Powell began by saying that he would usually never critique someone if they were not in the room, and that he was sorry that Dawkins wasn’t there. Well, I guess Powell might think less of me for critiquing him without him being in the room, but then again I’ve never been one for caring what Christian philosophers think of my ethics.

Powell also pointed out that he could not speak for Jesus. I thought this was admirable – he said that Jesus is ‘not an imaginary fwiend, not your widdle fwiend’ (he really said it like that) and ‘when you put words in his mouth…he doesn’t like that’. Despite this, he went on to imagine Jesus as saying several things. Similarly, I cannot speak for Richard Dawkins. But I can speak for myself, and for what I know of Dawkins. This I shall do. 

There were several recurring challenges that Powell presented against Dawkins. The first was that Dawkins had never read the Bible and was ‘not willing to study Christianity seriously and engage with its ideas.’ He also rejected Dawkins’ professional authority on the matter. His second major objection was towards Dawkins’ claim that ‘it is even possible to mount a serious argument that Jesus never existed’. Finally, he discussed what Jesus would, in fact, have said to Dawkins.

Between these two criticisms, Powell still managed to find time to attack Dan Dennett, Sam Harris, Hitch, and Laurence Krauss, whom Powell called ‘the next Fourth Horseman’. Powell was at the Global Atheist Convention where he must have seen Ayaan Hirsi Ali given that title. I cannot imagine what would bring him to make such an odd comment about Krauss, whose lecture Powell described – incorrectly, in my opinion – as being ‘fun but uninteresting’.

To rebut Powell’s first point directly, Dawkins is not ignorant of Christian scripture or dogma. He was educated in a religious school where ‘All pupils are required to attend services in the school chapel three times a week, one midweek lunch time service, Friday hymn practice, and the Sunday service’ (www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oundle_School). Dawkins often quotes the Bible, and has given a reading a chapter of the Song of Songs for the King James Bible’s youTube Bible project.

Well, there goes that. But Dawkins is just one man, falsely accused of being ignorant of Christian thought. The general accusation might be thought valid – can an atheist be considered to have made a real decision if they’re not well educated on ‘the other point of view’?

Another prominent atheist and biologist (I shall come back to this), PZ Myers of the blog Pharyngula, calls this ‘The Courtier’s Reply’. Think of the emperor who had his new clothes, and all the courtiers who assured him they were lovely. Then a small child comes along and points out that the emperor is not wearing any clothes at all. ‘Oh hush, child,’ says a courtier, ‘you haven’t read this beautiful poem describing the emperor’s hat!’ Another courtier reminds the child that there is a long book about the wonderful fabrics that the emperor wears. To say the emperor is naked, without having read these works, well, that was just lunacy!

I wholeheartedly endorse this response. I think that atheism is a sensible point of view even if your knowledge of the competing hypotheses is limited. (Though it does annoy me when people have an irrational reason for being an atheist.) College Humour said religious people are like Trekkies, having a really in depth knowledge of a fictional universe and arguing with others about which one was right. You don’t need to have seen the whole of The Next Generation to know that the Borg don’t exist.

Some people care an immense amount about Star Trek. I personally think religion is enthralling. I have read the Torah and sections of the Tanakh, and studied Jewish philosophy in depth, read most of the New Testament, studied Buddhism at a tertiary level, and although I have not read much of them yet, own copies of the Bhagavad Gita and the Koran. But I study these so that you need not, intrepid reader.

I’ll touch now on the other aspect of Dawkins’ legitimacy that Powell refuted, which is his professional qualification. He claimed that for a biologist to speak on religion was ‘like a professor of music on archaeology’. I call that tenuous at best.

Some, like Steven J. Gould and presumably Ian Powell who quoted him, think that science and religion deal with fundamentally different things. I disagree with them, but I’m sure that either of these men would at least admit that there was some debate to be had on the matter. Not to do so would be to ignore the facts of the situation. But no musicians claim that music is in some way essential to archaeology. Nor do any archaeologists that I know of tell musicians please never to discuss the events of antiquity.

But to reject the specific analogy that Powell gave is to miss the real point of his comment, to which I shall now respond. Powell is essentially maintaining that the topics about which Dawkins is well educated are irrelevant to the discussion of religion. This is false. Dawkins’ realisation that he was an atheist came with his understanding of the theory of evolution. For Dawkins, his understanding of Darwin’s theory is inextricably linked to his atheist identity.

In many parts of the world today, the theory of evolution is hated and rejected by theists, particularly Christians, because they see it as inherently incompatible with their idea of god. Evolution is, according to Rick Wetherbee of Melbourne University, the unifying theory of biology. Biologists, therefore, seem the obvious choice as opponents of religion.

For me, things went the other way than Dawkins. I first realised I was an atheist because of Occam’s Razor, and from there realised how wondrous the theory of evolution really was. I am now studying biology and genetics at university (admittedly as breadth).

On, then, to Powell’s second point, his criticism of Dawkins’ statement that ‘it is even possible to mount a serious argument that Jesus never existed’. Now, this seems rather a mild statement. Dawkins isn’t claiming that Jesus didn’t exist, nor even that he believes Jesus didn’t exist. Merely that it’s possible to argue that case.

I’m not sure how I personally feel on this debate. La Trobe University, where I was until recently enrolled, has a course called Jesus: Fact or Fiction?, which I was sorry to see become unavailable to me. I’m sure I would have a more fully formed opinion if I had taken it, but as it is, I think there probably was a historical Jesus. 

This historical Jesus, no doubt, was very different to the personage we think of when we say Jesus. He may well have been the son of woman named Mary, and had a father Joseph, but she was certainly not a virgin when she gave birth to him. He may have been an influential thinker, but he didn’t turn water into wine. At least, not without waiting a few months and having some grapes and yeast involved.

The question then arises – does it really matter if this historical Jesus existed? It’s like saying Santa really does come every Christmas, because you see him talking to kids in every department store you visit. It’s not the same Santa that people mean when they say that he doesn’t exist.

Powell called Dawkins ‘an ignoramus or a liar’ for his assertion that Jesus could be ahistorical. He also claimed that the ‘only bloke’ one could reference in support of this idea is Professor George Wells, who he discounted as being a professor of German Grammar and hence unqualified to speak on the matter.

Just to dispense with this point quickly and easily, I’ll mention R. Joseph Hoffman, Earl Doherty, and Robert Price. They are theologians and philosophers, and while I haven’t read their books, they are generally in support of the idea that Jesus did not exist.

Finally, Powell addressed the topic of the speech. What would Jesus say to Richard Dawkins? He reminded us that he couldn’t make up words for Jesus, but that instead we would have to settle with the actual words that Jesus said to someone in his era who was like Richard Dawkins.

And he chose Pontius Pilate! (Read that in a voice of stunned incredulity.)

Pontius Pilate was the governor of Jerusalem at the time Jesus was crucified. He tried to get the population of the city to change their minds about having Jesus executed, but they chose to release a serial killer instead. (I feel like there’s a moral in there somewhere.) He described Pilate as being ‘politically shaky’ and hence open to suggestion from the masses.

Well if there’s one thing Dawkins isn’t, it’s politically shaky and hence open to suggestion from the masses. He writes books like The Greatest Show on Earth specifically to point out how the masses are wrong! He certainly holds up well against the masses of political pressure against him from all sorts of people.

Dawkins also isn’t in politics per se. He doesn’t style himself as a lawmaker or judge. He is a scientist who sees a link between his work and his philosophy. I said at the start that I am not a big fan of The God Delusion and this is true. It provides a good introduction to some of the more common rationales for a god, and the objections to them. It is rather heavy handed, especially in the latter part of the book where he discusses the evils of religion (as opposed to the incorrectness of it). Dawkins understands philosophy well, because he is an intellectual who cares about what he says. He is not a philosopher though, and his books written as a biologist are of far higher quality.

I recommend The Greatest Show on Earth and The Blind Watchmaker as being superior titles, and if anyone wants to get me a copy of Unweaving the Rainbow that would be just grand.

What would Richard Dawkins say to Powell? I think out of all the objections he might have, he’d probably pick up mainly on something that Powell said about the origin of life, which is that science has ‘no answer’ for how life began. I imagine Dawkins would respond that no, we don’t have an answer yet which is an entirely different matter, and that at least we were trying to do something about it instead of just pointing at a man from two millennia ago and saying ‘he did it’.

I draw a distinction between these types of examples – atrocities committed by atheists is not the same as atrocities committed for atheism. In contrast, the Inquisition was for religious purposes. But as Miller pointed out, just because religion may in some cases oppose freedom, doesn’t mean that it is inherently the enemy of it. Hence he moved on to more philosophical pastures, but Miller’s defence of religion was weak. Let me show you why.

Miller rejects the intuitive definition of freedom. He summed up this intuitive definition as ‘freedom is me living my life however I want to’. His objections to the definition include the observation that one can make commitments, which he claims restricts freedom despite being an example of living life however one wants.

This is obviously crazy. Freedom isn’t rescinded by making commitments – otherwise no one would ever be late for an appointment. Choice is a key concept of freedom. The point of a commitment is that you could break it if you wanted but that you choose not to.

The definition of freedom that we are given instead is from David Bentley Hart’s book Atheist Delusions. It runs as follows:

“Whatever separates us from that end [of realising our true nature] – even if it come from our own wills – is a form of bondage.”

Now this is just silly. Freedom necessarily has to do with choice according to our will. If we do something against our will, it isn’t our choice. Imagine that Susan grabs Paul’s arm and uses it to hit him in the face. The movement of Paul’s arm is against his will; it is not by his choice that it is moving. He is not free to stop hitting himself.

Miller’s definition is almost exactly the opposite of what freedom actually means. He says freedom is acting like this or like that, regardless of your actual desire to do so. It has an almost Orwellian tinge to it, reminiscent of the Ministry of Truth’s slogan ’FREEDOM IS SLAVERY’.

If Miller intends to reject the accusation that religion is the enemy of freedom, it is a poor start to redefine the question so drastically. If I were to accuse him of murder, perhaps he would redefine murder as ‘giving birth’ and proudly proclaim himself innocent.

Let me touch briefly on a few ways in which Christianity opposes freedom. It might be unfair of me to abuse Christianity specifically, given that Miller was asked about ‘religion’ in general. But he spoke at length about how Jesus could help one achieve Orwellian freedom, so I will do the same.

Christians the world over lead the campaign against gay rights. They do not allow homosexuals to make the choices that they wish to make.

Christians oppose the freedom for women to have an abortion. They have murdered and wounded many doctors, bombed abortion clinics, and engaged in campaigns of fear and intimidation against women who are considering abortions. [Fun fact: the tradition of violent protest against abortion was made popular by the Ku Klux Klan.]

Christians oppose the use of contraceptives. This is particularly evil in the context of missionaries in Africa, where the use of condoms is discouraged and demeaned, in spite of firm evidence that condom use would significantly reduce the prevalence of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.

The list could go on, but as Miller pointed out right at the start, just because Christians do oppose freedom, doesn’t mean that they have to. I just wish that they wouldn’t.

Japan's MUCU notebooks

Offered in a small array of notebook choices

I’ve been waiting for a US outlet to carry these great artisan notebooks by Japan’s MUCU. Something about the craft of Japanese paper and stationery is so beautiful when jotting down your mental notes or just casually sketching as if you were back in college. Using untreated materials like newspaper stock, canvas and tarpaulin, the small variety of choices include a wire spiral, blank pocket notes, and a pocket ring flip book. Ranging in price from $12 to $20, you can now order domestically at the Virginia denim purveyor Need Supply Co.

Pe zi ce trece ma lovesc de tot felul de piedici in toata blogareala asta. Cea mai frecventa dintre ele (culmea! ) nu este pana de inspiratie, blocajul scriitorului sau ceva similar, ci abundenta de idei. Merg pe strada si-mi vin idei de blog, ma concentrez la  job si-mi fulgera gandul cate-un lucru nastrusnic, urc intr-un lift si iar ma loveste muza, stau intr-o buda de bar si tot asa. Ca sa nu mai vorbim de toate lucrurile care se mai si intampla la propriu zi de zi (in sensul de nu doar in capul meu) care iarasi ar putea fi izvoare generatoare de text scris. Ce mai! Sunt aglomerata in ganduri. Cineva sarcastic mi-ar zice ca gandesc eu prea mult.
Altcineva, mai rautacios, ar adauga ca-i mult si prost. Poatecada.

Astfel ca…insumez toate cele de-mi mustesc in minte si le arunc pentru voi (muguri noi?) ca sa nu zica nimeni ca ma scald in ganduri si nu dau si la altii. Asa ca va spun: Cum Ca Cainele (da stiu … !) de l-am primit din cauza ca pe usa noastra mai scrie in afara de apt. 7 si “caine de rasa ocrotit” este neasteptat de bine-crescut, excluzand desigur surprizele de culoare maro bine plasate pe covor ca sa nu le vezi cand calci pe ele. Cum Excursia la Cluj a fost parca mai in slow -tempo ca de obicei in sensul ca am dormit ca porcii, ca eu am inghetat de frig la fiecare centimetru de scos nasul in afara incintei (barului sau dupa caz casei lui scripi). Ca peste weekend mi-am dat seama scurt cum ca a friend with.. hm… is better. Cum Alunita Nr. 1 a fost dusa la medicul dermatolog in urma unui puseu de curaj si de tip ipo. Cum Beaves si cu Butthead (adica eu) au reusit sa bea niste beri si au aflat ca unii prieteni nu dispar oricat de mult s-ar ignora. Cum Am Decis Sa Nu Fiu Cool si o sa va povestesc in post-ul urmator de ce.

Pe masura ce scriu constat ca am uitat, cel putin temporar, toate acele multe treburi despre care voiam sa scuip. Cum e ea viata sireata uneori! Acu-ti-da-ceva…si hat! acu-ti-ia-napoi. Mai tre sa ai si grija cu ceea ce ai. De maine imi iau pix si hartie si vedeti voi mai apoi cate posturi o sa vie ; )

Sa fiti veseli!

PS> Pe cainutzul gasit de Nick il cheama Muku sau Nuku sau Nucu sau Caine Mic. Daca creste mare o sa-i spunem si Ciobanescu ca nume de familie ca sa aiba si el un statut.

PPS> Multumesc celor care au scrise despre Nuk pe blog si celor care i-au facut cont pe mySpace.