3 Common Defenses of Religion

[KipBond]

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I got about 8 minutes in where he's attacking Christianity and says basically, there's no contemporaneous account of Jesus' resurrection, and even if there was , blah, blah, blah ... no need to go further.

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So, NR apparently thinks this is the most egregious fault in Sam Harris' arguments:

Claim: A specific religion is true.

Rebuttal: The evidence for the religious doctrines is either terrible or non-existent.

Example: Christianity is predicated on the idea that the gospel account of the miracles of Jesus is true. This is why people believe Jesus was the son of God, divine, etc.

This is problematic because the Gospels followed Jesus' ministry by decades, and there is no extra-biblical account of his miracles. But the truth is worse than that: even if we had multiple, contemporaneous, eye-witness accounts of the miracles of Jesus, this still would not provide sufficient basis to believe that these events actually occurred.

Well, why not?

The problem is that first-hand reports of miracles are quite common, even in the 21st century. I have met literally hundreds of western-educated men & women who think that their favorite Hindu or Buddhist guru has magic powers, similar to those ascribed to Jesus.

People who tell these stories desperately want to believe them -- yet they lack the kind of corroborating evidence we should require before believing natural laws have been abrogated in this way. And people who believe these stories show an uncanny reluctance to look for non-miraculous causes.

Yet it remains a fact that Yogis & Mystics are said to be walking on water, and raising the dead, and flying without the aid of technology, materializing objects, reading minds, foretelling the future -- right now. In fact, all of these powers have been ascribed to Sathya Sai Baba, a south-Indian guru, by an uncountable number of eye-witnesses.

He even claims to have been born of a virgin, which is not all that uncommon a claim in the history of religion; or in history in general. His followers threw a birthday party for him recently, and a million people showed up. There are vast number of people who believe he is a living God. You can even watch his miracles on YouTube. Prepare to be underwhelmed.

Miracle stories of a sort that today surround a person like Sathya Sai Baba become especially compelling when you set them in the pre-scientific religious context of the 1st century Roman empire, decades after their supposed occurrence. We have Sathya Sai Baba's miracle stories attested to by thousands upon thousands of living eye-witnesses, and they don't even merit an hour on the Discovery Channel. But, you place a few miracle stories in some ancient books, and half the people on this Earth think it a legitimate project to organize their lives around them. Does anyone else see a problem with that?

[Nielsio]

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I got about 8 minutes in where he's attacking Christianity and says basically, there's no contemporaneous account of Jesus' resurrection, and even if there was , blah, blah, blah ... no need to go further.

[/ QUOTE ]

So, NR apparently thinks this is the most egregious fault in Sam Harris' arguments:

Claim: A specific religion is true.

Rebuttal: religion doesn't make any scientific claims. Religion is not in the business of knowledge.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xq7dcNJDhOE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrERN87nvIE

[bunny]

My position as a theist (though perhaps not a christian) is that believing because someone told you to is a bad reason. I agree with Sam Harris on that point. Personally, I dont think one can claim rational grounds for theism unless you have experienced something you are unable to explain without God.

[Nielsio]

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My position as a theist (though perhaps not a christian) is that believing because someone told you to is a bad reason. I agree with Sam Harris on that point. Personally, I dont think one can claim rational grounds for theism unless you have experienced something you are unable to explain without God.

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Elaborate plz.

[KipBond]

bunny -

I like your reply -- very honest & straight forward. I appreciate that.

Most of Sam Harris' arguments are addressing Fundamentalists beliefs. However, he does have some things to say to religious moderates & liberals as well. If you can listen to the entire thing, there is a part in there where he talks about religious moderates & liberals lending credence to religious Fundamentalists.

I would outline Sam Harris' major points as this:

* Religious beliefs should not be immune to public criticism, nor taboo to argue against
* Claiming to know something that you don't is bad
* The first two points keep us from making progress in human spirituality/enlightenment

[luckyme]

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My position as a theist (though perhaps not a christian) is that believing because someone told you to is a bad reason. I agree with Sam Harris on that point. Personally, I dont think one can claim rational grounds for theism unless you have experienced something you are unable to explain without God.

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How would that be rational grounds? "I can't explain X without God, therefore there is one." ??

luckyme

[bunny]

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[ QUOTE ]
My position as a theist (though perhaps not a christian) is that believing because someone told you to is a bad reason. I agree with Sam Harris on that point. Personally, I dont think one can claim rational grounds for theism unless you have experienced something you are unable to explain without God.

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Elaborate plz.

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It doesnt make sense to me if someone says "I believe in God because that person does." Nor if they say "I believe in God because it's written in this book." In my view, they can only claim a rational belief if they list a fact or set of facts about the world for which they find God to be the best explanation.

[KipBond]

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religion doesn't make any scientific claims. Religion is not in the business of knowledge.

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"Jesus walked on water." That's a scientific claim, no?

But, I do agree that where most of the argument lies is not in any scientific claim a particular religion makes, but in moral claims. It's just that they base those moral claims on certain scientific claims to substantiate them (e.g: the Bible was inspired by God, the Creator of the Universe, and it says that if you do X, then you will go to Hell).

[bunny]

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My position as a theist (though perhaps not a christian) is that believing because someone told you to is a bad reason. I agree with Sam Harris on that point. Personally, I dont think one can claim rational grounds for theism unless you have experienced something you are unable to explain without God.

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How would that be rational grounds? "I can't explain X without God, therefore there is one." ??

luckyme

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No.

"X has a number of possible explanations A,B,C,...,God,...(others I havent thought of)....God seems the best explanation to me."

The distinction I see between that quote and your rendering is that in my view, it's not enough to just deem God as some kind of default explanation, there has to actually be some real explanatory power (which I know you dont think God has - but a theist who did think that would be rational to accept God as one of a host of explanations).

[bunny]

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bunny -

I like your reply -- very honest & straight forward. I appreciate that.

Most of Sam Harris' arguments are addressing Fundamentalists beliefs. However, he does have some things to say to religious moderates & liberals as well. If you can listen to the entire thing, there is a part in there where he talks about religious moderates & liberals lending credence to religious Fundamentalists.

I would outline Sam Harris' major points as this:

* Religious beliefs should not be immune to public criticism, nor taboo to argue against
* Claiming to know something that you don't is bad
* The first two points keep us from making progress in human spirituality/enlightenment

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Well, I agree with all three of the starred points, so if that's a fair rendering of his views then I agree with his main points. However, I think he goes further and says all religions demand protection from scrutiny and criticism (or smile benignly and say "that's true for you but not for me" or some other postmodern rubbish). I also think he assumes religion requires certainty and while I think many people say this, I dont think most believers are actually as certain of their faith as is often supposed.

With regard to the moderates sheltering fundamentalist argument, I have never been convinced of this. It was a big problem I had with the God Delusion - I eventually wrote to Dawkins asking him to clarify how he thought someone in my position was sheltering fundamentalists but he declined to reply (quite understandably, I guess). Perhaps you can apply the argument to me?

I believe in a number of things (in Australia I'm called christian, it seems clear I should differentiate myself from what americans understand as christian though) for which I have the scantest objective evidence and a moderate amount of subjective evidence (which is by nature very weak and unreliable). I want people to criticise my view, I want people to criticise other religions. I dont think religion is much about morality, I regard it more as a metaphysical question. I expect there are a number of beliefs I have that are wrong. I expect most religions make incorrect claims. Given all that, how am I harboring fundamentalists?

EDIT: I also dont think we choose our beliefs. We examine them, ponder them, debate them, etcetera then they form and sometimes change in some mysterious way.