Intelligent people 'less likely to believe in God'

[JB Globe]

Now, doesn't that strike you as a little arrogant and presumptuous, for a reporter, who has no training in the study of religion, philosophy, or theology, to start making sweeping statements about what constitutes "real religion?"

It's becoming clear you don't know what you're talking about. - Hedges has an MA in Divinity from Harvard and his father was an influencial minister. So excuse me if I don't really think it's worth it to respond to your critique of one of his sentences.

Besides, Hitchens has no expertise in religion - but you have no problem with him writing about it, do you? Even some book reviewers who like him criticized him on this one because, in their words - he did not have the level of knowledge of religion necessary to write an intelligent book about it.

It's usually little more than an attempt to change the subject, whenever anyone criticizes the growth of Islamism or harms done by the Vatican.

They can criticize all they want - I won't ever deny that organized religion has been responsible for many crimes and violence. My point is that Hitchens & Harris are biased in their study of organized religion - they focus on the worst of religion and make no effort to examine anything else. Their books are glorified hack jobs, and one could quite easily do the same thing with any sort of secular ideology and make it look like it was the source of all evil in the world.

But the preachers and other religious critics like to lump every secular movement together,

Not all of Hitchens' and Harris' critics do this, but one common criticism from their critics (religious or not) of their take on religion is they do this very thing with religion.

Hitchens or Harris have a right to point out that Communism was not a humanist philosophy, since it did not value individual rights and freedoms, and made a claim to possessing perfect knowledge of human needs and how to remedy them.

Again - Hitchens and Harris don't want others to do unto them as they're doing unto others. They want people to make a distinction between THEIR Humanism and OTHER people's forms of atheism - but they're not willing to accept that there is a major difference between fundamentalist Islam and moderate or progressive Islam.

They don't want to be associated with Stalin's brand of atheism, because they follow a different, MORE TRUE brand, yet they want to associate all Muslims with radical, extreme Islam.

Out of the other side of their mouths, the same critics criticize humanism for not having objective standards and continually revising and updating their philosophy.

Again, not all of their critics say this. Reza Aslan for example is all about reformation and change in the Muslim world, but criticizes Harris for different reasons.

And one way to play games with this issue is to redefine the very word 'civilian'. You could say that no Israeli is a civilian, since they have a mandatory draft, and everyone has to serve in the army - as C.I.C. president, Mohammed Elmasry did, or you could quote the Quran and say they are just decendents of apes and pigs, like this sheik who runs a Vancouver mosque: Muslim leaders clarify anti-Semitic remarks

Shock! GASP! You mean, a minority of Muslims sometimes try to twist words to make religious doctrine appear in favour of immoral acts? All this time I though Muslims weren't fully human and that they're weren't a few bad apples in the bunch.

Here I thought it was only Jews and Christians and Hindus and Buddhists and Taoists and Humanists who did that.

But really - Islam is no more or less capable of attempting to justify immoral acts by twisting meanings than secular governments are capable of doing so by twisting the meanings of international law.

Got any polling data to back that up?

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN2244293620070522

"nearly 80 percent of all U.S. Muslims reject [suicide] attacks, a survey showed on Tuesday."

Stalin's and Mao's mass killings were done by starvation, not by holy warriors on a suicide mission!

So I shouldn't be concerned with Stalin & Mao's killings because of the method they used?

The question I want answered is how do you motivate someone to sacrifice his or her own life for the purpose of killing others, unless that you can convince him that he's not really going to be dead, and will instead have a better life than he would have if he failed to carry out the mission?

You make them believe in something "irrational," or rather, they're motivated by something other than immediate self-interest. This could just as easily be God or nationalism. After all, it's not like members of the armies of secular nations haven't been sent on "suicide missions" before.

And you're going to pretend it all began with Adolph Hitler?

Just because Hitler wasn't the first Jew-hater doesn't excuse him from being the most ruthless one.

Then, there should be!

According to you, but according to the historical community - there's no consensus on Hitler's personal views.

What started with Ataturk was secular government in a Muslim-majority nation; and even the moderates have to admit that Turkey's secularism has been continually dangling by a thread since the nation was founded, and would not have survived if the constitution wasn't set up to place the military in charge of safe-guarding that constitution, and overthrowing a number of elected governments that tried to change it!

Sure - but as with most of your analysis you're not being comprehensive - the question shouldn't be how stable is Turkey in comparison with all other secular governments, (comparing Turkey to Britain is apples and oranges) but how stable is Turkey in comparison to countries which are most like it? (new secular governments in unstable regions). I mean, can you say even that Turkey is any worse off than any of it's neighbours in the Balkans, Russia or Middle East for example? Frankly, I think Turkey has done decently, all things considered.

And wondering which version of Islam will prevail, would be nothing more than a parlour game for Westerners if it wasn't for the fact that we are spending billions of dollars to buy oil from Muslim nations, many of whom are using a large portion of oil revenues to build mosques and madrassahs that teach the most conservative, hardline version of Islam all around the world today.

Sure, but it's not exactly as if Western nations have been utterly stagnant for the last half century in trying to find alternative energy sources. We've been complicit in helping advance the kinds of ideologies we say we don't like - through oil money and our bumbling foreign policy.

Now this goes back to the contention of Sam Harris, that moderate religionists are part of the problem, because they want to block any criticism of dangerous ideologies!

They don't want to block criticism of dangerous ideologies, they just want to block criticism that lumps dangerous ideologies, in with THEIR ideology. Just like you don't want people equating you with Stalin.

Reason being, is because the "Islam is the enemy" approach makes the jobs of progressive reformers more difficult, in-fact, it renders them useless, because in a completely polarized conflict between "us" and "them" there can be no room for dissent or differing opinions, the "us" side must be totally unified, and dissenters must be thrown out of "us"

Should a non-Muslim Western man stay silent while female suicide bombers in Iraq are reminding the world about "martyrdom" or say nothing about barbaric judicial penalties of Sharia, like public stoning, beheadings, or chopping off hands of thieves? Or say nothing when Western publications are intimated into not displaying cartoons because of the threats of violence from Muslims?

Yes, actually, you should stay silent - you shouldn't say anything. Instead, you should be listening - listening to the voices in the Muslim world which have been speaking out against these crimes since before you were born, you should really HEAR what they are saying, and how they're saying it. You should understand how it is possible to criticize problems within Islam without vilifying the entire scope of Islam.

Only then should you start speaking - speaking in support of these people, never FOR these people.

Because really, they know more about the problem than any of us ever could, and they are more effective in finding and implementing solutions than we ever could be.

After all, we're outsiders, it's their community. We don't appreciate outsiders coming in and changing our communities, we appreciate it when change comes from within. Dito for Muslims, because after all, they're as fully-human as we are.

[WIP]

It's becoming clear you don't know what you're talking about. - Hedges has an MA in Divinity from Harvard and his father was an influencial minister. So excuse me if I don't really think it's worth it to respond to your critique of one of his sentences.

Well, maybe I should have looked further into his background, than the brief profiles listed on NPR and C.F.I. web pages; but his divinity degree does explain his fuzzy, open-ended theology that doesn't even define terms like 'God', 'faith', 'soul' etc. And Hedges wades into this debate and criticizes atheistic writers like Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens, for demanding that no beliefs should be beyond criticism, with claims that their arguments only apply to a tiny minority of extremist Muslims and Christians -- and when I try to discover what Chris Hedges' version of Christianity is, I find that he is off the chart, and the only church where he would find anyone who shared his version of Christian faith would be the pious atheists that inhabit some Unitarian churches; so what yardstick is he using to distinguish between moderates and extremists: "God is not an anthropomorphic deity; He is just “the name we give to our belief that life has meaning.” So, Chris Hedges is another liberal spokesman who greatly exaggerates the segment of the population he is speaking for, while claiming to speak for the majority of Christians.

Besides, Hitchens has no expertise in religion - but you have no problem with him writing about it, do you? Even some book reviewers who like him criticized him on this one because, in their words - he did not have the level of knowledge of religion necessary to write an intelligent book about it.

I don't put a lot of stock in arguments from authority (something I notice your pet, Reza Aslan is fond of btw). The book reviewers like to carp about his lack of credentials, but if you go on Youtube, you might notice that Hitchens can hold his own with anyone who wants to debate him on religion! What I find disturbing is that the critics who want Harris and Hitchens to stop talking (especially about Islam) don't have a coherent message -- on one hand we are told that religious dogma is always peaceful and beneficial, and only causes harm when it is subverted or misapplied; but then we are told that by speaking out, H & H are encouraging extremism! So, especially when dealing with the Muslim World, we are told we must only say wonderful things about them and their religion, or else they may start rioting in the streets!

Again - Hitchens and Harris don't want others to do unto them as they're doing unto others. They want people to make a distinction between THEIR Humanism and OTHER people's forms of atheism - but they're not willing to accept that there is a major difference between fundamentalist Islam and moderate or progressive Islam.

No, they want so-called progressive Muslims to define "progress" and where they stand on these issues. Most of the self-proclaimed moderate spokesmen do not believe in equivalent Western moderations like 'separation of church and state,' for example. They hmm and haw when asked if apostasy should be a crime! Are the moderates going to change the cult-like stranglehold that religious authorities have in Muslim-majority nations?

They don't want to be associated with Stalin's brand of atheism, because they follow a different, MORE TRUE brand, yet they want to associate all Muslims with radical, extreme Islam.

Again, not all of their critics say this. Reza Aslan for example is all about reformation and change in the Muslim world, but criticizes Harris for different reasons.

To begin with, there is no such thing as a "brand of atheism." Atheism means a lack of belief in a supernatural world, and from there, you can go off in all directions forming a naturalistic philosophy. Many humanists who were early supporters of Marxism, like George Orwell, became disillusioned when they understood that Marxist theory made claims that were given unchallengeable authority and did not support the rights of the individual. Orwell became one of the best critical analysts of Marxism, and repudiated every aspect of it; on the other hand, the "moderate" Muslims do a lot of fudging about what they believe in, and how we are supposed to distinguish them from the extremists. So far, all we get is a condemnation of terrorism against civilians; but what about other contentious issues? Reza Aslan expects us all to be silent, while the reformation process in the Muslim World apparently goes on in secret!

Shock! GASP! You mean, a minority of Muslims sometimes try to twist words to make religious doctrine appear in favour of immoral acts? All this time I though Muslims weren't fully human and that they're weren't a few bad apples in the bunch.

The Vancouver imam was using the Quran as his authority for his disparaging remarks, and Elmasry carries a lot of weight, since he is in charge of the Canadian Islamic Congress -- the group that is trying to become the dominant organization of Muslims across Canada.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN2244293620070522

"nearly 80 percent of all U.S. Muslims reject [suicide] attacks, a survey showed on Tuesday."

You do realize that the numbers wouldn't sound so good if you consider that the flipside would be that 20% of American Muslims DO NOT reject suicide attacks! According to these numbers, from a Pew survey, 60% of Jordanians, 55% of Egyptians, 25% of Pakistanis believe that it can be justified. Even where the majority are against suicide bombing, that still leaves a large base of support!

So I shouldn't be concerned with Stalin & Mao's killings because of the method they used?

Did I say that? You're still dodging the issue that the prospect of retribution keeps most crimes, especially ones that are difficult to carry out, like assassination, to a minimum. Anyone who is willing to die in order to kill others, is going to be a more difficult enemy to deal with than one who is rational enough to weigh the consequences of his actions. Can you motivate someone to be a suicide bomber without convincing them that they will survive bodily death and be rewarded for their actions in heaven?

Reason being, is because the "Islam is the enemy" approach makes the jobs of progressive reformers more difficult, in-fact, it renders them useless, because in a completely polarized conflict between "us" and "them" there can be no room for dissent or differing opinions, the "us" side must be totally unified, and dissenters must be thrown out of "us"

Yes, actually, you should stay silent - you shouldn't say anything. Instead, you should be listening - listening to the voices in the Muslim world which have been speaking out against these crimes since before you were born, you should really HEAR what they are saying, and how they're saying it. You should understand how it is possible to criticize problems within Islam without vilifying the entire scope of Islam.

Only then should you start speaking - speaking in support of these people, never FOR these people.

Because really, they know more about the problem than any of us ever could, and they are more effective in finding and implementing solutions than we ever could be.

After all, we're outsiders, it's their community. We don't appreciate outsiders coming in and changing our communities, we appreciate it when change comes from within. Dito for Muslims, because after all, they're as fully-human as we are.

This is the same idiotic reasoning that is allowing Muslims to push anti-blasphemy laws in Europe! You say critics must remain silent so as not to enrage peaceful Muslims. I say that all Muslims, even these self-styled moderates that you are so fond of, should be aware of other opinions and evidence that challenges their dogma. A lot of fundamentalist Christians have wet dreams about having this sort of strength through intimidation to protect their religious dogmas from being challenged.

Fundamentalists rail against the modernists and liberals who have applied higher criticism of the Bible. There are many textual and linguistic scholars who make a valid case that the Quran was originally written in Aramaic (since there wasn't a written form of Arabic at the time), but there is no equivalent of higher criticism in Islam, despite all your talk about moderates, because any Islamic scholar who dares to say these things, ends up charged with blasphemy, and no prominent Western scholars are willing to end up like Theo Van Gogh!