God, Faith, and the New York Times
Much to the chagrin of many an established church, people like me find comfort and solace in the logical investigation of the existence of God. I say: “many paths to faith.” Anyhow, on his New York Times blog, Stanley Fish recently posted an examination of the intersection of two authors’ views on suffering and evil (logically) titled “Suffering, Evil and the Existence of God.” It’s an interesting treatment of the topic — I am particularly drawn to this Anthony Flew character, author of There Is a God: How the World’s Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind.
Before I delve into the New York Times blog, let’s take a look at a summary from that page about Anthony Flew, which describes who he is a bit better:
Flew is a pioneer for modern atheism. His famous paper, Theology and Falsification, was first presented at a meeting of the Oxford Socratic Club chaired by C. S. Lewis and went on to become the most widely reprinted philosophical publication of the last five decades. Flew earned his fame by arguing that one should presuppose atheism until evidence of a God surfaces. He now believes that such evidence exists…
This history makes Flew a rather bit more interesting when he says, “well, now I think there’s a God.” Here’s an interesting excerpt from the New York Times blog post explaining Flew’s ideas about materialism (emphasis mine):
In an appendix to the book, Abraham Varghese makes Flew’s point with the aid of an everyday example: “To suggest that the computer ‘understands’ what it is doing is like saying that a power line can meditate on the question of free will and determinism or that the chemicals in a test tube can apply the principle of non-contradiction in solving a problem, or that a DVD player understands and enjoys the music it plays.”
How did purposive behavior of the kind we engage in all the time – understanding, meditating, enjoying – ever emerge from electrons and chemical elements?
The usual origin-of-life theories, Flew observes, are caught in an infinite regress that can only be stopped by an arbitrary statement of the kind he himself used to make: ” . . . our knowledge of the universe must stop with the big bang, which is to be seen as the ultimate fact.” Or, “The laws of physics are ‘lawless laws’ that arise from the void – end of discussion.” He is now persuaded that such pronouncements beg the crucial question – why is there something rather than nothing? – a question to which he replies with the very proposition he argued against for most of his life: “The only satisfactory explanation for the origin of such ‘end-directed, self-replicating’ life as we see on earth is an infinitely intelligent Mind.”
I greatly enjoy reading the end logical output of someone’s struggle with this topic, and it helps when the fellow is an 84 year-old expert. Exposure to these arguments transform the intangible nature of my thoughts and questions about the bedrock pieces of Life into ideas with shape and weight. It changes a question like “Why am I here?” to a statement like “Taking this path of thought will help me better understand the unknown pieces here.”
I’ve always taken issue with the title of Richard Dawkin’s book, The God Delusion — I’ve certainly judged that book by its title, which essentially states that believing in God is an affront to logic and reason, and that doing so makes the believer flawed in some way. Taking this type of tone, one criticizing the believer rather than the beliefs, seems to me the exact wrong way to deal with this atheism issue — to see this tact taken in such a high profile book is particularly discouraging. Indeed, such an idea returns us to a quote from that original New York Times blog post:
In short, these books neither trivialize their subject nor demonize those who have a different view of it, which is more than can be said for the efforts of those fashionable atheist writers whose major form of argument would seem to be ridicule.
Perhaps, with logic and reason, informed dialogue can lead to real discussions based not on blind attacks of passion, but on reasonable people pushing the envelope on previous discussions, thus helping those with and without belief in God to better understand what their stance means.
Comments
Alexander Micek
I’d like to temper my previous thoughts with an interesting issue: Flew is likely too senile to have written this latest book — that is, it was likely done mostly by the second author listed on the book. Thankfully, the driving tip of my point wasn’t about an atheist who changes their mind, but how thoughtful examination and guidance from writings on the topic can move us from one end of the discussion to another… without the Dawkins snarkiness and pretentiousness.
Nils
You should pursue some texts on the philosophy of religion if these questions really interest you. I would recommend literature by Descartes, Kant, and Aquinas. I read some of their very thought-provoking ideas during my philosophy class a few years ago.