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Dear Peter,
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I find your article, this month, to be an honest, unbiased presentation of atheism.

However, I am not happy with Merold Westphal's distinction between scepticism and suspicion:

« Scepticism is directed toward the elusiveness of things, while suspicion is directed toward the evasiveness of consciousness. Scepticism seeks to overcome the opacity of facts, while suspicion seeks to uncover the duplicity of persons. Scepticism addresses itself directly to the propositions believed and asks whether there is sufficient evidence to make belief rational. Suspicion addresses itself to the persons who believe and only indirectly to the propositions believed. »

Scepticism rejects claims to certainty. Suspicion is a feeling of distrust.

Also, I have a problem with the terms “opacity of facts” and “duplicity of persons”. “Opacity” may not be due to the “facts”. It may be due to the observer or, perhaps, to both the facts and the observer.

Duplicity implies deceit. In my mind, someone who believes in God (“the proposition believed”) is making an honest mistake, for reasons I ignore (other than the fact that there is no such entity), but I consider that cases of duplicity must be extremely rare. If they exist, it seems to me that they can only be due to very grave, exceptional circumstances.

Regarding your observation that “there have been two movements in modern atheism”, I consider it is an error to qualify the second movement as “atheism”. You indicate: “The second wave of atheism presumed the nonexistence of God.”

Those who make up the groundswell of the second wave are not interested in religion. It does not come under their radar. They do not define themselves, a contrario, by reference to those who believe in God. Atheist is not part of their vocabulary.

The only people who ostensibly claim their atheism are militant opponents of religion. They are few in number and vehemently hostile. The large majority of those who make up the groundswell of what you call the second wave are indifferent to religion.

They are not “atheists”. They are just ordinary people, like you and me.

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Hi Dan,
Yes, that is what I wrote and that is what I meant. Have a look at those other threads, I'm not really interested in going through the rather lengthy discussion about that all over again.

I'd be happy to discuss how our views may be compatible or otherwise once you have that background. If you are simply going to reiterate statements of faith though, there's probably little to be gained from that for either of us.

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Dear George,

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You wrote to Craig :

« I agree that one difference between mathematics and religion is that religion TRIES to understand reality within and without us, … »

It seems to me that religion, defined as “a set of beliefs”, does not “try to understand” but rather “projects a belief” (i.e., to cite Peter – or was it Feuerbach – “the consciousness that results is false consciousness. We remain enclosed within our own projections of what we wish the world to be”). But perhaps you have a different definition of “religion”. If so, would you be so kind as to indicate it ?

My Concise Oxford Dictionary indicates: “particular system of faith and worship”.

The Catholic Encyclopaedia indicates: “The derivation of the word "religion" has been a matter of dispute from ancient times. Not even today is it a closed question.” It then goes on to indicate the various definitions suggested by various “Catholic authorities” (Cicero, Max Muller, Lactantius and St. Augustine) before concluding: “The correct one seems to be that offered by Lactantius. Religion in its simplest form implies the notion of being bound to God”, and adding: “Religion, broadly speaking, means the voluntary subjection of oneself to God.”

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Hi Craig,

>>the poorly framed 5th axiom that proved the undoing of that way of thinking and lead to a proper geometry of the sphere.<<

Sorry for the misunderstanding. I was objecting to “a proper geometry of the sphere” which was known and studied e.g. by Gauss before the idea of dropping the 5th axiom allegedly came to Gauss (who never published it, see e.g. your link) and to Bolyai and Lobachevski (who published it).

Another thing is the sphere where great circles are called lines (and opposites identified) which in this set-up is the standard model of elliptic (non-euclidean) geometry, not a sphere as usually understood.

Thanks for the explanation by Feynman which does not contradict what I said about hindsight and the futility of trying to plausibly answer historical “if” questions. (I heard of a philosopher who claimed Aquinas would have better understood Einstein than Newton. Hence we would have been better off if Einstein followed medieval thinkers and Newton never came?)

>> Feynman's objection is … to the assumption that they defined the only possible path to a proper understanding.<<

Proper understanding of what? “Truth” that people spoke of intuitively before we came to distinguish e.g. between structural realism (Worrall) and constructive empiricism (Van Fraassen) in contemporary philosophy of science?

>> I think that … it will become obvious that what has been called "divine" is an emergent property of the interactions between the things that make up the self-organising "system of the world". This is what Maturana called "autopoiesis”.<<

Keppler correctly described the movement of planets but he could offer only a “divine” explanation (angels holding the planets). Newton gave a better explanation, removed the angels-explanation but did not claim that he could explain away the “divine” dimension of reality. Some people thought so, some people think Darwin explained it away and some may think that Maturana’s autopoeisis (a sort of biological mechanism projected into system theory) could do it. This is all about God being reduced to a “god of the gaps (in what science can explain)” and hence doing away with Him.

Dear Yuyutsu,

>>Which was wrong - the clergy were supposed to teach their flock the way to God, not about the ways of the world.<<

Who in their time decided what they were supposed to teach? If you mean God, and believe that His will is reflected in the Bible, then it is true that the Bible was about “the way to God”, but doing that it had to substitute also for explaining “the ways of the world” until He found us mature enough for proper science that could do it much better. Similarly the Church had to provide for many things that related not only to “Love the Lord your God” but also to “Love your neighbour as yourself” until a secular society developed that can do the latter much more professionally (well, at least in theory).

“The Bible shows the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go" became comprehensible only in Galileo’s time, although even today there are some who do not understand what it means.

Dear Banjo,

I agree that if religion is defined as “a set of beliefs”, then it does not “try to understand” anything. What you call “projections” is, I think, covered by my reference to “reality WITHIN AND without us".

I also agree that there are many “definitions” of religion as there are of other abstract concepts. My favourite is Geertz’s anthropological definition (c.f. http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=7816&page=0#124645 )

Dear Dan,

What other God could there be?

Surely God, "Christian" or otherwise, is not an idol which leaves space for any rivals...

The problem is that God cannot be described: neither words nor concepts nor any other finite expression can begin to convey even an infinitesimal idea of God.

But for religion to spread we need to use words, inadequate as they may be - such words that will propel the people to which they are addressed towards God and His ways. Christianity is one such attempt and has at times been quite successful.

The word "created" is no exception, for surely we cannot describe God's intents and actions in the way we describe limited human intents and actions. Yet if creation-stories is what does it, is what encourages people to lead a more virtuous life devoted to God, as they seem to work in ancient times, then so be it and they must be commended. However, if they can no longer provide this function (because modern people have been already stung by the poison of science), then other means should be sought - for example, Peter Sellick promotes the use of music and art to achieve the same.

As per Isaiah 55:1: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.", I have faith that the roads to God are never closed and when one door is closed, another opens.

Thank you George,

God's will is reflected in everything, not just the bible and ultimately there is nothing but God and no action or road which does not eventually lead us to God - whether via the straight and narrow or via the winding, long and painful... and anything in between.

I believe that some parts of the bible are purer than others, directing people towards the straight and narrow. The best parts, such as “Love your neighbour as yourself” can lead us not only to the booby-prize of heaven, but beyond towards God Himself.