A Subtle Ruse, But It Won’t Do
Michael Ruse. [shakes head] I don’t know, I just don’t know. I simply can’t agree. I think he’s wrong. I think it’s bad (or at least dubious) tactics and I think it’s even worse morality and epistemology.
But those are two different things. I know, I know. Is and ought; facts and values. But lying about the one takes you into questions about the other. Which is a roundabout way of saying that even if it were good tactics I don’t think it’s morally respectable to tell lies about what you take to be the truth for tactical reasons. At least not on the whole; not in general; not as a rule. In life and death situations (a murderer with an axe asks you where the little girl with the dear little puppy is because he wants to sell her life insurance, that kind of thing) it’s different; but as a general principle, we shouldn’t go around saying the stork brings babies and there is a thriving colony of utopian hemp-farmers on a planet behind the Hale-Bopp comet, simply to appease and mollify a lot of damn fools who think so and will get all offended and bent and slit-eyed if we contradict them. Especially, frankly, people who are educators, shouldn’t do that. Especially people who occupy chairs that are actually named ‘for the public understanding of science.’ People like that just have an occupational duty not to pretend to believe in a nice man in the sky who makes all our boo-boos go away simply because a lot of sentimentalists want to go on thinking so forever and ever amen and if we don’t let them then they’ll trash science education. Therefore I find it highly irritating that Ruse keeps telling them they should. I’ve upbraided him about it before, and he’s still at it.
Virtually every prominent Darwinian in recent decades has eschewed social Darwinism, and most believe that evolution itself, while responsible for the increased complexity of organic forms over time, cannot be regarded as a linear process driving toward a particular endpoint. But Ruse asserts that popular contemporary biologists like Edward O. Wilson and Richard Dawkins have also exacerbated the divisions between evolutionists and creationists by directly challenging the validity of religious belief – Dawkins by repeatedly declaring his atheism (”faith,” he once wrote, ”is one of the world’s great evils, comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to eradicate”), and Wilson by describing his ”search for objective reality” as a replacement for religious seeking.
But what are they supposed to do? What the hell is wrong with Dawkins’ ‘repeatedly’ declaring his atheism? And what is he supposed to do instead – lie? Shut up? What? And why should he do either one? When theists get to go on the radio and talk everyone else into the ground – why are atheists supposed to zip it? Oh, it makes me tired, this kind of thing. And there’s always more of it. It’s just an unending flood. It’s all the more depressing when people like Ruse join in.
Ruse, a self-identified agnostic, acknowledges the ”thrilling quality” of Dawkins’s writing but says he objects to adamantly anti-religion statements coming from a scientist. ”I don’t have any more belief than Dawkins,” he says. ”But I do think it matters that he is making it very difficult for those of us who care about evolution to put forward a reasonable face to the reasonable portion [of the public] in the middle.”
But there again. That just seems to be saying people should lie either explicitly or by omission, merely for tactical reasons. It’s appeasment, that’s all, and it doesn’t even work. The more people mollify religious zealots, the more the zealots demand. That’s all there is to it. There’s no such thing as satisfying them by just kind of moderating the tone. If you’re not completely on their team, you’re one of the lost, to be turned into pools of unsavory liquid when Jeezis comes back with his ray-gun or whatever it is. And the more they are appeased, the more they go on bullying, and the more likely atheists are to think that they are the only atheists on earth and they’d better not say anything lest they be sliced up with a dull razor.
And then he ends up asking exactly the question I’m asking.
”What am I supposed to do?” he asks in response. ”I’m an academic. I believe in freedom. I believe the most important thing you can do is criticize your own ideas.”
Eh? You’re an academic, you believe in freedom, so you’re spending your energy telling other academics not to say what they think is true, so that they won’t make creationists even angrier than they already are? Does that compute? What are they supposed to do, I keep wanting to know.
And by the way. When are newspapers going to start making their reporters take that course in elementary thinking straight. What’s wrong with this beginning?
In states from Alabama to Pennsylvania, supporters are attempting to restrict the teaching of evolution – and introduce their current favorite theory, Intelligent Design, into the classroom…And such efforts may be having an effect. According to a Gallup survey released last November, only about a third of Americans believe that Darwin’s theory is well supported by the scientific evidence, while nearly half believe that humans were created in more or less their present form 10,000 years ago. What accounts for this revival?
See it? See the problem? What revival? What effect? We can’t tell. We haven’t got a clue. The reporter just gave us one survey; we don’t have anything to compare it to. For all we know the figures ten years ago were 100% One survey is not useful for comparative purposes or for deducing a ‘revival.’
I think Ruse has put his finger on a problem, but he is himself inconsisent in addressing it.
The problem is distinguishing between science and philosophy or between science and religion. When Dawkins makes a philosophical statement about his belief in God in the context of an article about science, I can see how an unsophisticated reader may get the philosophy confused with the science. And I would agree with Ruse that this unintended consequence is unfortunate.
The problem, though, is the confusion—not the science or the philosophy. The way to address that problem is to aid those who have been confused in seeing just what the difference is.
This is the point where IMO Ruse is inconsistent. What he refers to here as an “occupational hazard” is not criticism, but a similar confusion coming from the creationists. The difference is that on their side the consequences are not unintended. Their business is nothing but confusing science and religion and Ruse should be willing to say that.
Is Ruse really his name? How perfect.
Still, it probably is good tactics to distinguish rabid fundies from moderate, secular religionists (if any such still exist in the good ol’ USA). And, of course, one distinguishing mark of a fundie is his rejection of evolution. So where are all these sober, sensible Christian biologists who accept the fact of evolution? They oughta speak up a bit more and keep their faith from being hijacked by Know Nothings, don’t ya think? What are they afraid of?
‘They oughta speak up a bit more and keep their faith from being hijacked by Know Nothings, don’t ya think?’
Thats the point, The know-nothings have the book on their side.
It seems that Ruse really wants evolution to be acceptable to moderate rational Christians: those poor conflicted cowards. He doesn’t want people to make the jump that believing in evolution makes you an atheist; it doesn’t, but it sure is a sign that you might eventually (and the Fundamentalists know it). That’s where the divide seems to be. He wants biologicians to be tolerant of religion and not force the issue, to say, in essence, ‘It’s okay to believe in God and in evolution.’
WMR seems to grasp his point as well, they want a division between the philosophy and science, but I disagree with his/her statement that Dawkins is making ‘a philosophic argument’ at all. To an atheist, not believing in god is not a philosophic belief. To Dawkins, atheism is the only acceptable position for an scientific biologician; hell, ‘practical atheism’ (God has no measurable effect on anything) is the only acceptable position for any scientist. There’s no ‘philosophy’ to it all.
How many times does it have to be said that atheism isn’t a philosophy or a religion or even a belief system? It is a simple accepting of the facts, a denial of ridiculous, unnecessary fictions – even if that nonsense is rising in fashion.
Sorry, Ruse got me a little mad.
No, Ruse gets me a little mad too. I know exactly what you mean.
How many times does it have to be said? An infinite number, apparently. People just will insist on insisting that atheism is a belief rather than an abstention from a belief – not something most people claim about other abstentions from belief. But we all know that theism is ‘special.’
‘moderate rational Christians: those poor conflicted cowards. He doesn’t want people to make the jump that believing in evolution makes you an atheist’
Great point. I have never understood the folks who seek a union of the two and then say they are compatible. Seems to me it smacks of wishful thinking and mental dishonesty to a certain degree.
I find the ‘Ruse’ian argument too often in my own circles. Living here in Kansas, with the Intelligent Designers breathing down our necks, I find many pro-evolution people refusing any help, much less public help, fighting back the forces of anti-science. They think we atheists should send them money to fight back the attack, but keep in the background, away from the public lights. I’ve even had members of my own organization, The Heartland Humanists, tell me that we should shut up and not draw attention to ourselves. You know, the hell with them. I am what I am, and if they don’t want to take my support, both monitarily and publicly, then I’ll send my money elsewhere.
Dave
I find a refreshing clarity in people who just say what they think, say what they mean, say why they think they do, and don’t go shrouding it and softening it dishonestly… ‘specially folks like Dawkins who, when they do so, actually make sense. Always refreshing to read him, exactly for that reason.
Ruse? Another of the muddled and middling, muttering about strategy. About as refreshing as a cup of mud. Find I couldn’t possibly care less what he has to say, for exactly those reasons.
My attitude toward God is the same as my attitude toward UFO’s: I don’t believe in them, but I can’t prove they don’t exist. I maintain that the step from evolution to atheism is unwarranted, though plausible.
The plausibility is what the creationists fear, but it has nothing to do with science.
Arrrgh.
I really do think that’s a mistake. Tactically as well as other ways. The more atheists stay in the background, the more other atheists think they’re the only ones. That story Daniel Dennett told in the Times op-ed last year (in which, unfortunately, he also had a good word for the ‘Brights’ idea) of casually telling a high school class he was an atheist and having several tell him afterwards that they’d thought they were the only ones.
I just don’t see how creeping religiosity can be resisted without resisting it. And I sure as hell don’t want to give in to it!
I agree evolution doesn’t equal atheism but it is hard to logically connect it with any major world religion. Deism on the other hand kinda fits.
Of course who says we always have to be logical?
:-)
The ‘that’ in above post refers to what Dave said. Little did I know there would be two more comments while I scribbled mine.
Right, wmr, so you’re an aUFOist then. You’re not a UFOist. Not being a UFOist does not entail any claim that you can prove they don’t exist. It’s just a refusal to sign up to UFOism. By the same token you’re an atheist, whether you like the label or not.
This idea that atheism=a claim to be able to prove that god doesn’t exist, is a (deeply entrenched) misunderstanding.
“Always refreshing to read him, exactly for that reason.
Ruse? Another of the muddled and middling, muttering about strategy. About as refreshing as a cup of mud.”
Very amusing. Exactly what I was thinking as I started the new N&C, so I wrote it. I almost said ‘refreshing’ then chose ‘relief’ instead. But it’s true. Ruse’s argument is kind of stifling; Dawkins’ is like a blast of wind.
I’m not a fan of the claim that evolution, and science in general, are not intrinsically opposed to religion. Of course they are. As long as both are trying to explain the existence and nature of the world, then they are competing hypotheses.
And in this competition, science is out there gathering data, critically evaluating the evidence, and actually accomplishing stuff, while religion sits on its ass pompously asserting its accuracy, confident that all they need to do is claim that god says they’re right to win.
“I’m not a fan of the claim that evolution, and science in general, are not intrinsically opposed to religion.”
Same here. I did an In Focus on that very theme a couple of years ago.
I really hated that book of S J Gould’s, Rock of Ages, and one reason I hated it was because it relied on simply pretending throughout that religion doesn’t make any truth claims about the natural world. Well what a joke! Of course it does! This god fella is a part of the natural world, for one thing – they think he designed the dang thing.
OB, Don’t you think it would be good political tactics for evolutionary biologists to trot out as many Christian supporters as possible and put ’em on display? Everyone already knows that atheism and Darwinism are compatible. Hell, the fundies’ ploy is to make middle-of-the-road types think science is inimical to all forms of religion, even the most watered-down. But show everyone that non-fundie Christianity and Darwinism aren’t mutually exclusive and you’ve kicked the main support beam out from under the IDers and creationists. And if the IDers and creationists respond by by claiming that non-fundies aren’t real Christians, then you”re helping to drive a wedge between the two groups, which weakens the fundies politically.
I can live with squishy, non-fundie secular religious types. Fundies, however, are dangerous, and whatever we can do to undermine ’em is a good thing. Or do you consider “politicians” like me even more dangerous than the fundies?
I think OB and others are too quick to dismiss positive atheism (an assertoric belief that there are no gods) in favor of negative atheism (a lack of belief in any god). While it is true that absence of belief in god is not the same as belief in the absence of god, they are both meanings that are perfectly reasonably attached to the word “atheism.” Any clear, substantive dictionary will list both meanings.
And note that even positive atheism – which is my position by the way – need not claim claim anything like proof, or even worse, certainty. One can be a dedicated fallibilist and still have beliefs, after all: In fact, all scientists deserving the name ARE fallibilists, insofar as they eschew absolute certainty in favor of beliefs modifiable by further evidence, and it would be ludicrous to say that scientists don’t have beliefs about the world on that basis.
Amongst the beliefs that one might (fallibly) hold about the world is positive atheism: I believe that human psychology, basic human needs, and cultural evolution provide a better explanation for how and why humans invented concepts of supernatural entities (including gods, but also spirits, ghosts, and all that rot) than the actual existence of such entities. If I believe that gods are a product of human imagination, I clearly believe that gods have no literal, independent metaphysical existence – hence I am a positive atheist as defined above.
So guess what? I’d bet most of you are positive atheists as well: While one interpretation of the term “atheist” is simply lack of belief in a god or gods, if you believe that myths are just that – myths, inventions, confabulations, stories in which the vast majority of the positive literal claims are simply false (even if there may be other levels of non-literal meaning which we might find “truths” of a different sort) – then you also believe that there are no gods. Welcome to the club.
Karl, no, not really. I don’t think evolutionary biologists should have to do that. I don’t think they should have to do any sucking up or apologizing or politicking, I think they should just get on with evolutionary biology. It shouldn’t be a crime or something that people have to beg for permission to do.
G, sure, you’re right, I am a positive atheist, but I don’t think the word has to entail that, and people who whinge about atheism appear to think there’s an atheist bible and ten commandments and pope and the whole works. All of it sprinkled with minus signs of course, but still just as elaborated as The Other Thing.
None of the things you cite are a necessary part of atheism, it seems to me. One can just be, for instance, a lifelong secularist who never gives the matter a thought. (Such people were abundant in the back woods of the 18th century US, amusingly enough. They’d never heard of any of it, and didn’t care. They were busy making tables out of old stumps and trying not to starve.)
“Ruse, a self-identified agnostic, acknowledges the ”thrilling quality” of Dawkins’s writing but says he objects to adamantly anti-religion statements coming from a scientist.”
There are many evolutionists who rely on the claim that there is a separation of religion and science, etc.etc.
Then there are some that seem to want things both ways, there is a separation of religion and science when it comes to seeking evidence for God, yet for atheism and Naturalism, Materialism and so on there is no separation and they rather just merge on in with science itself.
You can try to have things both ways, but the difference between Gould, Ruse and Dawkins is based on this notion of separation.
I prefer Dawkins, as that is the honest position. Yet there are plenty of separationists who will not admit that “religion” has anything to do with “science.” And most of them are the ones that count every piece of evidence against God that they can and then “separate” all else in the name keeping religion and science separate.
There was a book written recently called Total Truth that argues for a lack of separation with respect to knowledge.
OB, Well, of course they shouldn’t have to. But the political scene being what it is right now, that might be the shrewd thing to do. Do you see any drawbacks to that tactic? Would it be more detrimental than helpful in the long run? My immediate concern is to stop the spread of fundamentalism here and abroad.
G,
Well said and much appreciated.
Karl,
I think that the fundamentalists are attacking evolution for two reasons, one being that they see it as the most threatening aspect of science (as they once viewd Gallileo’s heliocentrism), and two, because the actual concepts contained within it are simply not grasped by the majority of the populace. To most people, evolution is not fully reasonable or plausible – they cannot make the leap required, so they view it with distrust. Even if we removed all the fundamentalist attacks, the principles would still be viewed as suspect, I think. We are not going to change the nature of fundamentalists by winning a war on evolution; they will just choose a new target. The problem isn’t that there are moderate Christians who are scared off supporting evolution, but rather that there are people rational enough to grasp evolution who are still supporting religion.
MP
Karl, I guess the drawbacks I see to that tactic have to do with the implicit authority the evolutionary biologists would be giving the moderate Christians. The trotting them out maneuver would seem to be endorsing the idea that evolutionary biology is somehow more permissable if religious people ‘accept’ it. That wouldn’t be the intention, but I don’t see how the implicit message could be avoided.
I think the disadvantage of having Dawkins as spokesman is that it runs the risk of broadening the debate from Evolution Right or Wrong to Let’s Talk About God. The IDers *want* to have the latter debate; it will be much harder for them if they have to argue with people that they can’t damn as Those Bloody Atheists Again.