The pseudonymous IDolator who wrote this:
I do not make any appeals to personal qualifications, training, or expertise. The reason being is that if I have no qualifications or relevant training, this may cause some to dismiss or overlook a good argument for this reason alone. On the other hand, if I do have qualifications and relevant training, this may cause some to embrace a bad argument for this reason alone. I would rather let the arguments stand on their own.
Thinks this is a fair argument against Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins:
is Harris (or Dawkins) recognized as someone who displays compassion? He can talk about it and write about it, but does he live it? What has the rich Sam Harris done to "help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak?" And while there are dozens of atheist organizations that bash religion, where are those that refrain from bashing religion, but instead devote most of their energy to "help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak?" For example, every Christmas, you can’t miss the Salvation Army people collecting money to "help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak." Why don’t we also see the "Army for Reason" doing the same thing every Darwin Day? And if we did, would it be a PR stunt or would the desire be genuine?
If Harris wants to claim there are "better reasons to help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak," he needs more than rhetoric. He needs a rich tradition of action to draw from. As it stands, he would struggle to come up with examples.
How many hours does MG spend doing actual research for the betterment of our world, or teaching the results of actual research to children and interested adults? How much blood has he donated? How many private or public acts of charity has he tallied up? Or does it only count as charity if it's part of a group with the word "army" in its name?
In the words of Joe Hill's great hymn "The Preacher and the Slave":
And the Starvation Army they play,
And they sing and the clap and they pray,
Till they get all your coin on the drum,
Then they tell you when you're on the bumYou will eat, bye and bye,
In that glorious land above the sky;
Work and pray, live on hay,
You'll get pie in the sky when you die
Bonus wanker: Bill "given funds to write another book on Orthodox Theology … however he has never written the book" Dembski, for approvingly quoting the same passage.
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May I ask why you didn't explain what Mike Gene was replying to in the passage you quoted? The way you present it, you make it sound as if he is saying these things are reasons we should ignore Harris. In context, though, he was clearly not doing that.
Actually he is saying that because of these reasons we can dismiss Harris' arguments, so yes, he is clearly saying that.
One should also note that the of the four greatest US philanthropists, three have been atheists/agnostics, so methinks Harris does indeed have "a rich tradition of action to draw from".
You are, quite simply, wrong. He is clearly only addressing one of Harris' arguments (hint: the one that Josh gave no indication of in his post above). What he is doing is saying that we could have all the good reasons in the world to "help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak" but those reasons don't amount to jack squat if you don't follow through with them. I hope you would agree that this applies to atheist, Christian, Muslim or any other person. The proper response to Mike Gene's argument, then, isn't to take him out of context and act like he is saying something that he isn't saying. The proper response is to give examples of atheists who not only talk about these principles but actually follow through on them ("live it," as Mike Gene said). Essentially what Mike is saying is that talk is cheap (or, as Mike said (and Josh conveniently left out) "these are empty words").
Gene writes, "What has the rich Sam Harris done to 'help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak?' " I was not aware that Gene had conducted indepth research into Harris' personal involvement in charities and causes.
Gene also writes, "Why dont we also see the 'Army for Reason' doing the same thing every Darwin Day? And if we did, would it be a PR stunt or would the desire be genuine?" That is, if you provide proof against Gene's argument, he is ready to dismiss or denounce it.
Personally, I don't see a lot of compassion coming from Dobson, Falwell or Robertson.
Macht, my point is that the same argument Mike Gene applies to himself, that his personal actions do not change the validity of his arguments, also applies to Harris or Dawkins. Yes, MG is trying to respond to an argument Harris (not Dawkins) made, but in doing so, he is contradicting himself.
I don't know what MG does in private life, nor what Dawkins and Harris do in theirs. All I know is that MG's arguments are inconsistent with themselves, arguing that personal anecdotes are irrelevant to argumentation when that's convenient, insisting that a complete autobiography is necessary to assess arguments on the other hand.
By the standard MG set initially, there is no situation in which the questions he asks of Harris and Dawkins would be relevant. It doesn't matter that he's responding to a general argument that theism isn't necessary for charity.
The validity of that argument isn't determined by the private activities of those two men, or by the existence of explicitly atheistic charitable armies. That's my point. What's yours?
Josh asks:
Excuse me? Are we to suppose you believe that a well-paid career choice of research or teaching somehow counts as charity work? Tell me... does that mean your income is non-taxable? What a clever scheme THAT is!
I guess we could exempt doctors, nurses, child-care workers, teachers, scientists, farmers, food service employees, all forest rangers and game wardens, politicians, garbage disposal, police, fire, military... they don't even need the nifty tax loopholes rich people designed for themselves and their corporations! That leaves secretaries, retail clerks, hair stylists, line workers, car salesmen, call center automatons and all of middle management to pay for government. And since it would take 100% of their earnings, they'd all be charity cases! [Or slaves, depending on how you look at it].
Sounds positively radical Neocon to me.
And, as I said, you skipped the context of Mike Gene's argument. Harris says 1) "There is no question that many people do good things in the name of their faith ..." but then says 2) that there are better reasons to do so that religious faith. MG doesn't take issue with that and isn't trying to refute 2). What MG is saying is that having "better reasons to help the poor, feed the hungry and defend the weak" don't amount to much if those reasons don't lead to action. And as I said above, the proper response to 1) isn't to say "Well, there are better reasons to do those things than religion provides." The proper response is to give examples of people doing those things while also saying that they weren't motivated by religion. MG is essentially pointing out that 2) is all fine and dandy but it doesn't say much about 1) - that is, talk is cheap when you are talking about being compassionate and charitable. And it is impossible to see that MG is doing this when you quote him out of context. That is my point.
Macht, that isn't MG's argument. His argument is that Sam Harris is only making a good argument if he acts a particular way. This contrasts rather strongly with what "Mike" has argued elsewhere in arguing for his own pseudonymity. Either we need to know about an author's private life to judge their arguments or we don't. If that question is appropriate about Harris, it's appropriate to ask about Mike Gene. If it's not relevant to ask about him, it isn't relevant to ask about Harris and Dawkins.
Yes, that is MG's argument.
jb, just because something is a public service doesn't mean it's tax exempt (or should be). Do you not think teaching and research are public services?
Why is there the assumption that atheists and agnostics do not support charities founded by Christian organizations? Personally, I have no hesitation in donating to the Mennonite Committee for Famine Relief, for example. Besides, I suspect it is more in the nature of atheists and agnostics to do things at a more personal level than to organize into groups.
Richard, I think you're probably exactly right.
I should point out that I was not defending the argument, I was defending MG from being misrepresented. Richard provided a quite reasonable answer to MG's argument. Josh, not so much.
But Macht wasn't misrepresented.
I don't think so. Did somebody write something about me?
Red Cross, and I don't believe they spend their contributions on building churches, or limiting their aid to confirmed believers.