticism into weak atheism leaves us at a loss for a term describing those who believe that the question of God's existence is unanswerable.
I disagree with your characterization of the problem. (1) and (2) alone are exhaustive; (3) is an answer to a different question. One can't deny both (1) and (2); that's incoherent.
We can fix that, though. Rather than ask for a simple proposition, we can ask for the probability that, say, proposition (2) is true; call it P(G) for short. Then clearly anyone who sets P(G) = 1 is a theist, and anyone for whom P(G) = 0 is a (strong) atheist. We could turn over all other values to the agnostics/weak atheists/whatever. But then almost everyone will fall into that category, which isn't very helpful.
So perhaps we should define a region around 1 for the theists, a region around 0 for the (strong) atheists, and leave the rest for the others to play in. Then we have a set-up equivalent to yours - but now I'll have to disagree that those who find themselves in the middle interval are making a positive assertion in any meaningful way. I'd say they're sitting on the very definition of a lack of belief.
Which means that ultimately, whether or not one considers atheism a positive belief will depend on whether one identifies that middle interval with agnosticism or weak atheism. And we're back to where we started, rendering the tour through logic 101 a complete and utter waste of time. Nobody was unclear on this point, as far as I can tell.
On the contrary, it's impossible to define a set without defining its complement. So as long as 'theism' is meaningful, defining 'atheism' entirely in negative terms is perfectly meaningful also.
Martin:
Thanks for your response. I'm currently tied up trying to finish a dissertation on the ontological argument, but I intend to respond to you tomorrow.
Cheers,
Stephen
Martin:
Thanks for taking the trouble to respond.
You don't seem to have the same respect for the concept of agnosticism as I do. Traditionally agnostics are undecided about whether or not God exists, with some going so far as to say that the question cannot actually be answered. I think this concept is quite different from the traditional understanding of atheism as adherence to the proposition "there is no God(s)." There's quite a difference between these two positions. However, what's important to recognise is that both have positive propositional content.
You dispute my reckoning that reflective people will hold some variation of one of these three propositions:
(1) There is no God(s)
(2) There is a God(s)
(3) There may or may not be a God(s)
1 and 2 are not, strictly speaking, exhaustive. Of course, if a person claims that 1 is false then they are committed to (2) (as you seem to realize.) However, some people who adhere to (3) do not accept either 1 or 2 as the final answer to the question (although they do not reject 1 or 2 either). Now, you introduce the notion of probability, but I'm not sure it helps your position. It certainly doesn't refute my analysis that ultimately everyone holds some variation of 1, 2, or 3 above (all of which have positive propositional content.)
You seem to want to characterize atheism as a total lack of belief or propositions. And yet I constantly find atheists holding beliefs regarding propositions relevant to the existence of God.
Where do you stand with regards to the following propositions?
1.God exists
2.God does not exist
3.God may or may not exist
4.God created the world
5.God is a mental construct
6.The atheist view of the world is correct
Which of these propositions do you reject? Which do you accept? Which have you no opinion on?
Are you telling me you lack any commitment to any propositions concerning the existence of God? I find that terribly difficult to believe.
I do agree with you on one point - this tour through logic 101 hasn't accomplished much. However, to me it is worthwhile - if only because it highlights that some statements that seem non-contentious actually are not so - like the statement that atheism is simply a lack of belief with no propositional content. I'm not sure why you think this has no bearing on the truth of atheism. It certainly does. Only propositions can have a truth value. If there is no propositional content to atheism it doesn't seem possible to ascribe any truth value to it. It is neither true nor false - and that would be a fairly incoherent thing to say, and more so to adhere to.
Now, these sorts of concepts are, to my mind, worth examining.
Perhaps the debate can't go much further from here, but it probably doesn't need to. After all, there are much bigger fish to fry in terms of the debate between atheists and theists.
Nice chatting to you.
Stephen
Perhaps Martin can't response owing to a complete lack of propositions.
Dan