I'm not sure why atheists praise me so much. When my book What's So Great About Christianity was published, Skeptic magazine editor Michael Shermer called me a "first rate scholar" whose "thorough research and elegant prose have elevated him into the top ranks of those who champion liberty and individual responsibility." Shermer wrote of me that "although non-Christians and non-theists may disagree with some of his arguments, we ignore him at our peril." As for my Christianity book, "it takes the debate to a new level. Read it."
Then Christopher Hitchens, author of God Is Not Great, complimented me on the occasion of our first New York debate, saying I was a formidable debate opponent on any topic. Recently Hitchens told me and my wife that I am responsible for one of the big conversions in his life. He informed me about something about which I had no idea: following our debate on capitalism vs. socialism at Georgetown University more than a decade and a half ago, Hitchens said he abandoned socialism. "After that evening," Hitchens said, "I just stopped calling myself a socialist." I was too polite to speculate on what might follow for HItchens from our God v. atheism debates, but of course I was delighted to hear that I helped a friend find his way out of the dead-end maze of socialism.
The latest addition to my atheist fan club is Dan Barker, head of the Freedom From Religion Foundation. Barker is a former evangelical preacher who has become a hard-core atheist. Now he heads a group that I would describe as a kind of atheist ACLU (although why we need two such organizations remains a mystery). Basically Barker's group agitates to remove all vestiges of God and religion from American public life, what Barker terms an "absolute separation" of church and state. Recently I debated Barker at Harvard University, after which Barker wrote me to say that of the hundreds of opponents he has faced over the years, "you are clearly one of the best debaters I have encountered." Is he right? You can find out by watching the debate here.
The Harvard debate was sponsored by the Harvard Secular Society and moderated by Harvard's humanist chaplain Greg Epstein. Epstein is himself an atheist, and only at Harvard can we expect to find such a creature as an "atheist chaplain." The format of the debate was interesting: no lengthy opening statements, no formal rebuttals, etc. Rather, a group of Harvard students peppered both Barker and me with questions, and then we got to engage with each other. Our debate was lively and wide-ranging, covering such topics as the existence of God, science and religion, the relationship of theism to morality, and church and state. Following this debate, the student head of the Secular society told me that unlike any religious believer he had previously encountered, I had compelled him to re-think some of his basic positions.
I know that there are some atheists who will respond to my Harvard debate with their usual ritual of abuse and name-calling. In a way I sympathize with them. Never has a group so desperately sought an intellectual victory in these contests, and so far there are no signs that it will come. So the best these atheists can do is to call me arrogant. But even the atheists I debate seem to think that this arrogance is justified.
In reality, as people like Shermer and Hitchens who know me will testify, I'm not arrogant. I am, however, just a little tired of hearing the propaganda about how atheists are the champions of reason while religious believers are the ignorant practitioners of "blind faith." You can see why I relish taking on the atheists with their chosen weapons of reason and science and evidence, and showing that I can not only defend myself but also defeat them on their own terms. At this point the atheists are running out of capable opponents. Many atheists are reduced to what one of their number, the mathematician John Allen Paulos, terms "the argument of the red face and the raised voice."
Is there any doubt why Sam Harris seems to have changed his mind about debating me, and why Richard Dawkins is still hiding under his desk? How come these "brights" seem to have fled into the cover of darkness? Do any of the atheist organizations offer an annual Wimp award?
Reader Comments ( Page 6 of 30)
76. Hi Jerry; good question deserving more than a 1-sentence answer. I'll work on a response for later.
fanman
fanmanaf1 at 12:00PM on May 7th 2008
77. Happiness is a by product, not a thing unto itself. What produces the most happiness for a human being is service to his/her fellow man. Selfishness on the other hand does not produce happiness, the best it can do is produce ego satisfaction.
fanmanaf1 OK
Jerry Brown at 12:08PM on May 7th 2008
78. I'd like to thank Dinesh for kindly mentioning me and the quote "the argument of the red face and the raised voice" from my new book, Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don't Add Up. As stated in the book, I regularly witness the invocation of this "argument" by many believers when their beliefs are challenged.
John Allen Paulos at 12:13PM on May 7th 2008
79. "the argument of the red face" certainly doesnt apply to Dinesh cos of his dark skin but raise voice... yes :)
kumar at 12:33PM on May 7th 2008
80. Psssssssssssst............
God is still a myth. Let go of fairy tales. No matter how hard you wish for a real god, there aren't any. Never were. It's okay. We're still here. The sky is still blue. The earth is still beautiful. You can live a good and moral life knowing this is all there is. Really.
Grammasez at 12:41PM on May 7th 2008
81. The Hedonist philosophy points out the eternal struggle between freedom/chaos vs. oppression/order
The founders of the U.S. clearly chose the former over the latter, but of course they recognized the fine line we need to walk between the two. Basically they decided to set up the 'order' part of the equation in fairly broad terms, to allow the maximum individual liberty - 'freedom' - within those boundaries.
I have always been puzzled by people who love their country (The US for most of us) but somehow don't appreciate their freedoms and in fact see them as some kind of moral cancer, when in fact it is those freedoms which ultimately keep each other in check.
Would you rather be a bird in a cage and get your three meals and never be allowed to leave? Or be free and takes your chances? Find your own food, find your own mate, find your own opportunities, learn to fend for yourself?
Freedom is always the better deal.
fabio at 12:43PM on May 7th 2008
82. ryan,
there is alot of truth in what botts said about denominations. no one really has perfect theology,no one. we all get God wrong to greater or lessor degrees. just now i was talking with a lady who quit going to church because she thought they did the baptism all wrong!! quit going over nothing.
getting god right i do think is what he expects. because he knows we in our finite minds cannot get ourselves around the infinite,its not possible.
as for my change? well it was botts, i realized how ugly i had become over my postings with him. then i said i did not care who he was maried to even if it was a baboon. i realized i hurt him the person, which is never what i intended. thats the danger of this blog. then loyd the lurking wrote me a very nice response and that is when god's spirit convicted me of my wrong, using atheist!!! i no longer hold angst in my heart because i not only confessed my sin to botts and others but to god as well. so i feel somewhat cleansed of the person i was becoming.
mind you though i still do not agree with an atheist world view. i still believe christianity best describes and remedies our state of being. that we were true christians,therein lies the remedy. that we are humans therein lies our hindurance and the constant battle that goes on.
so it was a combination of things. i do not want to go back to the other side. though i know it is there. darkness lurks in us all really.
thats about all i know to say.
brian at 12:48PM on May 7th 2008
83. An interesting read (fictional) that explores anarchy is Ursula Le Guin's "The Dispossessed." Before reading that, I had a hard time envisioning how ANY anarchy could actually work in a normal social structure. And, in a way, the anarchy in that book didn't "really" work, or at least wouldn't have worked in a world where the people could be tempted by materialism.
Interesting concept, though...begs the question of whether human beings could ever socially evolve to a point where altruism was the rule rather than the exception.
Kodiak at 12:50PM on May 7th 2008
84. Am I right?
Davidg at 9:57AM on May 7th 2008
_____________________________________
No you are not.
TJ at 12:51PM on May 7th 2008
85. jerry,
The SELF is a viscous monster that i do not think can be tamed. as woody allen said the heart wants what it wants. i think history would tell us there is something terribly wrong with mankind. we could have all been hitler, we all have it within us given the right situation to be rather fowl.
thats why i like believing that God one day will right the wrongs that have been done and set the record straight. because there are lots of people who have suffered and died throughout history who have never had there day. and if there is no ultimate justice then i think its all pretty crappy
brian at 12:54PM on May 7th 2008
86. brian,
"i said i did not care who he was maried to even if it was a baboon."
Actually you explicitly referred to her as a gorilla, but who's keeping track?
"The SELF is a viscous monster that i do not think can be tamed."
The viscosity of humanity has long been battled and in a billion different ways. I say the monster can't be put down, but it CAN be tamed... mostly. Trainers can raise tigers from cubs and they still get attacked.
Mokele Mbembe at 1:02PM on May 7th 2008
87. My, my, my we are so wonderful. Hey dimwit the next time you walk on water please let me know so I can take pictures
Geoff Barker at 1:04PM on May 7th 2008
88. Piggy backing off what Mokey just said... you didn't say "even if [he] married a [gorilla]." You said he DID marry a gorilla.
K at 1:06PM on May 7th 2008
89. to Jubal...why are FLDS more moral than atheists? What interpretation gives you that idea?
to Linda...I missed the point of your definition of hedonist, but I would say that atheists are not the equivalent of hedonist. I think that a lot of religious people get that fact confused.
I am a moral-living atheist, and like Grammasez noted, I can and do live a rightful, ejoyable life.
abbot at 1:06PM on May 7th 2008
90. brian,
We all wish for cosmic justice, and karma too often never comes around. The God that Christianity describes - it doesn't sound like proper justice to a lot of people. If I was going to choose my beliefs based on what SOUNDS good to me I'd go with the Buddhist reincarnation cycle where your reincarnated form is decided by the actions of your past life and previous lives.
Mokele Mbembe at 1:17PM on May 7th 2008