This post is by no means edited and is just cut and paste without formatting. I am lazy and didn't want to write it up in detail. If you have questions about specific points, please do not hesitate to comment and I'll explain gladly.
Most of this is very abbreviated paraphrase of the book. /I put my comments in between slash marks/. Bold for chapters, no tab for sections, 1 tab hanging for items under section.
chapter 4 is the main meat of his arguments, but ch2 agnosticism and noma, plus ch3 arguments for God are nice too.
Comments on
“The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins
From book
found at http://macroevolution.narod.ru/delusion/index.html and on my computer
I have not
seen the 1.5hr video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FiHRVb_uE0
Preface:
Sees religious
people are largely so due to indoctrination and not knowing they could disagree
or call themselves atheists
Chapter 1 A Deeply Religious Non-Believer
Deserved
Respect:
“…the most exalted
object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher
animals”.
Most faiths do not
exalt the grandeur of the universe
Most/all things
considered valuable to humanity simply emerges from natural matter
Einstein quoted to
not believe in personal God /I wonder if deist?/ no – ‘nonbeliever’ but he
still uses God quite liberally “God does not play dice” etc.
Some extremely
shaming quotes from religious people, including saying religion is not based on
knowledge and that doubts are suppressed for the good of the other people in
the faith
Undeserved
Respect:
Religion to be
treated as other argumentative subjects (like politics) /good/
People shy from
disagreeing with religious view. E.g. ease of pacifism draft exemption
Point of evidence:
religions help create cultures, help ethnic cleansing but not total separator
//move down to
common law and such privileges to religious people are less or clearer//
///freedom of speech
levels, noise ordinances, hate speech, whatnot///
Chapter 2 The God Hypothesis
Polytheism
The misogynistic
rant
One of books main
points to argue:
any creative intelligence,
of sufficient complexity to design anything, comes into existence only as the
end product of an extended process of gradual evolution.
Religion evolved from animism and
is “founded on private revelation rather than evidence” /we argue Adam and eve,
which should have some form of evidence (e.g. flood)/
Theory of the trinity is not
distinct enough to argue against /dimensional theory/
Catholics have large, unbased
systems of saints and angels (polytheism) /true, not my belief/
God is very male /eh…maybe…yes.
Shadow of wings, love strong, but mostly male seeming. Point accepted as part
of my belief/
Monotheism
God is very patriarchal and
subduing of women (where in bible? Maybe Hagar, sarah calling Lord, but think
the 3 sisters who slept with father, God said do not accumulate wives)
Paul founded Christianity /…ok…what
about the 12? Ethiopia, India. Catholic church looks to Peter (it has a bunch
of other stuff wrong, but eh)/
Christianity spread by the sword
Constantine /did he use sword? Typical roman cares not what you believe/,
crusades, conquistadores. /Sure, and Hitler killed Jews in the name of the
Aryan race. There is a little value from looking at this stuff yes, but perhaps
look at the first 100 years more closely./
Deists used to be rejected by
theists. /Ok./
America NOT founded on
Christianity…
“the fact that the United States
was not founded as a Christian nation was early stated in the
terms of a treaty with Tripoli, drafted in 1796 under George Washington and
signed by John Adams in 1797:
As the Government of the United
States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as
it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility,
of Musselmen; and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of
hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no
pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of
the harmony existing between the two countries.”
America more religious than England
due to Pvs.C wars, id hold by immigrants, free marketing in US,
Religious fanaticism rampant in
America /please describe/
Jefferson was deist, possibly
atheist /by Wikipedia, he believes that God is made out of matter/
Atheists are discriminated against,
harassed, whatever. Admission by a candidate would be political suicide.
Christian beliefs unbased
The Poverty of Agnosticism
Agnostic is ok for things without
evidence (like alien life and the end-Permian /flood/ extinction)
TAP – temporary agnosticism in
practice, the evidence isn’t in yet
PAP – permanent agnosticism
principle, question not answerable, all evidence not applicable
Even if conclusion unknowable,
probabilities may help
7 belief types: 100, close to 100,
>50, 50 <50 0="" a="" belief="" close="" o:p="" of="" off="" probability="" scale="">
Russell’s teapot > if
impossible to discover ever we should be PAP about the teapot, if possible TAP.
However probabilities still apply, burden of proof to believers
//hm, in what sense can
probabilities be calculated? A little with design clocks…//
Says God isn’t disprovable /say we
scientifically ‘prove’ JC did not rise? It’s not a viable explanation of the
evidence/
NOMA
Science and religion are not
Non-Overlapping MAgisteria, science can comment on God
Appears to base his argument on
the fact that he’s read so many books /I agree with your point but your method
is invalid/
Concedes science may have problems
saying stuff about morals /but if science >> God, then it can because God
>> morals/
Says theology has nothing else but
morals to contribute to human wisdom
Cannot base religion on morals b/c
what religion? How choose? /assumes religion not objective findable truth/
Science can comment on God, denial
of such is PAP.
Universe w/God is very different
from without /maybe…the universe is so saturated with God science must make
accommodation with such regularity I’d guess neither side would notice/
miracles > science applicable
Entities /I assume organism of
some sort/ exist for which no other explanation save evolution currently exists
/please name (he will in chapter 4 I think)/
The great prayer experiment
/now
we get to some real stuff/
Satirically Francis Galton sees
British royal family no more statistically healthy than average, though many
churches pray for it. Also personally prays for random plots of land which
exhibit no extra growth
Templeton Foundation, Russell
Stannard, Dr. Herbert Benson, 3 churches pray for 3 groups (1 prayer, 1 not, 1
pray and patient knows (placebo)). Patients are 1082 coronary bypass at 6 hospitals. Told to pray
for same things. No response but placebo worked reverse.
Quotes dude explaining suffering
in Gods world /relevant right now??/.
Quotes bad defenses of no results.
The Neville Chamberlain School of
Evolutionists
Theists who agree with evolution,
I think. He’s just quoting a ton of people, describing political positions and
people quoting people quoting people. Dang. Get to the point.
Can’t teach theistic biology
(evolution) or physiology (virgin birth) in class b/c separation of church and
state. /virgin birth is in violation of physiology, so that’s ok. Let the
theists explain that miracles can happen. In the event of biology/universe, if
there are Christians who are also evolutionists, then teaching evolution is
also a violation of church and state. Get over it/
Little Green Men
Russells teapot change to alien
life. Now consider how probability applies. We now have a little more data on
how many planets there are. /still don’t know spatial, time, or material limits
to universe, has the calculation been affected at all? I mean, I kind of agree
with you. This was the first chapter that I really enjoyed, but…/
Radio communication with aliens…
whatever.
Chapter
3 Arguments for God’s Existence
Yes finally
Thomas Aquinas:
Unmoved
Mover, First Cause, Costnological (there must have been a time without matter).
These do not necessarily prove the Christian God /yes, and you can deify the
universe…maybe./ Omnipotence and omniscience are mutually incompatible because
then he can’t change his mind. /That’s just a recursive like make a rock too
big to move, you don’t change your mind if you’re outside of time/ God is not
an adequate terminator to this regress like the atom is to splitting gold /um…I
don’t see why not. Split gold smaller and still be gold. Go back in causal
string and still obey laws. Reach atom and stop b/c gold defined at atom level.
Reach infinite or limit God causality and stop b/c laws defined at God level.
Sounds legit J/
Degree
need infinite or perfection to measure. He just dismisses. You could use
smelliness or some other measure. There has to be an ultimate stinker? /I
agree. Positive or negative? Things are measured relative and with numbers.
1.2inches. Relative to inch measure and number. There is something to be said
for abstract satisfactory measures though from the futility of purpose and
similar.
Design.
Naturally Darwin gave us all something to think about.
Ontological and other A Priori
Perfection
ontological: traditional takedown /yes I agree it’s an embarrassment how this
erroneous argument has been trumpeted (if it has) and how poorly better similar
ones have been communicated. That something of greatest perfection need not
have being (that is, the greatest perfection must exist in reality if it has
being, but that doesn’t mean it has being.) Please see my version from
Descartes wax./ Russell explains in a way that sets up for the wax.
Just
because I found it funny, doesn’t inf*0 = n prove an infinite God out of
nothing made a measurable universe?
Argument from Beauty /I’ve never
given this much credit or thought, but let’s see what goes/
Doesn’t
Shakespeare >> God? No, it just proves Shakespeare exists. Neither is God
to credit for Michelangelo, because it was just a product of the time. Why not
make a mural to science? Whatever. /Sure, yep. Still, would we have an
appreciation or hunger for or ability to create beauty w/o God? Idk/
Argument from personal experience
Man
hears ‘satan’ in Sottish isles, later probably is Devil Bird.
Easy
to have imagined experiences /hm, yes/ /other indicators of madness not present
in Christians/
Hollow
mask rotating. Auditory illusions too. He hears ‘male voice praying’ wind
through keyhole. /perhaps the option here is to use changed behavior/
70ppl
see sun plunge to earth at once. Discredited b/c sun didn’t actually fall,
we’re still alive /god could have made visual miracle. But idk the circumstances/
Argument from Scripture
Fourth
option to liar lunatic lord is that JC is honestly mistaken. /lunatics are
honestly mistaken that they are Charlie chaplain. One does not simply guess
wrong whether or not you are god/
Questions
vs. scripture: who wrote it and when? /mostly close observers within 50 years
of occurrence, with the exception of the pentuatech/ how did they know what to
write? /what they saw, heard, and divine inspiration/ have we interpreted their
intent correctly? /we have whole degrees to study that, probably yes/ were they
biased /pretty much yes. But e.g. tax collector and extrabiblical records, also
biblical facts that are hurtful to apostles and such/
Place
of JC birth: [Dawkins sees a contradiction between the accounts] /matthew does
not mention that mary and J were in Nazareth before (mentions no town), birth
in beth and flight to Egypt go to Nazareth. Luke has origin in Naz, census to
beth, stuff, boom JC is a young boy/. Why required to go to Naz if David lived
1000yrs before? /idk, good point. Not like census happen frequently though/
Says local quirinius census AD6, after death of Herod and too late. /hm, I
should look into that/. DOCS: Dec 2004 mag Free
Inquiry editor Tom Flynn.
Most legends of
the time had virgins births, kings adoration in crib, death and resurrection.
/interesting. Please list/. Many details only recorded in one and not the
other. Josephus does not have record of Herods massacre. Place of birth /dealt
with, no contradiction/ Geneologies are different /yes, wow. One follows
Joseph, the other mary, and both may omit generations. Esp matt who wants to
form 14s./
Gospel writers never met JC.
/um… where’d you get that?/.
Admired
Christian Scientists /irrelevant flat out I don’t care/
Admits to Farday, Maxwell,
Kelvin, Mendel (genes). Some modern people I don’t recognize, lawyers,
biologists, etc.
Side note: life without purpose
is ok, I’m anticipating having a good lunch.
Only a couple nobel prize
winners out of several hundred are Christian /hm, what a shame/. 12 vs. 213 in
the Fellows of the Royal Society (british equivalent of US natl. academy of
science).
Overall in US, religiosity is
negatively correlated with education, interest in science, and political
liberalism. /may make sense if ppl who don’t think they have it together accept
god easier/. Also with parents religion
Pascals
wager /yes yes, sore subject, let’s see if you admit the one point/
Believing cannot be motivated by
probability fire insurance /yup, probably the best point/
Why does God reward believing
instead of works /because works don’t cut it you fool, read the bible/
Due to sheer number of Gods,
probability lies with no god (probably)
Pascal was probably joking
/well…making a point that you should investigate it maybe/
Bayesian
arguments /never heard of these/
Bayes theorem is a mathematical
probability engine for determining truth with percent certainty like a
detective case
Bayes considers 6 elements and
assigns probability. 1 innate sense of good 2 ppl do evil 3 nature broken 4
minor miracles 5 major miracles 6 religious experiences /why not include
science stuff? Makes me sad/. Ends up with 67% probability then somehow hikes
it to 95% with faith but seems to give no reasoning. Dawkins says yeah, that’s
why it’s called faith /makes me sad. Bayes should include science and not blind
faith/
Dawkins does not include
goodness as a part of the god hypothesis /ok…sure. So…does evil still convince
you if there is a god he isn’t good? Misogynistic…/
Chapter 4 Why There Almost Certainly is not
God
Thinks
that a designer God requires being designed himself. /hm…any different from the
universe needing to be designed? Occam for and against. Universe without God
requires explanations that approach god/ This is his main rebuttal I think
Boeing
747.
Really, natural selection does
not depend on one change but many many chances to make very small changes.
/good call. However we consider thresholds like the beginning of life to
require 747s to cross, with no intermediates/.
God is the ultimate 747.
Natural
selection as a consciousness-raiser
Opposite north-south maps, feminism
language pronouns, Douglass Adams’s conversion, Archaeopteryx is not a hoax,
astronomy scales, if God used natural selection he’s not necessary and can be
omitted
Irreducible
complexity /alright, some examples?/
Goes over too many examples of
complex plants which creationists claim as evidence for design. Repeats that
God requires a designer so ‘science says’ natural selection. /moot point, he’s
not addressing irreducible complexity yet, just design. Whatever. He’ll
probably get to it./
Walk up gradual slope to summit
instead of jump precipice.
Quote of Darwin doubting due to
eye was rhetorical device for him, he explains after. There do exist
intermediates in natural (some good example of photosensitive cells and pinhole
eyes) /idk how to resond/
The
worship of gaps
Gaps in current knowledge (not
just specifically geological column). Religion makes us satisfied with not
understanding /aww, shame on thee. Religion maybe, but hopefully not JC follow/
Fossil record. Certainly not
just to demand explanation of every transition /hm..yes, at least not now/
Falsification possible by fossils in the wrong layer. Says creationists have
posed a few false ones.
Argument from personal
incredulity /well, neither can you just pose anything and ask us to wait for an
explanation…sometime later. Be reasonable/
From Dawkins and video,
irreducible complexity explained by small steps, parts that served to bridge
gap now disappeared, lesser uses,
Quotes Augustine as discouraging
curiosity. See http://sntjohnny.com/front/outright-lies-illiteracy-or-just-bad-scholarship/33.html
for the proper quote. Augustine is discouraging sorcery.
/which is better, laws that
never lead to anything besides more questions, or a God who definitively is not
caused (but yet asks us to investigate him and his nature)/
The
anthropic principle: planetary version /I like this one/
Goldilocks zone orbits from suns
where planets could have liquid water >> our kind of life. Anthropic
principle says duh we live on a good planet, we wouldn’t have got here
otherwise.
Same principle applies to origin
of life. /so…posit enough chances in the universe and time to come up with one life spark happening, then we’re it.
That’s what you need/
Probably in a semi-sarcastic
tone says God struck the soup with lightning to make life happen. /no, in case
there was confusion. He made life fully complex already (if we hold to 7 days
literal, which is ok with me)/
A billion*billion planets in
universe, large estimate 3k*b^2. He posits if life was 1/b /but it’s not that probable, please show me/
“We can safely predict that, if
we wait another ten million years, a whole new set of species will be as well
adapted to…” /ok, has anyone got close to seeing 10m yrs back? Ok yes, geo
column fossils. This fruit fly thing. Have you yet got any variations? Anyway,
just me being skeptical/
Says there are other thresholds
to cross: eukaryotic cell (our kind), consciousness, other parts of cells like
mitochondria. So he posits a few out of the billion (from the b^2) succeed with
these to have us w/anthropic principle. /don’t stretch it man, don’t hurt
yourself/
The
anthropic principle: cosmological version /even better/
Martin Rees Just Six Numbers constants which if slightly off would make life
impossible.
[Just Six Numbers] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFaPo2Z0KNc
[1) N = b^4 is elect F/gravity between them, affects 2) e=0.007 binds atomic
nucleus, affects formation of elements, 3) omega affects amount of matter,
gravity vs. expansion, affects collapse vs. no formation, 4) lambda antigravity
creates expansion 5) q ratio of two energies, small > inert, large >
violence w/black holes, 6) d=3 number of spatial dimensions, near black holes
time stands still] [btw at begin universe superstrings in 10 spatial
dimensions] [any untuning stifles life. He says infinite other universes,
anthropic principle] [2 basic forces, 2 size and texture and time, 2 space]
[10x frames:
human size, surrounding grass, public park, buildings, city, earths horizon, ,
whole earth, , , inner solar, entire solar, , , , star among neighbors, , , ,
start see milky way, , , whole milwy way spiral galazy, ?, more galaxies in
virgo cluster, virgo among others, full picture, 25 more frames to full
visibility (deep empty space). Now go in, arm, patch of skin, texture, cell,
molecules dna, atoms, find by colliders, 17 more to strings or quantum foam.
Total 60 frames top to bottom? Same qty humans in sun as atoms in a human. E78
atoms within telescopes.] [hm, fun that physics works everywhere in universe]
[finding planets by Doppler shift wobbles in their stars] [try to find life to
see if somewhat probable to start such that other lifes around, still
intelligence may be near impossible]
Always sets up theist
explanation vs. anthropic principle. /Now I’m not saying you’re wrong, but
you’re just asking for a false dilemma when you so strongly state two soft
options not defined as y or n Boolean/ Always goes back to God needing an
explanation. /Zikes, I got it already. Can you find one or two more debunkers
and interchange them for variety?/
Possibly no knobs to twiddle. We
know so little about the 6 numbers, they could be dependent on other stuff.
But again, you can still wonder
why all 10 firing squad ppl missed you. /funny you use analogies like this when
it pleases you. I’m all for the anthropic principle, but you just go and dodge
it when you want to bring up an interesting point that supports you. Come on,
man/
Possibly there’s quite a few
universes, and we’re just the lucky one. Or there’s been a series of
explosions, and this is a special one in the series. But the tendency is that
we’ll expand forever. Also possible that universes reproduce in black holes,
natural selection on the universe scale, and universes with black holes promote
life as well.
“Nobody understands what goes on
in singularities such as the big bang,” /well yes, you’re in the process of
discovering it. But please, if this is true, don’t get on your high horse about
how certain you are about the big bang/
Occams razor stuff /Why does he
mostly quote theologians in response to beginning of time stuff? They study
nonphysical stuff about God (I’d guess). Whatever/ Hm.. theologian guy says
it’s odd that all electrons are the same. They should be chaotic /what an odd
idea, maybe/ So god sustains their properties /yes, in the absolutist sense/
God is a single substance. /sort of…eh…lack of definition/ Dawkins says phooey.
Simplicity, some definitions
include indivisibility and heterogeity of parts /?applicable to indivisible
objects >> w/o parts?/
An
interlude at cambridge
Fun event regarding occam at
Cambridge. He riles it for having too many Christians and audience paid /lay
off, that’s just who they wanted?/ Quotes other agnostic at conference about
some of this. More screwy quote on quote on quote. 6 layers.
He raises occam objections at
said conference. He says best reply was NOMA, theo says God is simple. /yes,
that’s a bad reply, but that’s probably your filter. You don’t understand the
nature of God because he’s more complex than science. 3d on 2d/
2nd main method of
knowing theists pose is personal experience. Dawkins says this is within
science /yup…eh depending on your def of science/
Says first cause should be
simple, not God. /if there is a required object for first cause, it might as
well be God, for it’s just as unlikely to be a simple/
Says theologians in 19th
century began doubting historicity of bible. /please show me/
Says 747 is pretty much
irrefutable argument /appears to be a main foothold, I counter with god not
created, out of physics, etc/
Chapter
summary
1)
A great challenge has been to explain complexity
in nature
2)
It’s tempting to say it is design, to infer
design because we see so much human design
3)
A designer is more improbable and is not a
solution
4)
Darwinian natural selection provides the
explanation
5)
The equivalent in physics has yet to be found,
possibly helped by multiverses and the anthropic principle
6)
These ill-formed physics explanations are still
better than a designer
