Silicon age fairy tales and chronological snobbery

Christianity is often dismissed as 'Bronze Age Fairy Tales'. This lazy slogan is inaccurate on so many levels you could write an essay about it.

For a start, I ask the scoffer, can you make, and work, bronze? I didn't ask 'Do you know what bronze is' but can you MAKE it, not in theory but for real, starting with rocks, sticks and fire. Because our ancestors whom you denigrate with your cheap slogans somehow worked out how to.

C S Lewis wrote about 'chronological snobbery', the idea that we are necessarily better than our ancestors because we come after them and have taller buildings, airplanes and mobile phones. They were dumb so they just believed any old nonsense, but we're so much wiser than them.

Oh yeah? Because they had Mozart, Shakespeare and Columbus while we have Lady Gaga, Shoot 'em up computer games, a generation of kids on prescribed amphetamine for 'ADHD' and Magalluf?

There is no evidence that our ancestors were stupider than us. Our technology is more advanced, but that is down to building on accumulated knowledge we inherited. Standing on the shoulders of giants.

We believe some pretty dumb stuff today. We believed that conquered Iraqis would willingly embrace Western style liberal democracy, pluralism and probity and then the whole Middle East would follow suit. Our rulers refused to listen to those who knew different. But we repeated the same errors in Libya and Syria. We have borrowed money we can't pay back to buy stuff we didn't need.

We have eviscerated marriage and encouraged, subsidised and enabled an epidemic of fatherless families which we know harms future generations. We are short of nurses, engineers and artisans because we encouraged our youth to do junk university degrees in 'film studies', 'criminology', sociology, graphic design, media studies and other liberal vanities. And we have created a housing crisis partly by epidemic divorce and single parenthood and also by bringing in 5 million immigrants to to do the work our own benefit claimants won't do-not least because we sold them unrealistic expectations and recruited them into a Ponzi scheme to pay our pensions and healthcare costs out of their taxes while they struggle with student debt and unaffordable housing. No wonder euthanasia is being talked up so much.

I don't think we are wiser, or even cleverer, than the generations of Chaucer, Bede and Newton. Our grandchildren will curse us for our selfishness and stupidity as they deal with the broken relationships, dismembered culture and cosmic levels of debt we are leaving them. We have abandoned our Christian heritage not for 'enlightenment' but for debt funded electronic toys and games.

Something else our worthy ancestors knew was that Islam wanted to eat Western Civilisation (formerly known as Christendom) and needed to be restrained. But for their efforts we'd be speaking Arabic and certainly not on line as the industrial revolution would not have happened, or the so called Enlightenment. We have welcomed it in and invited it to sit at table and have a drink while they look at the menu.

When you ditch the beneficent Creator God and His Saviour Christ, eventually reason and liberty follow true religion out the window and are succeeded by madness and tyranny.

Is intelligent design religion: how do we define religion?

To progress the discussion about the question 'Is intelligent design religion?' we need a definition of religion. But how can we get one that isn't biased?

For those who get their ideas about religion in the form of short memorable slogans from Brian Cox, Chris Hitchens and Richard Dawkins, there is no problem. Religion is mumbo jumbo bronze age fairy tale delusional nonsense for losers without a shred of evidence and the cause of most of the evil in the world and has been disproved and displaced by science. But what about those of us who would like to think calmly and rationally about the subject?

my Oxford Reference Dictionary defines religion as 

'1) Belief in a superhuman controlling power, especially in a personal God or gods entitled to obedience and worship; the expression of this in worship . 

2) A particular system of faith. 

3) A thing that one is devoted to. 

4) Life under monastic vows 
(Latin religion-obligation, bond, reverence.

Well that is interesting. Evidently the Dictionary was put together by men (and/or women) who like me are fallible and may have differences of opinion, so the above cannot be claimed as absolutely definitive. It seems reasonable, if not absolutely clear cut. Fair enough, the great Oxford scholar C S Lewis wrote a book (The Four Loves) about the 4 different Greek words that can be translated 'love' and their different meanings. As Einstein is reported to have said, 'Make things as simple as possible, but no simpler.' Reality isn't always easy to comprehend and we should not violate reason and stifle enquiry by oversimplification, let alone in pursuit of a partisan agenda. I have a partisan agenda, perhaps readers (if any) have one too. Dawkins openly does, he wants to eliminate religion (including, perhaps especially, Christianity which he compares to child abuse, cancer and a virus). See 'confounding factors.

Christianity is a religion under definitions 1-3 (but not IMO 4) above. I'm a Christian, so I am (or try to be) 'religious' in the sense that I believe in, worship and seek to obey and follow the teaching and example of Jesus of Nazareth. But as soon as I say that, someone will quite reasonably ask 'What kind of Christian? Catholic? Eastern/Russian/Greek Orthodox? Protestant? And if the latter, what species of Protestant?' And I can respond to this, but not right now. Thousands of books have been written about the differences between different sects of Christianity, but that's not what I'm writing about here.

Religion: 'A thing that one is devoted to'

I note with interest the 3rd definition above 'A thing that one is devoted to'. This would appear to be capable of including various human philosophies and other objects of desire and perceived worth, even football or music. The question 'Is Atheism/materialism eligion?' is raised occasionally, and of course the proper response is 'it depends on how you define materialism and religion.' My Dictionary defines materialism as

'1) The tendency to prefer material possessions and physical comfort to spiritual values. 
 2) The theory that nothing exists but matter and its movements and modifications.'

Materialism: theory, philosophy, fact or religion?

Once again, I do not claim that any dictionary is absolutely reliable, but am interested to note that in 2 above materialism is called a theory. I would call it a philosophy, but I find that many of its followers consider it an established fact. More than a fact, the very ground and nature of our being. Anyway, can we consider materialism to be a religion?  Clearly it is not belief in a supernatural being, quit the reverse. It is a belief that there is no supernatural being. But materialism (which is basically another name for atheism) is clearly '2) A particular system of faith and  3) A thing that one is devoted to.

Do we ever deceive ourselves?

Atheists in my experience tend to be touchy when accused of BELIEVING in atheism. They reply that they have no beliefs but simply accept the findings of science. They have an absence of belief in God or gods for the same reason they do not believe in unicorns or fairies, that they have seen no evidence for these things. (*) They would believe in God if they were presented with compelling evidence, they say. Obviously their world view compels them to say that, they can hardly say that they would continue to refuse to believe if they saw good enough evidence. But how could we test that assertion? Sometimes we say things that we feel we ought to say in order to preserve out high self esteem and impress others, but maybe sometimes we are lying to ourselves. 

Christian apologists and preachers like G K Chesterton, C S Lewis, Ravi Zacharias, Lee Strobel, Ken Ham, John Piper and others would say that there is plenty of evidence if you look at it in an unbiased manner (see earlier post on confounding factors) but that no evidence will convince someone of something that he is determined not to believe.

Let me cut to the chase. every country has a criminal prosecution system of some kind. Why? Why do we need lawyers to prosecute and also to defend accused people? For the very simple reason that when people are in the wrong and facing sanctions, they lie, lie and lie again to evade facing their responsibilities. Same for politicians. The idea that people are routinely persuaded by good evidence when they don't want to be is.....unsupported by evidence.

When 2 men disagree, one of them at least must be wrong

But how can we know which is wrong and which is right? Its easy if we just say 'The one who agrees with me is right' but can we be more objective than that? Look at a Muslim and a Christian arguing. One of them (at least) must be wrong, but neither will change his mind. Look at a Catholic and a Protestant arguing about whose interpretation of the teachings of Jesus is correct. One must be wrong, but rarely is either persuaded by arguments. Atheist versus theist: same thing again. If you think I'm wrong, Dear Reader, then you have to ask yourself the question 'Why does this apparently educated person persist in believing nonsense which has been refuted many, many times?'. Fair question, why do you think I believe poisonous nonsense despite the evidence? But can you then find the wit and grace to apply the same reasoning to yourself and the position you hold? Oh but you don't need to, do you, because your beliefs are all supported by mountains of overwhelming evidence, aren't they? Obviously that would not apply to everyone, but it describes some fairly IMO.

Anyway, clearly the task of finding an agreed, clear and reasonable definition of 'religion' is not quite as simple as some would like to make it. But as we can't progress this discussion without a definition, why not go with

'1) Belief in a superhuman controlling power, especially in a personal God or gods entitled to obedience and worship; the expression of this in worship . 

Suits me. For the purpose of the discussion 'Is intelligent design religion?'

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><>><><><><><><><<><><>

PS the question of religion and good and evil is often raised. Too big and too interesting a subject to deal with as a postscript to this discussion which is about the question 'Is intelligent design religion?' but I'll very briefly address Christopher Hitchens' famous question 

'Can you tell me of any good deed which could be done by a person of faith but not by an atheist?' 

Hitchens evidently thought this was an incredibly powerful anti-religious question, because as set the answer is clearly 'no'. But, as his brother Peter said 'It's a duff question.'

to address the question, 2 questions and an observation about measurement.

1) What do you mean by 'good'?

2) Why are you so sure that atheism isn't a 'faith'?

3) 'could' versus 'would'. In other words, potential versus performance. What might happen versus what does happen. If you are into science and evidence, we are not interested so much in what might theoretically happen, but what actually happens in the real world and can be MEASURED. Not anecdotes or questions designed so that only one answer is possible but careful measurement with confounding factors taken into account.

More on this later.

(*) Oddly, many atheists are Marxists despite the evidence of misery, tyranny, poverty, environmental degradation and war produced by that particular godless philosophy when put into power in countries like China, Russia and North Korea. When I was approached by a Socialist Worker Party man with their magazine, I said 'No thank you, Marxism has failed.' He sneered at me 'It's never been tried.'

How deep our denial can run when the evidence is against something that we really desire to believe in?

Is Intelligent Design religion? part 1

Is Intelligent Design religion? part 1

It is difficult to have a conversation around God, religion, creation, evolution or intelligent design (whatever we mean by any of those terms) without stale clichés and slogans being deployed. The 'machine gun' tactic is often used, throwing up to 10 quick fire bold assertions and complex questions in a couple of sentences. The questions can usually be addressed, but one at a time, whereas a well designed and witty slogan can raise 3 or 4 key issues in a dozen syllables.

One of the stalest and cheapest slogans in popular use is 'Intelligent Design is creationism in a cheap tuxedo.' Another is 'Evolution is science, creationism is religion.' There are many others, including the crassly ignorant and irrelevant 'Michael Behe got his ass whipped at Dover.' Incidentally, the real truth about the Dover trial is a lot more interesting than the myth that is usually copied, including the fact that activist Judge John Jones violated the US Constitution by ruling on a matter of religion, but that's another story.

Slogans and clichés may carry some truth, (*) or they may even helpfully simplify a complicatede issue and help us understand something difficult, even if imperfectly. But they can mislead, distract, obfuscate or tramline our thinking and stall exploration. They may also be deliberately used by propagandists in order to mould the opinions and actions of others for their own purposes. Of course both sides in any disagreement can do this, and deny they have done it, even deny it to themselves. Since none of us is neutral, we may both use these tactics and be deceived by them.

Having changed political and religious allegiances more than once, I can look back on stuff I used to accept as self evident and see how I was believing half truths and untruths what 'The System' had primed me to believe, and in some cases I can see how it was done. And I wonder what I currently believe, knowingly or unknowingly, that I will discover in future isn't so-and i must think this because I am certain that I can see others who are in error but don't believe they are, so I must look to my own errors. Anyway, back to the question at the top of the page- Is Intelligent Design religion?

If we are going to address the issue as sceptical, free thinking truth seekers willing to follow the evidence where it leads, even out of our comfort zones, we must begin by assuming that we might be misled, not least by our own preference about what OUGHT to be true. Could we be wrong? Scientists are supposed to ask that all the time. The next step is to define the terms. then we can consider the case on its merits AND consider the opposite case. So before even addressing the question I believe it is fair and necessary to raise the equal and opposite question, is evolutionism religion?

Is evolutionism religion?

Well, is it? The question may at least be put, although as I said above, before we can consider the question we must define our terms or else we are just trying to use a piano to mend a puncture in a bicycle tyre, a futile exercise. Note my use of the term 'evolutionism', which I am aware causes offence to some. I use this term to denote the acceptance of molecules to man evolution over billions of years from Big-Bang derived space dust by impersonal forces, particularly natural selection acting on random mutations (I avoid the term 'belief' here to avoid distraction). I believe this is a fair definition, but when I use it, immediately the objections come flying.

'Evolution is nothing to do with how the cosmos originated or how life began!'

'Evolution is about change over time!'

'Evolution is about changes in gene frequency in a population.'

'Evolution can be clearly seen in plant breeding.'

and, above all

'You don't understand evolution.'

And these objections, all of which I hear often, are only about DEFINITIONS! We are still nowhere near analysing truth claims about any part of the thing itself. See what I mean about how difficult it can be to have a reasoned discussion? To even start one?

Anyhow, I mean to post several short discussions over the next month or so considering the linked questions-Is Intelligent Design religion/ and 'Is evolutionism religion?' 

Feel free to comment, comments here are not moderated or censored, unlike the atheist page I was deleted and blocked from recently without warning for making a critical comment.

(*) As C S Lewis wrote in 'The Last Battle' 

" The enemy made his lie stronger by mixing a good deal of truth with it."

More reflections on C S Lewis and the science versus religion paradigm

Christians from nearly all traditions, Catholic to Calvinist, love and quote the prolific writer and apologist C S Lewis. I say ‘nearly’ all traditions, there are a few who damn him for being a smoker, drinker, friend of the ‘papist’ Tolkien and the very unorthodox Charles Williams. Some who cite him approvingly might not if they had read some of the less orthodox views in his letters, for example on purgatory and prayers to saints. I once read an angry Bible Blogger who cursed Lewis for ‘believing in the Tao’. A more depressing misreading of what Lewis actually wrote about the Tao (a term he used in Mere Christianity and The Abolition of Man as a metaphor for the essence of the moral imperatives found in most religions) could hardly be imagined.

Much has been written about Lewis, perhaps too much, but as a long term fan I can see why. Today I want to add a little more to earlier reflections about him and science, including evolution. As far as can be ascertained from what he actually wrote, his view was nuanced but far from fully accepting of Darwinism. This reflection is based on the essay ‘Dogma and the Universe’ from 1943 which is in ‘C S Lewis essay collection: Faith, Christianity and the Church' (Harper Collins, 2000)

This essay addresses the position that Christianity is outdated primitive dogma while science is the active pursuit of truth, always finding out new things that Christianity cannot accommodate. Science, in this view, is beating back ‘superstition’ (i.e. religion) which is withering away. This is the ‘science versus religion’ metaphor, so beloved of dogmatic materialists. As Lewis put it in the first paragraph

‘For it seems to him (the outsider) that if our ancestors had known what we know about the universe, Christianity would never have existed at all....’

Certainly the sceptics of Lewis’ time deployed all the tactics and held all the views which our ‘New’ (actually not so new as any reader of Lewis can see) atheists use. Rubbing shoulders with other Oxford academics daily, Lewis was well aware of the assertions of modern science, quoting from Professor Sir Edmund Whittaker’s Riddell lecture ‘The Beginning and End of the World’ (1942) in which he acknowledged that the fundamental assertion of materialism that’...the world has existed from all eternity...’ had recently been withdrawn, making, as Lewis quipped ‘..contemporary science come into line with Christian doctrine’ (i.e. that the world had a beginning. It is worth noting the big bang theory was initially opposed by some atheists on philosophical grounds as it was thought to point to a creator).

Lewis remarked that people sneer at Christianity because the currently known size of the universe was much larger than was thought by our ancestors were in fact ignorant of what our ancestors actually thought. He wrote that this was ‘a simple historical falsehood. Ptolemy (2) knew just as well as Eddington (3) that the earth was infinitesimal in comparison with the whole content of space.'

He went on to write

‘There is no question here of knowledge having grown until the frame of archaic thought is no longer able to contain it. The real question is why the spatial insignificance of the earth, after being known for centuries, should suddenly in the last century become an argument against Christianity.’

Which brings us to the flat earth slander (which Lewis addresses in more detail in his essay ‘’Religion and Science’.

I was taught at school that until modern times everyone thought that the earth was flat, and that this was (A) because the church taught it because it was in the Bible, and (B) that this false belief held back science. In fact none of the above is true. The flat earth slander was invented in the 19^th century by the American writer Washington Irvine. It caught on like a house on fire. Even Wikipedia, not known for its sympathies for Biblical Christianity, states

‘Irving's writings on Columbus are a mixture of history and fiction, a genre now called romantic history/historical fiction. Irving based them on extensive research in the Spanish archives, but also added imaginative elements aimed at sharpening the story. The first of these works is the source of the durable myth that medieval Europeans believed the Earth was flat. (See Myth of the Flat Earth.)’

And

‘In his biography of Christopher Columbus, Irving introduced the erroneous idea that Europeans believed the world to be flat prior to the discovery of the New World. Borrowed from Irving, the flat-Earth myth has been taught in schools as fact to many generations of Americans.’

Lewis expresses interest both here and in another essay 'Religion and Science' in the speed at which this lie spread and became widely accepted. He observed that he found that the opponents of the Gospel would, like a policeman with a suspect he has arrested who will use anything he says against him, use whatever came to hand as a reason for rejecting faith. 'If the universe was teeming with creatures, that reduced the Christian claim that we are somehow unique to absurdity. On the other hand, ‘if the earth is really unique, then that proves that life is only an accidental by-product in the universe, and so again disproves our religion. Really, we are hard to please.’  Lewis was incredibly prescient about the propaganda tactics of today's atheists, but then again perhaps this is because there is nothing new under the sun and he had to endure the same misrepresentations in his day.

Back to the significance of the size of the universe, CSL wrote ‘Men look on the starry heavens with reverence: monkeys do not. The silence of the heavenly spaces terrified Pascal, but it was the greatness of Pascal that enabled them to do so.’ The universe of the Christian is great and sublime (see Psalm 8, Psalm 19 and Job 38-41) and points us to a Great Maker. Dawkins’ jibes about a ‘poky little mediaeval universe’ is typical of this self-besotted little man.

Lewis concludes that Christians have nothing to fear from an increase in scientific knowledge, but ‘It is those systems which place the whole meaning of existence in biological or social evolution on our own planet. It is the creative evolutionist, the Bergsonian (4) or Shavian (5), or the Communist, who should tremble when he looks up at the night sky.' We should not expect to understand all of God’s creative works, from atom to cosmos, we cannot expect all questions to be answered. Revelation from God is not to satisfy our 'liberal curiosity' but ‘appears to me to be purely practical, to be addressed to the Fallen Man, for the relief of his urgent necessities.’

In other words, as I believe Galileo may have said, ‘Science is about how the heavens go, the Bible is about how to go to Heaven.’

True religion, Lewis argues, is like mathematics. ‘There is a great difference between counting apples and arriving at the mathematical formulae of modern physics. But the multiplication table is used in both and does not grow out of date.’

He finishes the essay by warning us to flee from the wrath to come. Even the best science cannot help us here, but a false view of science may hinder us if it persuades us that science has ruled out God and a coming Judgment. I continue to argue that while being wrong (either way) about creation need not prevent us being reconciled to God, evolutionism is a potent cause of atheism and so therefore may help to keep some people from a saving knowledge of Christ. ‘No possible complexity which we can give to our picture of the universe can hide us from God.’ Citing Revelation20:11 the great polymath and beloved apologist reminds us that ‘in the twinkling of an eye’ we will each stand alone and naked before God, the righteous judge, to receive ‘bliss or horror’ according to how we lived our lives and what we did with Jesus. This, Lewis asserts in a conclusion reminiscent of the final verses of Ecclesiastes (5), is the real business of our life, not the endless pursuit of knowledge but getting right with the God who is our creator and will be our Judge. Wise man and fool, professor or pinhead, we can any of us do this by the means which God has so graciously made available, His beloved Son Jesus.

I hope to return to C S Lewis on science and evolution later. I repeat that I am not ‘claiming’ him as a young earth creationist, just saying that he is no friend to Darwinism and a vigorous and effective opponent of the sad and harmful ‘science equals materialism’ philosophy. I conclude this reflection by agreeing with my brother and sister Christians who (unlike me) accept Darwinism as good science, that getting right with God through Christ matters more than our view of science and origins. My contention is that accepting molecules to man evolution makes people less likely to feel the need to do so, and I suspect that C S Lewis might be on my side regarding that if he had engaged with the debate as it is today. 

(1) 'The Magician’s Twin: C S Lewis on Science, Scientism and Society' edited by john G West (Discovery Institute Press, 2012) is the best study of Lewis on the 'science versus religion' argument I have seen yet.

(2) Ptolemy lived in Alexandria in the second century AD)

(3) Arthur Eddington died in 1944

(4) Henri Bergson wrote a book ‘Creative Evolution’ which is probably the biggest load of impenetrable ravings and balderdash in my collection of research books. It’s as incoherent and rambling as the similar Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s ‘Phenomenon of man’ next to which it sits in my naughty library, but worse written. Incidentally, Teilhard de Chardin (a Jesuit priest and progenitor of theistic evolutionism) was probably involved if not the main perpetrator of the Piltdown Man Fraud, but that is a story for another day...

(5) Shavian-to do with George Bernard Shaw

(6) Ecclesiastes 12:12-13 'And further, my son, be admonished by these. Of making many books there is no end, and much study is wearisome to the flesh. Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.'