I’ve been commenting on that thread at CFI. The moderators want it to go away, but I think they shouldn’t want that, because the underlying issues are entirely relevant to CFI. They think it’s all personal, but it isn’t. It really isn’t. The truth is I don’t care about Chris Mooney as a person at all. Of course I don’t. I care about what he’s saying and doing; I care about the ideas and their consequences. It’s not personal. (I admit it seems personal, while it’s going on, but when I think about it, I realize it isn’t, at all.)

So here’s some of what I said.

He has still never explained what he thinks Jerry Coyne should have … Read the rest

Mark Vernon explains that John Polkinghorne is not a god of the gaps theist-scientist. He’s a nature is underdetermined theist-scientist. That’s much more sensible, apparently.

…there is a possibility of giving an account of divine action within nature, which is compatible with science. It relies neither upon a God who intervenes outside the usual play of nature, nor seeks low-level causal gaps. Rather, God’s action could be viewed as analogous to top-down, emergent causation – particularly when it implies signs of purpose or intentionality.

He doesn’t explain why “God” is the right name for top-down, emergent causation, or how one is to reconcile that with the familiar “God” of the people who pray to it, but never mind – … Read the rest

It seems to me there’s a considerable amount of bullshit in the UK government’s response to the petition urging it to tell the pope on second thought to stay home.

The visit is described as a Papal Visit with the status of a State Visit… 

The Holy See has a global reach and so is a valuable international partner for the UK Government.  Our relationship with the Holy See enables us to address jointly a range of foreign policy and development issues…

As with any bilateral diplomatic relationship, there are issues on which we disagree.

Lots of things have “a global reach”; that doesn’t necessarily make them worth treating as honored guests. Al Qaeda has a global reach; McDonald’s … Read the rest

A note on Karl Giberson’s Huffington Post piece.

Can one accept the modern scientific view of the world and still hold to anything resembling a traditional belief in God?

My answer to this question is “yes, of course,” for I cannot see my way to clear to embrace either of the two alternatives — a fundamentalist religion prepared to reject science, or a pure scientism that denies the reality of anything beyond what science can discover.

But that isn’t the choice. Really, it’s not. Science can’t discover exactly what it feels like to be you, for example, but you know that that feeling is real. The complexity of personal experience alone is enough to keep you busy and happy … Read the rest

If you’re tired of hearing people say that science cannot address the supernatural, Barbara Forrest’s “Methodological Naturalism and Philosophical Naturalism: Clarifying the Connection” is just what you want to read.

From the abstract:

I conclude that the relationship between methodological and philosophical naturalism, while not one of logical entailment, is the only reasonable metaphysical conclusion given (1) the demonstrated success of methodological naturalism, combined with (2) the massive amount of knowledge gained by it, (3) the lack of a method or epistemology for knowing the supernatural, and (4) the subsequent lack of evidence for the supernatural. The above factors together provide solid grounding for philosophical naturalism, while supernaturalism remains little more than a logical possibility.

From page 5

…the methodology

Mooney doesn’t like being called an accommodationist. (Not unlike the way we don’t like being called “the New Atheist noise machine” or “the New Atheist comment machine,” perhaps.) He suggests different words.

I also am tired of the label “accommodationist.” It seems to imply that there is something weak about my view, as if I’m all ready to just cave to some common enemy. On the contrary, I think that I’m being tolerant and pragmatic.

Tolerant of what? Not of overt (explicit, non-apologetic, argumentative, reasoned) atheism, certainly. Tolerant of one side of a dispute that he himself has done a lot to create, so “tolerant” doesn’t really fit. (That’s not a very damning point, in my book – I think … Read the rest