This is my review of Atheism Remix: A Christian Confronts the New Atheists by R. Albert Mohler Jr.
If anyone at all reading this knows about R. Albert Mohler Jr. it is more than likely from this NPR story titled "Christians Divided Over Science of Human Origins".
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/22/140710361/christians-divided-over-science-of-human-origins
In this story the author of the book Atheism Remix: A Christian Confronts the New Atheists shows his support for a literal Adam and Eve event in human history: one man, one woman. (You know, just like REAL marriage!) Dan, an old friend of mine, mentioned a book his boss at the time had written. This was the book by R. Albert Mohler. At the time this was mentioned Dan and I were having a mild debate on creationism vs. evolution. Dan attended the same Christian Junior High School I had once attended in a small town in the Midwest. He eventually went on to attain his degree from a Bible college and become a professor, pastor, and currently dean of Boyce College in Kentucky. We took drastically different paths. I let go of Christianity after attending a different Bible college and have become a vocal atheist/anti-theist. We have clashed several times on facebook. Dan preferred to come to an em passe (as he would say) in our discussion. I always wanted to dig deeper and to come to some sort of change (one of us). Looking back at some of those heated discussions I see many flaws (as we usually do as we learn more) by my tactics of debate, but the general themes I was arguing were never really answered - which seems common with all Christian apologists. Let's just say, ... They like to dance.
When I was beginning my Bible college education I looked up to Dan as someone I wanted to be like. He was young, funny, and energetic, with a passion for the gospel. He made that gospel relevant to our generation. He seemed real and his beliefs and convictions came from a real place compared to many Christians I had grown up with, those that were simply brainwashed since birth. Dan was brought up in a Christian home, but he attended a public high school eventually. Growing up, I remember he was very intimidating to me. Dan was tough and intense as a teenager. I suppose when he was eventually "saved" and "called" into the ministry it made me respect him and admire the life-changing power of God.
The last time I really talked with Dan we discussed reading Kenneth Miller's Finding Darwin's God: A Scientist's Search for Common Ground Between God and Evolution . We were to complete a book then come up with a short little essay bullet pointing some of the key points. Then we would present it to each other and discuss what we agreed with and disagreed with. I still have not finished the book, and this assignment sort of fizzled out. I had an issue with pinning Dan down on a single subject. I never wanted to talk about atheism or abiogenesis. I just wanted to talk about common descent and evolution by natural selection vs. intelligent design. This is an argument that is airtight in favor of the theory of evolution. There is no other alternative theory to how life began and as good religious apologists do, Dan danced around the subject matter never specifically answering questions, instead just attacking the way I ask questions. For an expert in Christian theology (to a good degree, though he may say otherwise) he tries very hard not to discuss anything other than theism vs. atheism. Which is ultimately a discussion between deism vs. atheism in my opinion. Theism to Christianity is literally "a leap of faith" with not enough (if any) sufficient evidence. However, the scientific evidence to support the theory of evolution (that for me quite literally destroyed my belief in Yahweh) is too immense to argue. Learning the basics of evolution led me completely away from Christianity. Science killed the God of the Bible in my life.
Almost a year or so has passed since I talked with Dan about anything regarding these topics. During our lull I did, in haste, post a "KONI 2012" link on his facebook wall before doing much research on the hype (not my best skeptic moment). Sorry, if you were one of my facebook friends reading this right now that was victim of my "sheeple moment". The other day I was thinking of the next blog entry when I remember Dan's old boss's book Atheism Remix. I looked it up online and found it used for $6 with shipping and purchased it. In the next few weeks I cracked open the 108 pg. book to see what this was all about. As most atheists I've been a huge fan of the "four horsemen" (Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, and the late Hitchens) and all of their books and debates. I've watched the 2 hour long "Four Horsemen" video Dawkin's released about 6 times (where they all sit around drinking and talk about religion). As you can imagine I was very skeptical after knowing a little of what R. Albert Mohler Jr. is all about. I've seen him talk about creationism and stories in the Bible being historically and scientifically accurate. I've seen him on Larry King showing his disapproval of gay marriage. So in a way I went into this book biased. I wanted a good laugh. So I cracked it open
First off,
The book is mostly resumes for each of the "New Atheists". Mohler begins telling us what Old Atheism is, how it started, and what new atheism is and how it arose from secularism. The one thing I expected out of this book (but knew in all seriousness I really wouldn't get) was a single specific refuting argument against a a single specific argument made by the New Atheists. When I pause to think for a second, I can conjure up about a dozen specific arguments made by either Hitchens, Dennett, Harris, or Dawkins against theism and not a single one of them was addressed in this book. In fact, the only time Mohler shares criticism at all is when he is quoting other theologians who have written books such as The Twilight of Atheism: The Rise and Fall of Disbelief in the Modern World by Alister McGrath, The New Atheists: The Twilight of Reason and The War on Religion by Tina Beattie, and John F. Taught's God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens. Mohler also mentions Alvin Plantinga who has written a few articles in several different publications criticizing the New Atheists.
Mostly all arguments cited from these books deal with Richard Dawkins and his book "The God Delusion". Sam Harris is mentioned as the "junior partner in the enterprise of the New Atheism." The New Atheist Mohler barely mentions is the late, great Christopher Hitchens. I wonder why?! Besides providing a small resume he barely mentions his book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. The author does make a rather weak point. He states that the tepid Christian education that Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins received as children more than likely produced their devout atheism. I suppose if they were to be brought up under someone like Jerry Falwell or James Dobson we may have a couple devout Christian evangelists on our hands instead. All arguments seem to converge on the simple assertion that Richard Dawkins wouldn't pass a sophomore college class in philosophy with arguments he presents in his book. He is out of his field of study and makes obvious points against vague, ignorant, stereotyped religious people. While there may be some point to these assertions there is no helpful alternative presented in this book.
Alister McGrath believes Dawkins book "The God Delusion" is made for his fellow atheists as a rally cry to start a revolution against religion. They fail to see that the book is also written for the laymen, the average church-going American who absolutely fits the stereotype presented in his book. A good portion of the people reading Dawkin's book are Americans, and as Mohler makes clear more than once: Most Americans believe in God and nearly 40% don't accept the theory of evolution. Dawkin's book wasn't meant for the theologian Bible scholars with upper level degrees in theology. Richard Dawkin's is writing a book to reach the religious masses.
That brings me to one of many logical fallacies Mohler so kindly graces us with - "Appeal to Popularity". Our author asserts several times in the book that the majority of Americans (95%) believe in God which shows us that secularization is not winning. To his credit however, Mohler does go on to tell the global story that in countries like Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, France, Spain, etc. only 1-5 percent of the population attend church. He states that fewer than 10 percent of these populations claim to believe in God, but in America ("the most hyper-modern state in the world as measured by sociological analysis"- as he puts it) some 40% of Americans don't accept evolution as how we came to be. Thus, evolution is not a sure bet on how we came to be (Fallacy #2 - The Balance Fallacy: Thinking that there is equality between to things Evolution vs. Intelligent Design) Within this mini-book we see logical fallacies ranging from "Appeal to Authority", "Appeal to Tradition", and "Appeal to Consequences of Belief", to name just a few.
I also noticed this behavior and attitude in the New Christians (as I will now call them). There is this laughing off, this intellectual snobby attitude where when we as atheists question the absurdity, contradictions, or falsehood of specific passages of the Bible we are "out of our element". Scholars whose whole life it is to study the original texts in their original languages have answers to these concerns. (Clearly it takes a full time job and an entire academic field to come up with excuses for an irrelevant ancient book pieced together by less intelligent human beings than us). This goes to prove nothing. This is the logical fallacy "Appeal to Authority". There is something to this intellectual dishonesty and academic hysteria that appears to me to be the one last defense before religious literalism crumbs apart completely. Before it all becomes so irrelevant and is studied as simply mythology along with the Greek or Egyptian gods and their stories. Ask a Biblical literalist that is educated like William Lane Craig what they think of the historicity of the talking donkey story in the book of Numbers and see how they respond. They usually don't or give some complicated verbal dance using big theological words that really mean, "yeah, we're full of shit. Obviously a donkey didn't actually talk, but I can't actually admit that the Bible is full of fantastical fictional tales.
For example,
I once asked Dan if he really thought Jonah lived inside a whale, a donkey talked to his owner, and two of every animal species fit on one boat to avoid a worldwide flood. I couldn't get a straight yes or no answer. (*Just as I never could when asking how old he thought planet Earth was). That seems like a simple enough question. Dan responded to the first question with something to the effect of
- Why would you think that I couldn't think these things are possible? I, as a Christian, believe that there is an all-powerful, all-knowing deity that transformed his own son into a human/god to die for the rest of the human race so they won't burn forever in hell? Why would I not believe in miracles such as Joshua stopping the sun or Jesus resurrecting the dead? To be a Christian you simply believe in the supernatural.
Well, um. OK then...
So his answer to my question was of course I believe it .. why? Because the Bible said so and how do I know the Bible is true? Because the Bible says it is? So it's just faith then? When you get to this part... Dan goes silent. See, to theists their faith has evidence to back it up but when asked for evidence it is either going to take an advanced degree in theology, ancient history, and ancient languages to decipher the holy books or it will take too much time to show me Christian history. However we, as atheists, have beliefs that if traced back, end with evidence (until the point where the is no more sufficient evidence). Theists have beliefs that if traced back end with faith. Period. The entire path of Christianity is not littered with evidence at all but faulty assumptions and circumstantial historical documents. Atheism leads us to be humble and say WE DON'T KNOW! where Christians and other theists say we not only know but if you don't accept what we know then you will be punished. Sorry - it's just the nature of God. (who we can't prove exists. Oh but he loves you too.).
The interesting thing is the "liberal" theologians that Mohler uses to "prove" that this New Atheism is flawed are people that he doesn't ultimately agree with. For example Haught and Beattie are, as Mohler writes, "appalled by the identification of Christian theology with biblical literalism." The "liberal" theologians Mohler cites are in complete opposition to what Mohler believes. He is a Biblical literalist and goes on to offer no reason to be a Biblical literalist except that the Bible says its true so it is. Mohler writes,
This means that Haught, with Beattie, is particularly appalled by those who defend the historicity of the Genesis accounts of creation and, more broadly, those who would argue that evolutionary theory and biblical theism are fundamentally incompatible.
So I found myself eight pages away from the end of this book eagerly awaiting an answer on how to address this problem from the author of our little book. Mohler needs to explain to me how the historicity of the Bible and Christian theism can make sense with everything we know about the cosmos (including Earth and our origins) through modern science. I need specifics and there is less than ten pages left. I would, as you would suspect be disappointed.
R. Albert Mohler Jr. sums things up in the last few pages,
The only God that matters is a supernatural God - a personal God - who will judge. In the end, the existence of the supernatural, self-existent, and self-revealing God is the only adequate starting point for Christian theology.
Mohler's point seems to be that the New Atheists and New Christians can meet on this common ground that liberal theologian scholars can't, that God is supernatural and the Bible is literal, and historically and scientifically accurate. This is where we are, sure I agree. The New Atheists fight isn't with the liberal Biblical scholars but with the common Christian (the New Christians) who think the Bible is to be followed as a perfect mandate from God. Mohler's end of the book sounds like the beginning of the book, or at least the early middle. We need to start from this part. I hope Mohler is planning on writing a second book because it goes on to end offering no answers, even within the last two chapters titled, "The Defense of Theism" and "The Future of Christianity"
As I approached the last 2 pages of the book I was laughing out loud and shaking my head in confirmation of what I already knew before I opened this small book- We have not only no specific arguments presented here against specific claims made by the New Atheists, but we have not a single argument supporting theism. Oh, and even better, readers of this book are also left with not a single argument for Christianity. The last page tries to sum up how the author feels Christians must fight in the public arena of ideas for the "truth" of Christianity (giving no instructions on how to specifically do this). As I'm reminded from Sam Harris, "We are seeing religion losing the argument on a hundred different fronts." And Mohler ends with "The New Atheists are certainly right about one very important thing - it's atheism not biblical theism. There is nothing in between." ... I actually wrote the words underneath "Wait! .. What? NO!" This last sentence is false. There are plenty of things in between. Ever heard of Islam? There are few other religions out there. And multiple denominations and sects in each. Mohler is the same all all the New Christian apologists who understand some philosophy but no science. Even though they commit constant logical fallacies such as the obvious "Argument from Authority" or "Appeal to Ignorance".
Now please take time to look at Dan blog. He doesn't allow comments so post comments here or email me if you want to discuss anything. He has obviously put much more time into the layout of his blog than say me or many other atheists blogs I've seen. He enjoys graphic design as well as preaching the gospel. But just because something is dressed up doesn't distract from the fact that at it's core there is nothing there. There is no argument for theism / specifically Christian theism. Read through some of Dan's posts or even sketches. You will see poking holes (that sometimes I may even mildly agree with) at Harris explaining morality strictly through scientific means. You will see his blog entries where he talks all about New Atheism and some of their arguments then in the end .. makes a giant unintelligible leap to the gospel with no string of evidence to support this leap. It's a leap of faith and that is all. It would just be nice if on this point he was honest.
-Meet Albert Mohler:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhypIUOvp3s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&feature=endscreen&v=k_iCmRBFOPk
- Meet Dan:
(his blog page) http://www.theolatte.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quVQEKII4JY
No comments:
Post a Comment