While I have been arguing that atheist arguments prompted by the Haiti earthquake are toothless, my friend and fellow blogger John Richardson, the Ugley Vicar, has been questioning whether they are really rational. John looks from the perspective of an atheist (although he is in fact a Christian minister) mainly at what Richard Dawkins has written about Haiti. He finds in Dawkins’ article anthropomorphic language and an anthropocentric perspective. He finishes by condemning Dawkins for irrationally calling for aid to be sent to Haiti, when the rational response from an evolutionary perspective is to let even more Haitians die, to reduce the world’s overpopulation which threatens the survival of our species. Read it all here.
Of course John’s tongue is firmly in his cheek here. And he is perhaps attacking a straw man version of atheism in response to the way atheists often attack straw man versions of Christianity. But he shows how the thinking of people like Dawkins is in fact firmly based in the Judeo-Christian morality whose roots they want to pull out. Do Dawkins et al really want human society to go where their rationalism seems to lead it? They may be playing with fire. Is it really rational for our society to pay a pension to Dawkins, who is no longer productive or (I presume) reproductive? Wouldn’t it be better in evolutionary terms to have him put to sleep?
It is interesting to see how atheists like Dawkins and John Loftus seems to have as a basic presupposition that human death is the ultimate evil. They use it as an argument that God cannot exist because otherwise he would not have allowed multiple human deaths. But what is their ethical basis for that judgment? It is not originally a Christian one, as Christians have always held, at least in theory, that it is better for them to die and be with God than to suffer in life. It is not an evolutionary one, for as the Nazis infamously argued the survival of the species is enhanced by the death of the less fit and of those past the age of childbearing. It is not even the ethics of a popular culture which is increasingly coming to the view that the terminally ill should be allowed to die. So why are today’s atheists still presupposing that human death is the ultimate evil?
Yeah, from what I remember of debating proper atheists (as opposed to agnostics who just aren’t aware they are), they don’t really like it when you point out this sort of thing. It usually results in comments along the lines of “Well, obviously, Hitler isn’t the poster-boy for us – but atheism/evolutionary theory wasn’t the problem there. It was mis-applied”. Of course, we can’t possibly claim that doctrine and dogma are also just “mis-applied” when they talk about the crusades and other evils of religion.
I guess it comes down to what Schaeffer used to talk about re: the “mannishness” of man. Yes, atheists may be able to argue against the existence of God, but they usually aren’t then able to give an account of why man is the way he is, whereas the Christian/Abrahamic-faith-person can.
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Peter,
Have you looked at C.S. Lewis’ Abolition of Man recently? He addresses these very questions. Amazing how prophetic it is, even after 50 + years.
James
Indeed, Jon. I don’t want to tar anyone with the Nazi brush, but the logical consequence of evolutionary atheism is killing or abandoning the useless.
James, thanks for the tip. I have read that book, but it was a long time ago – but not 50+ years!
I’ve just mistakenly posted a comment on this via Twitter (which I don’t really understand at all)! What I wanted to say was that I’ve tried to avoid having my tongue in my cheek. On the contrary, I’ve sought to get ‘inside’ atheism and make my points as seriously and rigorously as possible. In this respect, I hope I have avoided ‘straw man’ arguments, though obviously seeing this accurately from this perspective is not easy to do. In evidence of this, I would point out that a reply I gave to one comment gives, in my view, a better argument for what Dawkins is advocating by way of giving aid than those he puts forward (namely to relieve suffering and to show that you don’t need God to be good). Any help spotting the holes in what I’ve said would be appreciated.
John, I didn’t receive a Twitter comment on this. Sorry about “tongue in cheek” – perhaps that wasn’t the right expression. My point was that this is not your real position. Your 14:09 comment is indeed a good one.
Peter,
John Haught makes an interesting connection in his recent book critiquing the new atheism. He says that the real atheists like Sarte and Nietzsche would consider the new atheists “soft-core.” They would probably point out that the new atheists simply have not taken their ideas to their logical conclusions.