Über die Freiheit / de libertate

Just in case you thought that anti-evolution people were exclusive to the United States, Michael Shermer is here to remind you otherwise.

But Rabshakeh said unto them, Hath my master sent me to thy master, and to thee, to speak these words? hath he not sent me to the men which sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung, and drink their own piss with you?

2 Kings 18:27 (KJV)

Often, they [Wilfrid and Zoe] talked of religion. There was no satisfaction in that area for either of them. In his eyes, she was overly zealous in her practice of doctrine and uncritical of what was being asked of her. In return, she deplored his refusal to attend Mass, his ardent and impatient censure of practically all clerics and their practices, and his unwillingness to return to the cradle of his faith. He was often impatient with her over these matters and she retreated, sad and morose, leaving him convinced that she was without “aucune volontè, aucun sentiment*,” as he once wrote to her.

[Laurier L. LaPierre, Sir Wilfrid Laurier and the Romance of Canada (Toronto: Stoddart Publishing Co. Ltd., 1995), 6.

 *lit. “no will, no feeling” - “any willpower or feelings”]

How does an atheist debate a theist? It seems to me that such arguments accomplish nothing due to unprovable assertions by theists. Now obviously I am biased, but I think that the onus should be on the religious to prove God’s handiwork in daily life. I’ll admit that history demonstrates a consistent belief in the supernatural by humans, but I’d still argue that I should not have to disprove an invisible, unknowable divine.

I think of this issue thanks to an article posted on Prof. Koyzis‘ blog. In his article mainstream screenwriter Joe Eszterhas discusses his conversion to Christianity. He recounts surviving cancer concluding

I will thank Him forever because He gave me new life and a heart which is truly able to love for the first time in my life. His love is mine.

My first thoughts were posted in the comments at the blog.

But why must we assume such a result is from God? Simply because he says so? Could it not be that Mr. Eszterhas’s change came not from God, but rather from human intellect and will power and the medical science that results from it?

As a devout fundamentalist (not to mention hateful and ignorant) Christian for the first nineteen years of my life, I can honestly say that I never once felt, despite naïve pleas, the ‘presence of God’. Thus, the first step outside of my engrained religiosity was to reject an active god and support full cessationism. Subsequently this led to a clockmaker god, who lets the world operate after initial creation. And finally, I came to an outright rejection of theism.

With this in mind, I find Mr. Eszterhas’ claims of God’s role to be lacking. However, Prof. Koyzis responded, defending God’s work in daily life.

Robert, medical science does not negate the work of God. The human intellect and will power are gifts of God. Most of the time God uses ordinary means to accomplish his work.

Of course I did not say that medical science negates the works God. In and of itself medicine and other human advances are not an argument against theism. What I questioned was why one would assume that surviving cancer must be explained by God. Nothing in Esterhas’ story is particularly revealing except that he feels that God “saved” him. On the contrary, I would argue medical science, self-confidence and family are what got him through the undeniably trying event.

Prof. Koyzis’ points seem to be circular. Human intellect is a gift of God. We know this because the Bible claims it so. We know the Bible is correct because people like Mr. Eszterhas’ demonstrate God’s work in our lives? But this reasoning and gotten us absolutely nowhere.

However if intellect is a gift from God, why do so many intellectually endowed people reason that God mustn’t exist? How can I use my intellect to reason the non-existence of God if my intellect is the product of God? I don’t understand this paradox.

Likewise, how can a nontheist argue against the proposition that “God uses ordinary means to accomplish his work”? If every little element of life is God’s work and it is invisible and ordinary it is incredible easy to support the existence of God. Merely the existence of the world would be “evidence” of God’s existence.

Thus the central issue is that the theists put forth arguments for God which are supposedly a priori. That is, God exists because he obviously does, look at the world! And yet they also try to make the a posteriori argument with conversion experiences like Mr. Eszterhas. Our daily lives in addition to supposed miracles provide the experience which should lead one to posit the existence of God.

If religion can assume both types of knowledge, without a shred of credible evidence, how does one begin to focus on specific issues? Observing the world clearly demonstrates that human intellect is capable of explaining nearly all of the presented evidence for God. I don’t just mean this in a biased way, but human reasoning clearly leads to central contradictions in the biblical and experiential “evidence for God”. Thus when it comes to focusing on certain cultural and moral issues it is hard to have a fair debate because the nontheist is expected to ignore rational thought and accept the premise that a divine being is controlling the game.

Thus when discussing suicide the rational person is forced to accept that humans should not have the choice when to die, yet the theist is not required to supply an intellectually based argument. If you can use God and the Bible as a crutch, then you can win any argument. Similarly, on a societal issue like same-sex marriage, or homosexuality in general, the nontheist is greeted by a proclamation that the Bible condemns homosexuality. Thus arguments based around human intellect which produce arguments for equality and biology are drowned out by the fact that a 2000 year-old, human-created book says the opposite.

Can there ever be a fair argument if the unreasonable, illogical and anti-intellectual position holds veto power?

Over at the econoblog Division of Labour Tim Shaughnessy has a post about “why libertarians don’t gain much ground”. His basic thesis is that libertarians are intolerant atheists. His post is centered around a post by Nicholas Provenzo of The Center for the Advancement of Capitalism’s blog Rule of Reason. Provenzo’s post has caused quite a stir in intarweb circles. Here is the central idea behind the post:

Like many, I am troubled by the implications of Alaska governor and Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s decision to knowingly give birth to a child disabled with Down syndrome. Given that Palin’s decision is being celebrated in some quarters, it is crucial to reaffirm the morality of aborting a fetus diagnosed with Down syndrome (or by extension, any unborn fetus)—a freedom that anti-abortion advocates seek to deny.

On the surface this seems like inflammatory and perhaps harsh, but I’m not sure myself. One blogger called it “pretty vile stuff” another blogger called him an asshole, repeatedly. The hate mail he received and subsequently posted has even more interesting responses: he’s a Nazi; kill yourself; you should have been aborted, etc.

Most of the backlash comes from the second sentence of the paragraph quoted above: “it is crucial to reaffirm the morality of aborting a fetus diagnosed with Down syndrome”. If one looks at this quickly, as many seem to have done, it might appear that he is saying that all Down syndrome babies should be aborted. However, I think people might be misunderstanding the word “morality”. Rather than saying that it is only moral to abort, I believe he is saying that if one chooses so, it is moral to abort, as it is in any situation. Now obviously from the remainder of Provenzo’s post it is clear that be believes the better choice is to abort the child, but I don’t believe he is saying all should. It truly is a matter of choice, but Provenzo is attempting to argue for what he believes is the more moral choice.

Of course this is where the debate really takes off. As callous as it might seem, I think Provenzo’s moral preference has the better argument. While I would never attempt to undermine the individual choice of any woman, I think there is a good argument to be made for abortion in the case of severe disabilities in fetuses. I am uncertain of what moral good comes from bringing a child into the world where they will have no quality of life. Indeed, I think Provenzo might be right when he alludes to the fact that bringing a severely disable child into the world might ultimately be selfish and cruel.

I also cannot agree whatsoever with the standard pro-life/Christian response which attempts to say that bringing such life into the world is a beautiful act. To say that the mentally handicapped are “ambassadors of God” is profoundly misguided. To say that they are “ambassadors of God” is to show how evil the god of Christianity must be. If god would allow a such a hardship upon a innocent child just to show god’s supposed love then god is undeserving of any reverence. Likewise as the National Review article shows, Christians appear to use the disabled as pawns in a disgusting game of self-satisfaction. Take these for example (emphasis added):

• “Their presence, in short, elevates all of us.”
• “It wasn’t until my brother John lost his battle with cancer ten years ago that I truly appreciated how much he influenced those around him.”
• “He made us better people”

In each instance Franc shows that the disabled’s presence is designed to improve our lives. I don’t doubt the genuine love and care that was provided, but it seems that there is little concern for the life of the disabled person. If one person’s life is based around the self-satisfaction that another might get out of it, it seems a little troubling to me. If the primary purpose of disabled individuals is to demonstrate god or teach the rest of humanity a lesson and the comfort and happiness is in the background there is a huge problem with priorities.

All that said, I think I agree generally with Provenzo’s point, however, I think he was unnecessarily terse and probably could have crafted his post more carefully as to better deflect the criticism—though in such debates civility, especially on the anti-abortion side, is generally lacking and based primarily on guttural instinct. I also must point out that I, like most people, don’t like abortion, and wish it were unnecessary, however I believe that it is a fundamental freedom that women (and to a small extent, couples) should always have.

As for Shaughnessy’s response, I don’t much understand it. I don’t know any libertarian who is as openly hostile to religion as he claims. Reason magazine, though cosmopolitan and generally irreligious, isn’t as hostile has he states. There is nothing inherently incompatible about religion and libertarianism. It is only incompatible when religion is applied in as though it were a strict guide for political philosophy. Indeed, I think there is a strong case to me made for Jesus being a libertarian in a basic sense, though this supposes a strong Arminian view of theology. That said, religion, and Christianity specifically, are huge obstacles to a more free society. Looking at abortion, same-sex marriage and other dictated morals one can see how Christianity is, or at least has been portrayed as, the antithesis of libertarianism. The reason that many libertarians are atheists is because libertarianism puts a huge emphasis on human reason, while religion attempts to directly undermine the abilities of humanity.

More specifically, I don’t know how Shaughnessy can think that his argument for a libertarian stance on abortion has much merit. Invoking the non-aggression axiom in the case of a zygote is patently absurd. He states that he doesn’t “see how, after the two haploids become a diploid, this being is anything but human, and thus deserving of the rights any other human has.” I’m sorry, but I honestly don’t understand how one can think that a microscopic ball of cells can logically have the same rights as a rational human being. (I’ll admit this does provide a problem in respect to babies which are not “rational”, however, I think that the birthing process IS important in this respect.) If all things that are potential human beings—a zygote—are worthy of protection, shouldn’t we also include the sperm and egg within the realm of protection?

I don’t know if calling an abortion moral is necessary, but surely forcing a woman to carry to term an unwanted child is immoral. The abortion itself might not be moral (depending on one’s definition of morality) but having the choice to do so certainly is moral and any prevention of this choice is rightfully condemned.

Now I’ll agree with Shaughnessy that Provenzo’s post might not convince “an ideological fence-sitter”, but I don’t think that such fence-sitters really exist. However, in my former life as a fundamentalist Christian I completely rejected abortion and now such posts appeal to me, at least in an intellectually stimulating way. So perhaps posts will help abortion foes to at least reexamine the basis of their beliefs.

I think the strange comment about potheads is also revealing. First off, what’s wrong with potheads wanting to get their drugs cheaper? Additionally, how is calling one’s self a libertarian going to reduce the cost of marijuana? If potheads want to get cheaper drugs they’d be better off attempting to influence members of the Democratic Party. Putting a Bob Barr sign on your lawn isn’t going to accomplish anything. So when Shaughnessy can point out potheads who are calling themselves libertarians for this sole reason, I’d like to see it. Until then, he should work on stopping sounding like a moralist.

The ultimate point of this post seems to be that until the Randians stop insulting is religious faith he will “continue to be slightly embarrassed [sic] to admit my libertarian leanings.” First off, I think “leanings” is accurate since, from at least what he presents in this post, he seems more like a market-oriented conservative, rather than a libertarian. (But I’d have to see his position on same-sex marriage and other cultural issues to make a better judgment of his ‘libertarian purity’.) Secondly, I think it’s odd to be embarrassed to call yourself libertarian because some elements within the ‘movement’ disagree with you. Using this logic he should be embarrassed to call himself a member of Louisiana State University-Shreveport since presumably there are some ultra-leftists on campus or perhaps he should embarrassed to be an American since there undoubtedly some douche bags to be found within the population.

Moody Bible Institute
In the spring of 2006, the student body voted to keep a prohibition on DVD viewing in the dorms.

Religions are false. Religious morality is thus based in falsehood, insofar as they are distinctively religious. I don’t know why I should take people who are wrong more seriously than people who are right. Also, I think it’s more respectful to be frank about what I think and treat religious people like adults, responsible for what they believe, than it is to allow religious people a special zone of personal irrationality, not to be mentioned in a bad light, lest they become insulted. [The Fly Bottle]