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Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul
http://www.onlyatheorythebook.com/OAT-excerpt.pdf


Anyone purchased this yet? I just purchased a copy from Amazon and it looks good.


I was looking for reviews of the book and found this one. It's from the Catholic News Agency.
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/columns.php?sub_id=4

The proponents of ID may very well be wrong -- and Miller takes on their claims adeptly -- but they are by no means the dangers to progress he makes them out to be.

And that leads into the main weakness of his book: his apparent blindness to the dangers of the "evolutionist" movement.

But in identifying that problem, Miller ignores the far greater danger of evolutionism, as represented by the likes of Richard Dawkins -- the harrowing realization of Dostoyevsky's Ivan Karamazov: If there is no God, then anything is possible. His argument that evolution need not be an anti-religious theory is certainly true, but it nevertheless continues to be the primary weapon atheists use to attack religious faith. Advising religious believers that they shouldn't fear evolution is like telling Jews they shouldn't fear the swastika -- it may be strictly true, but one can hardly blame them for being suspicious.

The reviewer is a highschool biology instructor, so, I took that into account when reading the review. Not that there's anything wrong with the credentials of highschool biology instructors --merely that the expertise may not be up to par with Kenneth Miller. :) Anyway, the part I quoted was interesting, to me. Again and again I seem to see the notion that whether science is valid is not as important as whether or not it is dangerous. Then I see the theory of evolution being linked to some type of danger -- and I don't understand precisely what this danger is! It's dangerous to religion? Is that the extent of the danger?

He's saying that Dawkins uses evolutionary theory to advocate for atheism. Since atheism entails amorality, if Dawkins is successful and atheism becomes more prevalent, it will result in horrors. After all, without God all things are permitted. He openly compares evolution (at least insofar as it is a tool of atheist advocacy) to the religious to what a Nazi symbol means to the Jews.

I'm not sure if this is more offensive because of how it maligns atheists or because of how dumb it is.

I would be very surprised if Ken Miller didn't say anything about atheism and evolution in his new book. He did in his last book (Finding Darwin's God). He mentioned Dawkins and Dennett and their kind, and pointed out that they are also part of the problem with creationism. If I recall correctly, Miller said you have creationists who think evolution destroys religion, and then you have Dawkins saying "yep, that's exactly what evolution does." Come on, he must have mentioned this again in the new book. I wonder if the high-school biology teacher is using this "review" to do some preaching about his personal fear of evolution.

Here's what I don't get about the "anything is possible" bit. I'm assuming this is a reference to the idea that people will indulge in all kinds of horrible, terrible behavior because they're no longer afraid of the Guy With the Big Stick in the Sky, right? Are these people really saying that they, personally, would engage in all sorts of horrific behavior if they no longer believed in God? Would they start molesting children? Raping women in the street? Shooting up heroin? What? What would they do if they no longer believed??

As well as the lack of a godbeing being seen as dangerous, it's also seen as depressing and discomfiting. It would lead to nihilism!!!

I know that religious belief is constructed and maintained for all sorts of reasons, but I believe that emotional comfort and safety is a BIG one.

Oh, by the way, I had a first this past summer during summer school. I, an elementary school remedial reading teacher, actually got in trouble for "teaching evolution" in my class. Can you believe it? We did a unit on dinosaurs, which kids this age always love - and they did love it - to preparation for reading a book about dinosaurs. Part of the book and the preparation dealt with the fact that dinosaurs lived MILLIONS of years ago, and MILLIONS of years before human beings. One of the little girls asked "but where did dinosaurs come from in the first place?" I suppose I should have said "you have to ask your parents that", because obviously that was dangerous ground, and obviously not an appropriate topic for school. But, you know, I'm an evil atheist so have no morals. So I very briefly explained how organisms change over millions of years, and it all started with very simple organisms. She was clearly interested.

The next day I was called into the principal's office and he carefully explained to me that I had upset the parent, who wanted me to explain to the child that this is just one THEORY that SOME people believe, and there are other legit theories others believe (including, apparently, young earth, which these parents adhere to). Fortunately, my principal thought the parents were being ridiculous and wasn't angry at me in any way. I frankly told him that he could have that talk with the child if he wanted to, but I would not. I told him that even though I am not a science teacher, I know enough about the topic to know that there is no good scientific evidence supporting Young Earth and that the evidence supporting evolution is overwhelming. I would not give even the appearance of giving the "stamp of approval" to silly ideas that actually conflicted with known science. He was understanding and took care of it. That was the last I heard about it, except for the fact that the little girl continued to demonstrate great interest in the topic, and later in the week, asked me "do YOU believe the earth is millions of years old"? I simply said "yes". I can only hope that this child continues to be exposed to teachers who refuse to coddle her parents' religious ideas to the point where they teach bad science. She may actually grow up to figure things out one day.

I am sad to report that, whenever studies are done in the topic, many HS science teachers think some form of ID should be taught. That is a sad state of affairs, in my opinion. This willingness to bastardize science in the service of religion may be part of the reason the US lags behind other countries in scientific education.

I thought the saying was "WITH god all things are possible."? With god on your side, any atrocity can be justified.

beastie wrote:Are these people really saying that they, personally, would engage in all sorts of horrific behavior if they no longer believed in God? Would they start molesting children? Raping women in the street? Shooting up heroin? What? What would they do if they no longer believed??

One of my favorite quotes is from the movie Men In Black...

"A person is smart. People are dumb."

A mob will commit atrocities that every individual in that mob would recoil in horror from every committing alone. I'm not so sure the same wouldn't hold true for an atheist society.

My observation is that the ideas and beliefs about God follow the collective human cultural "evolution".

In other words, if society is OK with burning children as a sacrifice, then God is OK with it. But when the consciousness of human society questions and eventually decides it may not be a good idea, then God also doesn't go for it.

If men want to slaughter whole communities to wipe out a particular belief system, God too wants to get rid of the infidels. But if humans decide this isn't appropriate, God agrees with them.

If society thinks it is OK for men to own women and girls, then God is fine with it as well. When human awareness evolves to the point that they sense this is not a good way to exist, then God will agree with them.

God doesn't seem to be the one commanding or teaching anything. God is more the follower of human cultural consciousness.

When humans evolve to become more aware and concerned about others, then then God will follow suit.

Of course there are always those enlightened souls who lead the way and begin to bring forth deeper awareness... as soon as people agree with these insightful people, then God will as well. ;-)

When humans realize that the elitism and chosen-ness of many religions is divisive and harmful, then God will let go of this nonsense too. Give us another few millennia... (smile)



(Just playing prophetess for a sec).

;-)

td

Hey, TD. You are exactly right!

Just look at how much less racist God has become over the past century.

I suspect that God will become much less of a homophobe in the next 50 years as well.

beastie wrote:Here's what I don't get about the "anything is possible" bit. I'm assuming this is a reference to the idea that people will indulge in all kinds of horrible, terrible behavior because they're no longer afraid of the Guy With the Big Stick in the Sky, right?

It's a reference to the idea that atheists lack meaningful moral grounding in a way that theists do not. Following that "harrowing realization" comes the fear of moral chaos. How people go about justifying this varies, but one of them is arguing that God provides motivation for proper behavior in a way nothing else can. You'll see that more in your lay-person doing apologetics than in theology proper, but we're on a message board here after all. If you unpack that, the person usually just ends up defending a form of ethical egoism that atheists, ironically enough, can just as easily believe without the attempt to make what moral views one wants to believe in our best interests by attaching them to hardcore divine consequences. If you argue that God grounds morality by making X, Y, and Z in your best interests via reward and punishment and that you ought to do what is in your bests interests, all you are saying is that you ought to do what is in your best interests. God doesn't ground that notion, and atheists are free to think that. You then can try to get them to try and justify their egoism, which is a blast because, let's face it, if they are arguing this they probably haven't thought this out well. Or they switch from talking about God to really talking about eternal life.

Anyway, divine command theory is to philosophy of ethics what creationism is to biology. It's fun to see just what a person think theism adds to the mix.

A mob will commit atrocities that every individual in that mob would recoil in horror from every committing alone. I'm not so sure the same wouldn't hold true for an atheist society.

Mobs commit atrocities due to the fact that individual thinking has ceased. How would this apply to an atheist society? Mobs aren't considering God's Big Stick or anything else.