The non-science offered by the new atheists

This article is a continuation of my previous post analyzing Installments I – IV of David Sloan Wilson's series of articles titled "Atheism As a Stealth Religion" (Here is Installment I). This article relates to D. S. Wilson’s installments V through VIII. In Installment IV, D. S. Wilson presented six major hypothesis that have been used as plausible evolutionary explanations for religion. In installment V of his eight-part series of articles on atheism as a stealth religion, he indicates that religion is "a fuzzy set," and that each of the six hypotheses he previously offered seem to bear on at least some aspect of religion. The only way to pick and choose which hypotheses truly work is to employ the scientific method, strictly speaking. That is the approach D. S. Wilson has claimed to have done in showing that the super organism hypothesis is more relevant and persuasive than the others.

If you could say only one thing about religion, it would be this: most enduring religions have what Emile Durkheim called 'secular utility.' They define, motivate and coordinate groups to achieve collective goals in this life. They promote cooperation within the group and bristle with defenses against the all-important problem of cheating.… [T]hey score high on practical realism, no matter how much they depart from factual realism along the way.

Wilson argues that the "byproduct" and "individualistic" accounts of religion can be fully reconciled with the superorganism hypothesis. For instance, the byproduct approach often includes the concept of a "hyperactive agency detection device (HADD)" that refers to our over willingness to explain events in terms of actions of "intentional human-like agents." To the extent it exists, such a tendency could have come into existence about for reasons having nothing to do with religion. As such, HADD could well be a byproduct (or an exaptation) that currently contributes to our groupish tendencies. D. S. Wilson's argument reminds me of the concept of "ontological metaphors" offered by Lakoff and Johnson. At bottom, human animals quite often demand intuitive explanatory models for understanding causation with regard to complex phenomena, and a prime method of portraying causation is through some sort of sentient agency. Since there is no evidence of such sentient agency, it becomes a logical move for a motivated individual to argue for a supernatural version of sentient causal power. What are the consequences of accepting the superorganism hypothesis? By choosing among the hypotheses, we can better devise strategies for dealing with religion. Organisms and super organisms "compete, prey upon each other, coexist without interacting and engage in mutualistic interactions." In these ways, superorganisms can be seen to be a special type of secular system akin to governments and business corporations. Religious organizations are not exceptions to the rule on how one conceives of and deals with organizational systems. Religions are, rather, merely one type of organizational system. Granted, they are notable to the extent that they "depart so flagrantly from factual realism," but they are, at bottom, "corporate units." Because they are essentially corporate units, we should expect that they behave comparably to other corporate units with regard to such things as competition and predation. D. S. Wilson notes that he has done quite a bit of research in this area, and is convinced that

[T]he majority religions… Originated and spread in a non--violent fashion--think of early Christianity and current versions such as Seventh-day Adventist him. I am not claiming that religious groups are biased toward pacifism, only that they are like secular groups in employing the full range of options in their interactions with other groups.

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David Sloan Wilson: some types of atheism serve as stealth religions

In an extraordinary series of postings at Huffington Post (the first installment is here), David Sloan Wilson has taken aim at many people who have been taking aim at the dogmatism and blind faith encouraged by many religions. Yes, many religions encourage between-group conflicts and many of them disparage rational thought, at least when it comes to looking at their own religious tenets. D.S. Wilson is a careful evolutionary biologist, however, and he takes these common criticisms of religion in a new direction. D.S. Wilson knows that between-group conflicts aren't only caused by religion; between-group conflicts are often found in non-human animals such as "ant colonies, lion prides and chimp troops [that] don't have religion." As far as rational thought, he asks why brains evolved through natural selection. His answer will be stunning too many and (in my opinion) difficult to refute: the main purpose that brains evolved "is to cause organisms to behave adaptively in the real world--not to directly represent the real world." What? Human brains are not the way they are in order to allow humans to be objective and rational beings? It is at this point that D.S. Wilson carefully distinguished factual realism from practical realism. Long ago I concluded that there are beliefs that are important, critically important to survival, but not literally true. It is also clear that the intellect will warp itself to believe something that serves a deep, sometimes ineffable, function even though the belief is literally and demonstrably false. This phenomenon comports with D.S. Wilson's distinction: A belief is factually realistic when it accurately describes what's really out there (Wilson notes, and I agree, that there are no people up there sitting on clouds). A belief is practically realistic when it causes the believer to behave adaptively in the real world. Though many of us skeptics love science and long for objective truth, practical realism can also be "a good thing," because

Most of us presumably also want to live in happy, healthy, thriving communities. If there is an unavoidable trade-off between factual and practical realism, that would place us all in a moral dilemma. Atheists such as myself are banking on the possibility it we can have our cake and eat it too; that factual realism can contribute to rather than detracting from practical realism. We need to be clear about our own articles of faith.

Factual realism is not always at odds with practical realism. A hunter who needs to make a kill in order to eat in order to help his clan survive, also needs to know "the exact location of his quarry." It is critically important to recognize that

[O]ur minds are prepared to massively depart from factual realism, when necessary, in ways that motivate effective action. This is not a sign of mental weakness but a time-tested survival strategy. Moreover, adaptive fictions are not restricted to religions. Patriotic histories of nations have the same distorted and purpose driven quality is religions, a fact that becomes obvious as soon as we consider the histories of nations other than our own. [More . . . ]

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Excellent websites present the basics of evolution and the scientific method

The University of California Museum of Paleontology and the National Center for Science Education have offered an excellent remedy to the increasingly vocal anti-science chorus one hears in the United States. This remedy is a website called "Understanding Evolution." The site is a link-rich resource for both teachers and for the general public. From the About page:

Understanding Evolution is a non-commercial, education website, teaching the science and history of evolutionary biology. This site is here to help you understand what evolution is, how it works, how it factors into your life, how research in evolutionary biology is performed, and how ideas in this area have changed over time.
Consider these pages to get you started: "What is the evidence for evolution" and "Misconceptions about natural selection and adaptation." And why stop at evolution while you're in the learning mood? Why not also explore the scientific method at a related site titled "Understanding Science." As was the case with "Understanding Evolution," "Understand Science" was produced by the UC Museum of Paleontology of the University of California at Berkeley, in collaboration with a diverse group of scientists and teachers, and was funded by the National Science Foundation. Here's an excerpt from the About page:
The mission of Understanding Science is to provide a fun, accessible, and free resource that accurately communicates what science is and how it really works. The process of science is exciting, but standard explanations often miss its dynamic nature. Science affects us all everyday, but people often feel cut off from science. Science is an intensely human endeavor, but many portrayals gloss over the passion, curiosity, and even rivalries and pitfalls that characterize all human ventures. Understanding Science gives users an inside look at the general principles, methods, and motivations that underlie all of science.
At this site, you'll find answers to such questions as "What is science?" and "Why science matters." At this site, readers can also access information "correcting misconceptions" about science and teachers have access to numerous resources. [caption id="attachment_16827" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Image by Zabiello at dreamstime (with permission)"][/caption] Both of these sites are both well-written and well-designed. You might want to keep these links handy for those increasingly frequent occasions when you hear evolution-ignorant and science-ignorant folks spout off the that the earth is 6,000 years old or that "evolution claims that people came from monkeys."

Continue ReadingExcellent websites present the basics of evolution and the scientific method

Useful fragile accidents

I have long struggled to understand how it is that otherwise intelligent adults can make religious claims that make no sense at all. For instance, otherwise intelligent people will claim that Jesus walked on water, or that Mary had a baby even though she was a virgin. These claims have no factual basis. To my ears, these are ludicrous claims. How is it that the human intellect allows these things to be uttered? Well, perhaps the intellect barely tolerates this. The human intellect is a relatively weak Johnny-come-lately to our cognitive apparatus. What really drives our decision-making is a big elephant underneath a tiny lawyer. Each of us is a tiny lawyer riding a big elephant. It turns out, however, that the elephant has almost irresistible power to reach up and invade the lawyer's ability to articulate. It takes great training to resist the elephant and to maintain disciplined abstract self-critical thought.  When we speak words, then, it is rarely the lawyer in full command of the mouth. That elephant is smart in the sense that it was evolutionarily honed over many millions of years to allow us to survive; most of those years, we survived even though we were not even conscious. And that elephant is still powerful, compelling decision-making based upon millions of years of trial and error. And the intellect? We give it far too much credit, even though this is where humans can sometimes shine above and beyond the other animals. After all, other animals cannot calculate a 15% tip, and they cannot figure out how to invent medicines or discover DNA. [More . . . ]

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The evolution of the mechanism for evolution.

I must confess that I have something in common with Creationists: I find it difficult to understand how the earliest and simplest life forms came to exist. Unlike the creationists, however, I am not willing to suggest that the earliest life forms were created as-is by some sort of disembodied sentient Supreme Being. I can’t fathom how such a Being could get anything at all done, given that “he” is alleged to be disembodied; for instance, some sort of physical neural network is a prerequisite for cognition. Further, those who posit that life was created as-is by a supernatural Creator need to explain how that Creator got here in the first place; their creation of a Creator constitute an eternal regress. Who created “God,” and God’s God, etc. Thus, I don’t believe in a ghostly Creator, but where does this leave me?  How did the earliest life forms emerge from non-life?  Though firm answers have not yet been derived from rigorous scientific experimentation, I am intrigued by the ideas put forth by Stuart Kauffman in his 1995 book, At Home in the Universe: The Search for Laws of Self Organization and Complexity. Early in his book, Kaufman points out that the simplest free living cells (called "pleuromona") are highly simplified types of bacteria. They have a cell membrane, genes, RNA, protein synthesizing machinery and all the other necessary gear to constitute a form of life. Here's the problem: [more . . .]

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