PZ Myers has gone and gotten himself embroiled in another one of those imbroglios. For those of you who don’t trouble to read any other blogs, the story began with the report of a student in Florida who smuggled a Communion wafer — the Body of Christ, to Catholics — out of Mass. This led to something of an overreaction on the part of some local believers, who referred to the stunt as a “hate crime,” and the student even received death threats. (You remember the part of the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus says “Blessed are those who exterminate those who insult Me,” right?)
PZ was roused to indignation by the incident, and wrote a provocative post in which he volunteered to do grievous harm to Communion wafers, if he could just get his hands on any.
Can anyone out there score me some consecrated communion wafers? There’s no way I can personally get them — my local churches have stakes prepared for me, I’m sure — but if any of you would be willing to do what it takes to get me some, or even one, and mail it to me, I’ll show you sacrilege, gladly, and with much fanfare. I won’t be tempted to hold it hostage … but will instead treat it with profound disrespect and heinous cracker abuse, all photographed and presented here on the web. I shall do so joyfully and with laughter in my heart. If you can smuggle some out from under the armed guards and grim nuns hovering over your local communion ceremony, just write to me and I’ll send you my home address.
But the thing that took the whole mess to another level was the intervention of Bill Donohue, whose Catholic League represents the very most lunatic fringe of the Church. Donohue, who specializes in being outraged, contacted the administration at the University of Minnesota, as well as the state legislature. Later deciding that this level of dudgeon wasn’t quite high enough, Donohue soon after upped the ante, prompting a delegate to the Republican National Convention to demand additional security, as the delegates felt physically threatened by PZ and his assembled hordes. (The Republican convention will be held in the Twin Cities, about 150 miles away from PZ’s university in Morris, Minnesota.)
There is a lot of craziness here. People are sending death threats and attacking someone’s employment because of hypothetical (not even actual) violence to a wafer. Even for someone who is a literal believer in transubstantiation, threatening violence against someone who mocks your beliefs doesn’t seem like a very Christian attitude. Donohue and his friends are acting like buffoons, giving free ammunition to people who think that all religious believers are nutjobs. But it gets him on TV, so he’s unlikely to desist.
However.
We should hold our friends to a much higher standards than we hold our adversaries. There is no way in which PZ is comparable to the folks sending him death threats. I completely agree with him on the substantive question — it’s just a cracker. It doesn’t turn into anyone’s body, and there’s nothing different about a “consecrated” wafer than an unconsecrated one — the laws of physics have something to say about that.
But I thought his original post was severely misguided. It’s not a matter of freedom of speech — PZ has every right to post whatever opinions he wants on his blog, and I admire him immensely for his passionate advocacy for the cause of godlessness. But just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. And there’s a huge difference between arguing passionately that God doesn’t exist, and taking joy in doing things that disturb religious people.
Let me explain this position by way of a parable, which I understand is the preferred device in these situations. Alice and Bob have been friends for a long time. Several years ago, Alice gave birth to a son, who was unfortunately critically ill from the start; after being in intensive care for a few months, he ultimately passed away. Alice’s most prized possession is a tiny baby rattle, which was her son’s only toy for the short time he was alive.
Bob, however, happens to be an expert on rattles. (A childhood hobby — let’s not dig into that.) And he knows for a fact that this rattle can’t be the one that Alice’s son had — this particular model wasn’t even produced until two years after the baby was born. Who knows what mistake happened, but Bob is completely certain that Alice is factually incorrect about the provenance of this rattle.
And Bob, being devoted to the truth above all other things, tries his best to convince Alice that she is mistaken about the rattle. But she won’t be swayed; to her, the rattle is a sentimental token of her attachment to her son, and it means the world to her. Frankly, she is being completely irrational about this.
So, striking a brave blow for truth, Bob steals the rattle when Alice isn’t looking. And then he smashes it into many little pieces, and flushes them all down the toilet.
Surprisingly to Bob, Alice is not impressed with this gesture. Neither, in fact, are many of his friends among the rattle-collecting cognoscenti; rather than appreciating his respect for the truth, they seem to think he was just being “an asshole.”
I think there is some similarity here. It’s an unfortunate feature of a certain strand of contemporary atheism that it doesn’t treat religious believers as fellow humans with whom we disagree, but as tards who function primarily as objects of ridicule. And ridicule has its place. But sometimes it’s gratuitous. Sure, there are stupid/crazy religious people; there are also stupid/crazy atheists, and black people, and white people, and gays, and straights, and Republicans, and Democrats, and Sixers fans, and Celtics fans, and so on. Focusing on stupidest among those with whom you disagree is a sign of weakness, not of strength.
It seems to me that the default stance of a proud secular humanist should be to respect other people as human beings, even if we definitively and unambiguously think they are wrong. There will always be a lunatic fringe (and it may be a big one) that is impervious to reason, and there some good old-fashioned mockery is perfectly called for. But I don’t see the point in going out of one’s way to insult and offend wide swaths of people for no particular purpose, and to do so joyfully and with laughter in your heart. (Apparently the litmus test for integrity vs. hypocrisy on this issue is how you felt about the Mohammed cartoons published in a Danish newspaper a couple of years ago; so you can read my take on that here, and scour the text for inconsistencies.)
Actually, I do see the point in the gratuitous insults, I just don’t like it. Like any other controversial stance, belief in God or not divides people into camps. And once the camps are formed, the temptations of tribalism are difficult to resist. We are smart and courageous and wise; the people who disagree with us are stupid and cowardly and irrational. And it’s easy enough to find plenty of examples of every combination, on any particular side. There is nothing more satisfying than getting together and patting ourselves on the back for how wonderful we are, and snorting with derision at the shambling oafishness of that other tribe over there.
My hope is that humanists can not only patiently explain why God and any accompanying metaphysical superstructure is unnecessary and unsupported by the facts, but also provide compelling role models for living a life of reason, which includes the capacity for respectful disagreement.
I say all this with a certain amount of care, as there is nothing more annoying than people who think that professions of atheism or careful arguments against the existence of God are automatically offensive. Respectful dialogue cuts both ways; people should be able to explain why they don’t believe in the supernatural or why they believe. Even if both atheists and believers are susceptible to the temptations of tribalism, that doesn’t make them equivalent; the atheists have the advantage of being right on the substance. Richard Dawkins and his friends have done a great service to our modern discourse, by letting atheism get a foot in the door of respectable stances that one has to admit are held by a nontrivial fraction of people — even if they stepped on a few toes to do it. But stepping on toes should be a means to an end; it shouldn’t be an end in itself.
Adrain: “I would far prefer that ideas were discussed publicly in a rational, genteel fashion with credence given to fact and reality.”
That’s great, and that’s what I suggest for all around, religious, atheist, whatever. I think it’s pretty clear, as I said, that inviting ridicule of one’s critic on a “blog” is rather revolting. BTW some have the fallacious notion that complainers about the wafer incident imply or state that ridiculing non-religious belief is somehow OK in a general sense but ridiculing religious belief isn’t. I sure don’t think so, to me it’s about the particulars and weighing of significance to the believers versus actual threat to liberties or whatever – and even in the last case, it is debatable in perfectly rational terms what should be done (is it *logically obvious* that same-gender persons should be able to enter into the same state-sanctioned ceremony as others? How about private use of intoxicants, how about public nudity (or, why should men be allowed to go shirtless and not women, etc.)? Many of those are political disagreements, not what you can “prove” logically to be the “correct” social policy.
(How ironic, so many of these materialist skeptics don’t even appreciate that their ethical pronouncements about oppression etc. are philosophically “meaningless” in strict positivist terms, just like metaphysical statements about God etc. That’s what the positivists actually said, don’t blame me and I don’t agree with them – but what then would be your excuse?) In any case, I think that if something is bad and dangerous enough not to deserve consideration per believers’ feelings, then it’s too grave to trivialized by ridicule anyway.
As for the points raised by JimV:
I mean, there’s no reason to think non-existence is more likely for a hypothetical, over and above the merits or lack of, for believing in it in particular. IOW I don’t trust the Occam argument, however much attractive and historically followed – what is the basis for our having and trusting that insight into reality’s “existence habits” anyway? Whether you agree with my take on the razor, the case of extra fiddles in Maxwell equations etc. (since they are loose-end refinements to an existing structure) is not at all like whether the whole universe needs some cause beyond itself, or not. It’s the difference between a thing having extra curlicues versus whether there’s something at all, or not at all, in a fundamental category. As for explaining the FC, it has long been appreciated that the real question is: what sort of being would be self-existent, not the sophomore’s straw man pretense that if “everything needs to be created then who created God.” (Every Medieval schoolman realized that.) The problem with our universe being “it” is that our universe is too particular. For all this to just be here and be self-justifying among all the possible worlds in the platonic mindscape (ref. modal realism above) is like the number 23, among all numbers, being made into real brass numerals despite just being a number like 0, 1, 5, 100, e, 4.5 – 12i, e, etc. Even picking out some realities is the same problem, like why reify the numbers from 5 to 28 but none of the others, etc.
But if you want to believe the opposite extreme that “everything exists” and there’s no distinction anyway, go ahead but be warned – it creates a huge mess. If you read Davies’ book The Mind of God, you will see that many of the intuitively appealing drawing-room rational homilies and objections you’re used to don’t do too well in the philosophical meat grinder. That doesn’t mean the case for God is tidy and convincing either, just that (as you admit) smart people are aware this is a deep question which can be cogently argued either way at the highest levels. It sure isn’t a skeptics’ slam-dunk or sandlot blow-off.
Q: I think you’re right: what PZ did was rude, not evil. How many here will even accept that it was rude, in a sense deserving of complaint about rudeness? Some just plum defend it. (Or is that “plumb”, from lead pointing straight down from it’s density?)
Neil B., I suspect some of the resistance to stipulating that PZ is being rude is that his mere rudeness is being returned by death threats. So taking the time to stipulate to PZ’s rudeness in this matter (as I have) runs the risk of putting the emphasis on the wrong syl-LA-ble.
piscator,
“invicit,
I don’t accept the relevance of the analogy; such hypothetical technology would not affect the biology of the sexual act.”
Well, with the rest of your post you demonstrated precisely how my remark was relevant. The whole idea of the analogy was to show that Catholics are not just concerned with the practicalities of procreation, but have strange ideas about certain things being sinful in and of themselves for no particular reason and when they do not cause any harm. The moral system of Christianity is based on vague reasoning and reliance on an antiquated text with little relevance today, and furthermore glaring inconsistencies and not only illogical statements, but statements given no justification at all but simply to be taken as truth because they happen to be found inside the cover of a particular book which has been declared holy. I prefer a moral system which actually makes sense and is not based on magic. Where actions are based on whether they are harmful or beneficial for others and oneself, not just simply declared right or wrong for no reason at all.
i had to check this blog after i had my sleep. you are still at it!!!
i have been reading cosmic variance for not-quite-a-long-while. i wish beliefs on crackers and rattles and rudeness and patriarchy and humanism can assume a quantitative value to arrive at a MASS to formulate how it affects the politics of beliefs and symbols! 🙂 this is exciting.
i would be happy to know if someone has written a book about the politics of [form and function] dearly held beliefs in the post modern world, its assumptions and implications. thanks 🙂
i am new to your blog. i am far the far east where the old and the new thrive and respect one another and sometimes have bloodshed.
From #142 Maynard Handley
“So Luke, please explain and clarify for us, oh wise one, the many documented cases of homosexual behavior in a wide variety of species.”
From #147 Lawrence B. Crowell
“You might want to look at a book titled “Exhuberant Life,” which gives a lot of examples of homosexual and transgendered behavior in a wide range of animals. ,,These behaviors occur in mammals and birds, and probably there were bisexual, homosexual or transgender behaving dinosaurs.”
Why is animal behavior relevant to the issue of human homosexuality? Is this an attempt to justify certain types of human behavior if similar behavior can be found in animals in the wild? I am somewhat afraid to ask, but is this where are you going? Should we model our behavior after what animals do?
It feels almost embarassing to have to point this out to the many here (including the original post) who seem to have completely missed it, but…
While pointlessly provoking someone’s outrage may indeed be hurtful, it’s a horse of an entirely different color to do so in order to make a point. Especially to someone who so many wish desperately would confront the underlying irrationality driving their outrage, in a very public fashion, for didactic value.
Neil B @150
My deep and dark suspicion is that those on the two sides of the “genteel vs rude” debate are closer to agreement than one might suspect. Was PZ rude in his original post? Yes. Was he being rude because he is a “snotty brat” or was it calculated to produce an effect? My suspicion, having read Pharyngula for a long time, is the latter.
Again, the tool one uses depends on the job one wishes to do. If one wishes to argue a point and persuade others (not necessarily the individual you are directly arguing with, but perhaps a bystander) then one may have to resort to such tactics. My experience from living in Texas for 8 (very long) years and Georgia for 6 is that one has to use these tactics more frequently than one might like.
Some make the argument that the tactics used by PZ and others display an arrogant sense of superiority. I think a convincing argument can be made for the opposite; those arguing for a more genteel approach have the superior attitude. If the point of the argument is to convince others, then you use the tools that are necessary. If the point of an argument is to come away knowing that, even though you’ve not convinced anyone of your point of view, at least you have not stooped to the depths of using unpleasant tactics, then you will always follow the route of being genteel.
In a good martial art, students are taught to use an appropriate level of force for the task at hand. You use a gentle put-down for a harmless drunk at a party. You may have to break the wrist of someone attacking you with a knife, The same rationale applies here, if your aim is to convince others of your point of view.
I must admit to being confused about the discussions involving public nudity and intoxication. I’m not sure where that comes in.
“In any case, I think that if something is bad and dangerous enough not to deserve consideration per believers’ feelings, then it’s too grave to trivialized by ridicule anyway.”
Unfortunately, the reality of the situation is that if you use the genteel approach with these matters here in Georgia or in Texas, you will loose your argument, things will not change, and what’s worse, you will be perceived of as being weak and rather pathetic (incorrectly I know, but that is how people will see you). Frequently, you have to shock people out of their habitual modes of thinking (or even shock them into thinking in the first place) in order to make any headway at all. This is just the reality of the situation.
Personally, I’m very happy for you or anyone else if you never have to experience this. I think Americans (as a gross generalization here) have, over the last 10 years, displayed a remarkable ability to be unmoved by fact, reality and rational argument. This disdain for reality goes all the way to the top. If you argue rationally and politely you get labelled a liberal (when, why and how the heck did “liberal” become a dirty word) and are immediately dismissed.
All the best,
Adrian
I suggest that people go and read the original story. I haven’t read all the posts here, and I understand that this post is more about PZ’s response and not the original incident. In general, I agree with Sean. But as a UCF student and long time reader of CV, I think I should point out a few things.
When Webster was asked to eat the wafer, and he refused and attempted to explain why, a student at the Campus Catholic Ministry tried to use physical force to make him eat it and then the minister kicked him out. He gave the wafer back a week later when he was given the chance.
Yeah, that’s right. He saved the wafer. For a week. And gave it back. Because in the process of getting kicked out, he realized that it was important to them.
He filed charges with the school for the physical force used against him, but dropped them because he realized that the situation was a misunderstanding and was willing to let it go.
The Campus Ministry is still pushing to have him face severe consequences – to expel him from school or press hate crime charges. Even if that doesn’t go through, he will probably be removed from his student government position.
Webster has also received hundreds of threats. Hundreds. After already being assaulted. I would also like to point out that the Christian groups on campus have a history of being nutty and taking things too far. I have been harassed more than once on my way to class, as have many people I know. (They like to stand outside the Physics & Math building.) I have a few friends who are Catholic, and they all attend church off-campus because they don’t want to participate in the on-campus groups.
So take their threats seriously. And it’s likely that they pressing this because they want the university and/or police to officially recognize the wafer as the body of Christ, and nothing less.
OK, thanks to anyone who read this, and back to the original topic…
@Trace: Body of Christ??? Yuck – imagine alone the *smell* of a bloke who spent 40 days hallucinating in the desert. Is that why they wash him down with wine (sorry: his blood)?
Some time ago, Dr. Carroll made a post here explaining his comment-moderation policy. It contained some general rule about not accepting comments whose intent was to be offensive. Dr. Myers made a comment to that post implying something like this: that he himself could not reliably distinguish between offensiveness and passion, and so gives commenters greater leeway in this regard. I think the same disagreement is in evidence here.
At times I admire the passion with which Dr. Myers writes, especially the intellectual passion he exhibits in his science posts. At other times, he extends the line between passion and offensiveness over into what is foul territory on my playing field. Still, if there were no variations between individuals, evolution would have had to invent some.
JimV: if you are referring to my comment 159 as too offensive, I am fine with having it removed. On a more serious note, the mere thought of consuming something that is physically part of someone, especially a person I claim to love, is unbearable, to say the least.
1.
It’s a cracker like the flag is a piece of cloth, or the Constitution is a piece of paper or books are fuel for fires like wood, or Michelangelo’s David is a slab of marble. There are ideas and values bound up with things – PZ Myers in his purely materialistic vein tends to forget that human beings tend to do that.
However if someone desecrated the Catholic worship, the response ought not to be violence or intimidation. Nor should the response to PZ Myers’ mockery be these threats and intimidation. At some point the Eucharist does become only a cracker because of this stupid behavior. Unless you’re claiming that Jesus Christ would support death threats and hate mail.
—-
2.
Is human life sacred? It is also just a collection of material and material processes. If human life is the highest value we have, why do some people put their lives at risk not bowing down to tyranny? Many people would trade for a shorter life but that did something “significant”, that lasted beyond their lifetimes, that gave them “immortality” in this short-lived civilization of a recent species.
Once we admit that there are values not inherent in matter, then who is to say which is real and which is a delusion? To the Christian I imagine (I am not a Christian) that cracker represents a transcendental love. It doesn’t really matter whether an instance of that love really existed any more than it matters whether the flat infinite plane of Euclidean geometry is actually realized in our world.
Did those particular Catholics respond in a wrong manner to the desecration of their rite? IMO, yes. But the answer to that is not PZ Myers’ desecration. Not because as Sean Carroll would have it, secular humanists should treat retards with respect; but simply because attaching deep significance to things is a human characteristic; we would be something else, not human, if we did not.
(Warning – I’m not going to fend off the idiots who come along and say, what if it was human sacrifice, blah, blah, blah. Generously, they’re idiots because otherwise they could figure it out for themselves.)
Arun, it does matter whether a flat, infinite Euclidean plane actually exists in our world or not. Leaving aside the cosmological implications, whether infinite planes exist in reality or not is an important factor in determining how accurately such planes can be used to mathematically model things in the real world. In the same way, if the kind of transcendental love you speak of does not in fact actually exist, it behooves us to pointedly question how much relevance the idea has to actual human life and experience in the universe. It is human to attach deep significance to things, but that doesn’t mean we should do it naively or without thought.
Wonderfully written article!! I love your point and couldn’t agree more. Atheists are constantly seeking rational and logical discussion regarding the existence of God, and having such a well-known and respected man doing something childish out of spite is a step backwards in the effort for mutual respect and tolerance.
Also, Arun, great point!! “Did those particular Catholics respond in a wrong manner to the desecration of their rite? IMO, yes. But the answer to that is not PZ Myers’ desecration. Not because as Sean Carroll would have it, secular humanists should treat retards with respect; but simply because attaching deep significance to things is a human characteristic; we would be something else, not human, if we did not.”
P.S. The blog I linked to is a friend’s blog. He writes about Atheism and religion tremendously more than I do, so I figured it would be of more interest to everyone here. (My blog is in redevelopment)
How about getting a big swig of the consecrated wine ?
@ daisy rose
As a former alterboy (non-fondled kind), on occasion we were allowed to help finish off the consecrated wine. I would avoid it as I have tasted better boxed wines.
Pingback: The parable of Alice’s rattle! « Entertaining Research
The story of Jesus started as a tale of social insurrection and crossed the political spectrum to being a tool of civil indoctrination when Constantine recognized the cross made an effective war totem. Like all religion, it finds ways to express the political dichotomy and has a bit of split personality as a result. I tend to view God the Father as the conservative, absolutist, past and order oriented analogy, while the Holy Ghost is the future hope/mystery side of the equation, with Jesus being the complex intersection of order and chaos that is the present.
Sean, oh you are quite dramatic in your pregnant use of the “however” word, aren’t you? Followed immediately by that “tactful” spiel about how one “should hold one’s friends to a much higher standard than our adversaries”. You almost had me
You usually have plenty of sensible things to say, and I regularly find myself in agreement. But in this one I utterly disagree with you. You are dead wrong.
Your “parable” does not match the circumstances that transpired over at Pharyngula in any way shape or form. Why? Because your premises are wrong to begin with. For example, you say:
“There’s a huge difference between arguing passionately that God doesn’t exist, and taking joy in doing things that disturb religious people.”
For crying out loud! PZ was NOT “taking joy” in doing anything to disturb religious people. This is YOUR conclusion. Atheists like PZ do NOT get any jollies out of criticizing religious fanatics. What, do you think because his growing legion of commentors often utilize sarcastic wit in order to get through their blogged-out day that you can conclude that there is merriment in the circumstance that the world is literally held hostage by superstitious nonsense? Or that what his commentors post reflects what you suppose PZ thinks, say, because he’s somehow cultivated rather than merely attracted that large following?
Religious superstition is a disaster against the welfare of humanity and civilization. How do you suppose any sceptic who loves their species or culture or nation could possibly enjoy the thankless task of trying to help free so many fellow beings from the tyranny of institutionalized superstition?
How can PZ’s remarks threaten any “desecration”? DESECRATION ISN’T EVEN POSSIBLE, as you very well know, and most reasonably-minded Christians know. It wasn’t even an issue, until the crazies weighed in on it, as I’m sure you already suspect.
I happened to be visiting his site the moment PZ the posted “It’s a Frackin’ Cracker!” It was quite obvious to anybody who read that post at that time that he was simply mocking the outrage of the lunatics who threatened violence to that poor student. WHY? Because it’s obviously insane to place more importance in what he repeatedly characterized (and rightly so) as a “frackin’ cracker” than in a real human being. He said so: it was nothing more than “a frackin’ cracker”. That’s all it is, and that’s really all there was to it.
Can you possibly object to that? Because that’s what it was all about…until some people’s opinion of it were increasingly colored by subsequent comments (several thousands now) and assorted emailed threats of violence to PZ. Now, somehow, what PZ said must be characterized in a different light, aye?
This is NOT something that THEN offended any of the majority of the semi-rational religious, as PZ would readily acknowledge. But his remarks were very well and expertly calculated indeed to inflame those with a fundamentalist bent who do nothing ELSE but react outrageously, angrily, and irrationally, over the most trivial possible circumstances. That a young man should suffer such terrible ridicule and abuse and threats to his life (not to mention eternal damnation) JUST BECAUSE HE STOLE A LOUSY WAFER is absolutely, positively, good, decent and virtuous reason to assail the real culprits in this adventure.
PZ hit the bull’s eye precisely. Your shot is so wayward that it completely missed the target and hit the wrong guy.
Don’t you see? PZ was pointing out how foolish the MOST FOOLISH people are. So everyone can see how incredibly silly their professed allegiance to a lousy cracker is. Did his remarks disturb or offend anyone? SURE!!! Anybody who is clueless enough to think that a piece of bad bread can actually host a son of a deity who’s been dead for 2000 years.
Your parable of an emotionally vulnerable mother who has lost a child (which you so simplistically identify with all Christians) and her asshole antagonist male friend which you offer as an analogy of what’s transpired with “Crackergate” is so off base and insulting I am frankly dumbfounded that it was crafted by a person who is trained in the hard science of physics.
Now, PZ’s site has become enormously popular, especially over the last year or so, no question about it. Good reason, too – the man is a genuinely honest fellow, as well as a genius. And, of course, it is precisely because of the nature of the topic under discussion there, that the religiously fanatic trolls – relatively few in number (and ONE individual has apparently been responsible for posting under about a dozen monikers, according to PZ) – can weild a disproportionate influence on many of the regulars who post comments there, because the temptation to “feed the trolls” by ripping into their incredibly ignorant and insulting remarks with exceedingly colorful language can be overwhelming.
Can anybody be justified in judging PZ or his atheist afficianados with poor social skills as a result? NOT AT ALL!
The minority of believers who were “disturbed” or offended by his remarks are the same ones who were outraged that that poor kid had run off with the wafer without ingesting it on the spot. This is sheer madness, and PZ was entirely justified in calling these nuts out for all to see. You want to make a bet that the vast majority of “religious” people (you know, those who haven’t yet been totally absorbed by the really REALLY Dark Side of their culture) agree with PZ that these folks are nuts? It would be a good idea if you could summon at least some objectivity whenever you are henceforth moved to judge the motives of certain individuals based on what you hear from the worst of their kind. I’ll just assume that I’ve seen yet another blip of the sort that has long convinced me that even the most rational among us stumble badly from time to time. It’s ok, as long as it isn’t habit-forming.
Luke (#149) wrote:
That sounds hopelessly naive, and the effect if any is probably miniscule to non-existent.
Evolution isn’t just about individuals but related groups, and there are loads of plausible explanations for how homosexuality could benefit a group, or be a neutral byproduct of some advantage.
For example, adolescent homosexuality in primitive societies (which humans have been for the vast majority of our existence as a species) could help with bonding among equals and mentoring with elders a-la ancient Greece. It would also have reduced the physical risk to teenagers of competing with larger adult males for women.
Also, a recent study indicated that more fertile women were more likely to have homosexual male offspring, presumably something to do with more female hormones swilling around while the foetus was developing.
Reading between the lines (and apologies if I’ve misread), you also seem to think of homosexuals as worthless and contemptible individuals we’d be better off without. But consider how many famous generals and leaders have been gay, in part or entirely, for example Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Hadrian. The list is endless, and far more than one would expect by chance. This isn’t intended as a panegyric or anything like that, but merely to make the point that homosexuality can go hand in hand with the charisma and insight into their fellows which makes for an effective leader and therefore benefits a male-dominated society or group.
Anchor:
PZ was NOT “taking joy” in doing anything to disturb religious people. This is YOUR conclusion. Atheists like PZ do NOT get any jollies out of criticizing religious fanatics.
My conclusion too. Read his blog without reading any of the comments. He does get jollies criticizing not just religious fanatics but religion of any kind.
-Arun
Anchor:
Religious superstition is a disaster against the welfare of humanity and civilization. How do you suppose any sceptic who loves their species or culture or nation could possibly enjoy the thankless task of trying to help free so many fellow beings from the tyranny of institutionalized superstition?
Presumably everything that exists due to evolution has positive or neutral survival value; and that would include religion. If you want to give an argument that religion is an evolutionary deadend do so before you say that skepticism is driven from love of species.
Good reason, too – the man is a genuinely honest fellow, as well as a genius.
The man is a great teacher of biology. Beyond that I fail to see genius. His railing against religion has all the slickness and shallowness of the snakeoil salesman at the county fair. His explanations of why people are religious never go beyond pop psychology. As he is a honest fellow, he will probably agree with this.
I strongly agree with the original post.
My, doesn’t self-righteousness feel good?
Arun: “Presumably everything that exists due to evolution has positive or neutral survival value; and that would include religion.”
Your presumption that evolution produces “positive or neutral survival value” is only partially true at best (even organisms that are profoundly diseased or fatally damaged can and DO “exist” – alive – for a time, you know, and these unfortunate beings are products of said evolution every bit as much as successful or healthy individuals are), but the implication that the all resulting CONFIGURATIONS are necessarily the best possible ones is completely untrue.
I have no doubts that religion is an artifact of cultural evolution. That certainly doesn’t mean that religion ought to be uniformly regarded as a positive or neutral cultural configuration, especially since anyone can plainly see that what religion so effectively cultivates – superstitious thinking – has not been shown to have any survival value other than as a rallying point around which some measure of social coherence amongst like-minded advocates is achieved. However, we all know that many other rationality-based belief systems offer precisely that very same particular survival value in terms of social cohesion.
It ALSO confers a survival value in those who make a strong effort to continuously improve their world views in order to better reflect the real world outside of our heads. These people realize that viability is dictated by natural laws independent of what their conceptual models – they’re dictated by a reality that exists “outside” of their minds, not some superstitious figment residing inside their minds. So, comparitively, just what is so “positive or neutral” about the chronic denial of evidence which superstition promotes?
At any rate, just because you think “everything that exists due to evolution has positive or neutral survival value”, isn’t a reason to draw any conclusion that we should all give up on trying to shape and improve our societies and destinies by letting some mindless thing we call evolution call the shots. I trust you would not think that, would you?
By “genius”, I was simply using the word in it’s broadest meaning, referring generally to a comparitively high standard of excellence, and referring to PZ’s exceptional ability as a writer and, yes, as a teacher. One CAN be a genius in those areas and many others, can’t they? I appreciate your veneration of the word, but all the “geniuses” I know don’t place that much importance in it as a label of personal distinction. It’s just a WORD, one that describes relative distinction, not a physical attribute.
As for your sentiment that “his railing against religion has all the slickness and shallowness of the snakeoil salesman at the county fair” and that “his explanations of why people are religious never go beyond pop psychology”: I certainly respect your opinion, however faulty I think it is. That’s my opinion. You are entitled to your own, but I find it amazing that you should go to such pains to characterize what is, after all, the personal observations of a bloke in the informal atmosphere of a BLOG!
Have you actually READ what PZ writes? It’s MY opinion that it is an exemplar of rational discourse (on a touchy subject, to be sure) presented in highly digestible colloquial terms, so that almost everyone can understand what he’s talking about. HE knows it’s inappropriate to use excessively technical jargon which is popularly perceived to be how the ‘scientific elite’ impress each other. He posts VERY frequently on examples of consummate silliness, because there is an enormous amount of silliness out there. How can anyone blame him for the foolishness of others? MAJOR foolishness that affects us ALL adversely. He’s a clearing house of the absurd, and he gets criticized for pointing out the most ghastly examples? Surely you can reserve your carny “snakeoil salesman” for the vastly more appropriate target, such as the incessantly barking evangelical fundamentalists who behave as if ignorance is a virtue.
Nick: thanks for the support! Much appreciated.