Critique of "God is Not Great" by Christoper Hitchens

[The Grand Nudger]

Rationality is no cure for religiosity, it would not be even if we were fully rational beings...which we aren't. Take an otherwise unremarkable man. His religious beliefs can be and often are remarkable. I don't think that you would be alone in considering religion and religious thought a symptom, in fact...I think Hitchens would agree. What's the line, "a babyish attempt to meet our inescapable demand for knowledge (as well as for comfort, reassurance and other infantile needs)"..?

What book was that, ah, I remember. God is Not Great.

[robvalue]

Even though I think religion is bullshit and it doesn't directly poison me, it still affects me by the way it has poisoned the environment.

I'm lucky enough to live in England where God has left the building, so the effects are minimal locally, but in many other countries religion is everywhere fucking up your shit even when you want no part of it.

"Poisons everything" is clearly a euphemism anyway, I don't think it's reasonable to assume this was literal. He doesn't mean it poisons every single atom in the universe, or even just here on Earth. It's just a shorthand way of describing the multitude of ways religion can cause harm.

[phil-lndn]

My only argument is that Christopher has made a truth claim without offering fact and reasoning to support the claim.

Unlike arbitrarily assigning 'enlightenment ideas' to the fourth rung of one person's hierarchy of personal cognitive development? Perfumed and polished bullshit is still bullshit.

Do you not think that perhaps a rational thinker would have asked me what evidence I had to support the theory?

---

OK - some of this feels like it hits the mark, perhaps I had not sufficiently considered the premise for his book. Although I did give mention in my post that I thought his writing (insofar as achieving what he'd set out to do) was very well done, perhaps it's reasonable to say that I am criticising the book's premise rather than the book itself.

Nevertheless (for the reasons stated in my post) I do not feel he does demonstrate 'How Religion Poisons Everything', I think through a developmental lens, religion looks more like a symptom (of low levels of development) than a cause and I think his inability to see that creates something of a red herring argument that runs throughout the book.

Example: as an experiment, try and use religious beliefs to "poison" someone who is a fully rational thinker. They are immune to such beliefs, it won't work. So in that context, religion poisons nothing, it's just a meaningless old book.

Just curious...why have you registered here at AF.org?

To post the post I posted at the start of this thread. Which I wanted to do for multiple reasons: I wanted to see if valid criticism could be levelled at it - this seemed like  good place to find it. I also wanted to hear the reactions of people who identify as atheist to having the book and Christopher criticised.

Christopher seems to have broad support in the atheist world, and my impression from hearing Christopher speak is that he operates from a belief system because his truth claim over-extends. Since his belief system seems to be critical of belief systems, I thought that would be a very interesting topic to explore.

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No, he wrote exactly the book I had wished for. 

I had a wonderful time criticising it :-)

In other words - you read it with your mind already made up and with an expressed wish to criticise it. Mission accomplished. Now - as far as I'm concerned - you can f*ck right off...

Haha! Perhaps :-) 

Interestingly, (as noted in my post) Christopher himself admits to having made up his mind at the age of 9 (long before he had an adult knowledge of science or religion) as a result of an insight he had regarding the position of his biology teacher.

Do you think there is something wrong with his behaviour? And if so - what?

[robvalue]

I'm not really understanding your objections.

Sure, he may have phrased some things badly. And no sensible atheist just agrees with everything he said, or claims he was infallible. He made mistakes like everyone else, and could hold strange or unsupported views.

I haven't read the book so I can't comment too much further.

Holy books are mainly nonsense stories, I trust you're not debating that, but we can learn things from them of course. It depends what you're trying to learn as to how detailed your analysis should be and how you should approach it. If you're trying to determine whether a load of magic garbage happened, then the analysis is rather quick.

[phil-lndn]

Rationality is no cure for religiosity, it would not be even if we were fully rational beings...which we aren't.  Take an otherwise unremarkable man.  His religious beliefs can be and often are remarkable.  I don't think that you would be alone in considering religion and religious thought a symptom, in fact...I think Hitchens would agree.  What's the line, "a babyish attempt to meet our inescapable demand for knowledge (as well as for comfort, reassurance and other infantile needs)"..?

What book was that, ah, I remember.  God is Not Great.

Can you please give me an argument for your truth claim that "Rationality is no cure for religiosity".

And (if not rationality) what is the cure for religiosity, how have people managed to step beyond it?

And you seem to be arguing that Christopher thinks that Religion is a symptom of low levels of development ('low levels of development poison everything'), whereas I thought his argument was that religion was actually at cause here? ('religion poisons everything')

Which one causes which?

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Even though I think religion is bullshit and it doesn't directly poison me, it still affects me by the way it has poisoned the environment.

I'm lucky enough to live in England where God has left the building, so the effects are minimal locally, but in many other countries religion is everywhere fucking up your shit even when you want no part of it.

"Poisons everything" is clearly a euphemism anyway, I don't think it's reasonable to assume this was literal. He doesn't mean it poisons every single atom in the universe, or even just here on Earth. It's just a shorthand way of describing the multitude of ways religion can cause harm.

Perhaps, although if that were completely true I doubt Christopher would have chosen to defend the sub-title in the speech of his I posted.

(The link i posted was removed by the moderator, not allowed until i have posted 30 posts for some reason, go to youtube and search for 'Christopher Hitchens Explains Why Religion Poisons Everything' if you want to hear his talk)

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I'm not really understanding your objections.

Sure, he may have phrased some things badly. And no sensible atheist just agrees with everything he said, or claims he was infallible. He made mistakes like everyone else, and could hold strange or unsupported views.

I haven't read the book so I can't comment too much further.

Holy books are mainly nonsense stories, I trust you're not debating that, but we can learn things from them of course. It depends what you're trying to learn as to how detailed your analysis should be and how you should approach it. If you're trying to determine whether a load of magic garbage happened, then the analysis is rather quick.

I think you'd be surprised what happens if you undertake a detailed study of the structure and nature of human perspectives (especially with respect to how different developmental perspectives are structured and dimensionalised)

I take a perspective-centric view of reality, which arrives at the conclusion that all stories about reality are true, but only true from a perspective. So all stories are simultaneously true (descriptive of reality) and untrue (they are all simply stories).

In my opinion, this is equally true for scientific and religious creation stories.

[LadyForCamus]

Unlike arbitrarily assigning 'enlightenment ideas' to the fourth rung of one person's hierarchy of personal cognitive development? Perfumed and polished bullshit is still bullshit.

Do you not think that perhaps a rational thinker would have asked me what evidence I had to support the theory?

---

Just curious...why have you registered here at AF.org?

To post the post I posted at the start of this thread. Which I wanted to do for multiple reasons: I wanted to see if valid criticism could be levelled at it - this seemed like  good place to find it. I also wanted to hear the reactions of people who identify as atheist to having the book and Christopher criticised.

Christopher seems to have broad support in the atheist world, and my impression from hearing Christopher speak is that he operates from a belief system because his truth claim over-extends. Since his belief system seems to be critical of belief systems, I thought that would be a very interesting topic to explore.

Okay, but keep in mind that most of us around here don't hero worship, so if you think you are "taking us down" just because you have objections to one book written by one atheist, you're swinging at nothing. Personally, I preferred The God Delusion by R. Dawkins over GING, but that's just me.

[robvalue]

Phil: I have no idea what you're talking about I'm afraid.

Here's a story:

God just told me I'm in charge of the world now. Then he destroyed himself.

Is this story true in some way, because it's a story?

[Cato]

Unlike arbitrarily assigning 'enlightenment ideas' to the fourth rung of one person's hierarchy of personal cognitive development? Perfumed and polished bullshit is still bullshit.

Do you not think that perhaps a rational thinker would have asked me what evidence I had to support the theory?

No. The point of my reply wasn't discovery. Much of your criticism hinges on what you deem are unsubstantiated claims, yet you engage in the same practice. Is holding and practicing a double standard rational?

[Cato]

I take a perspective-centric view of reality, which arrives at the conclusion that all stories about reality are true, but only true from a perspective. So all stories are simultaneously true (descriptive of reality) and untrue (they are all simply stories).

How do you assess whether or not the story you are being told is an apporximate description of reality; i.e., actually occurred versus being a complete fabrication?

I can't be certain based on your limited input on the matter, but you're coming across as someone that is wrestling with well documented issues with the accuracy of eye witness testimony and the fact that our sense perception gives an incomplete assessment of reality. I stressed 'incomplete' because I typically encounter people that abuse this fact in order to claim that since our knowledge is incomplete then all claims carry a measure of truth to them which couldn't be farther from the truth. Again, until you explain more precisely what you mean I am speculating.

[phil-lndn]

Do you not think that perhaps a rational thinker would have asked me what evidence I had to support the theory?

---

To post the post I posted at the start of this thread. Which I wanted to do for multiple reasons: I wanted to see if valid criticism could be levelled at it - this seemed like  good place to find it. I also wanted to hear the reactions of people who identify as atheist to having the book and Christopher criticised.

Christopher seems to have broad support in the atheist world, and my impression from hearing Christopher speak is that he operates from a belief system because his truth claim over-extends. Since his belief system seems to be critical of belief systems, I thought that would be a very interesting topic to explore.

Okay, but keep in mind that most of us around here don't hero worship, so if you think you are "taking us down" just because you have objections to one book written by one atheist, you're swinging at nothing.  Personally, I preferred The God Delusion by R. Dawkins over GING, but that's just me.    

OK, although I do like to keep my opinions facts-based, so with respect, rather than simply believing what you say is true, my opinion on whether or not I am "swinging at nothing" will be decided the basis of how much defensive behaviour shows up in this thread.

Actually I do think most who have posted have handled the challenge pretty well, but I think it would be incorrect to say that there has been zero defensive behaviour on this thread.