Top Five: Nicknames for Richard Dawkins
March 9, 2008I think I’ll start another tradition to help prevent post-droughts: Top Five Lists. And yes, the idea of a top five was entirely and unashamedly inspired by High Fidelity. 
Now that he will no longer be called the Charles Symonyi Professor of Public Understanding of Science, I figured it might be nice to come up with a nickname for good ol’ Richard Dawkins. So I’ll throw five out there and you all can let me know which you prefer.
1. Dawk the Hawk
This is solid. Hawks are predatory and vicious. Plus, those who are pro-war are referred to as hawks or hawkish, and Dawkins certainly likes to promote a war on parochial faith.
2. Darwin’s Chihuahua
If Huxley was Darwin’s Bulldog, Chihuahua sounds about right for Dawkins, who is as worked up as Huxley ever was about the implications of Charlie’s message for the religious. Full of spunk and energy, he seems cute at first, but like all small yapper-type dogs, after a while you wish he’d just shut the eff up. (Maybe someone could give him a can of Cesar’s).
3. Stumpy
If you tell me you wouldn’t pay $20 to see someone walk up to Dawkins and say “Hey Stumpy!” whilst giving his hair a good-natured mussing I will call you a liar to your face.
4. Jack
As far as I can tell, this is considered an appropriate nickname for any Englishman, regardless of their given name.
5. Double D
(The twa D’s coming from Dick and Dawkins). This is perfect, and it gets my vote. Just like real double-d’s, the vicious, and sometimes rather eloquent attacks of Dawkins look big and sexy and attractive to atheists and anti-religionists of all stripes, but when you get down to business he/they are just overly heavy, get in the way and sometimes even cause back pain.
(Note: This last nickname would apply equally as well to Daniel Dennet, by the late Nineties on. In fact, Dick and Dan together could be called the Double D’s, and that my friend is as tasty as a pancake breakfast.)
“As tasty as a pancake breakfast”? What does that even mean? I have to start writing these things *before* 2a.m.
I don’t know about the rest, but I have to agree with your description on #1. There is a war on faith-based thinking, just as there was (is) an on-going war on illiteracy. An evidence-based way of looking at the world IS much more effective than a faith-based outlook, afterall.
Hi Dan, thanks for stopping by. Dig the blog too.
I find you’re statement “An evidence-based way of looking at the world IS much more effective than a faith-based outlook” to be very interesting. I take your claim to be an epistemological one, i.e., that you are claiming that an evidence-based approach is more effective just in that it allows us to know the truth more effectively. There’s a lot to question in such a claim, but I think I’ll just ask one of you:
What is the benefit of being effective?
I ask this, taking for granted that you believe that an evidence-based approach leads to atheism.
If you answer something to the effect of “Look around us at all the good science has brought us through technology” I will, on a good day point out that people of parochial faith (with negligible exception) do not dismiss the evidence-based thinking that is in or has lead to our technological society. (On a bad day I might point out the fiduciary components of scientific activity.) And if you reply that it is simply better to know the truth than to believe a falsehood, I will then ask why, given atheism, is that so. Or, more precisely, I’ll ask the brace of questions, “Better to what end?” And, “Why should I consider that end to be good?”
Why then seek effectiveness?
yep DD it is
The benefit of ‘effectiveness?’ From a purely epistemological standpoint, the benefit is clearly to approximate a more correct and precise description or understanding.
So having a “more correct and precise description or understanding” is always good? But whence that goodness?
Or, let me state my position positively: If one accepts physicalism as true, then one has no basis for considering things good apart from personal preference.
So I guess I should rework my question to you to be… Why should anyone care what you (or Dawkins or whoever) feel is good?
Whether goodness=effective depends on the speaker, and what sense of the word “good” is being used. For instance, if you’re referring to how an idea or object works, it is good if it accomplishes its function better than alternative ideas or objects. Something that functions well is, by definition good, whereas something that functions ineffectively is bad. (think good versus bad, as compared to what you’re suggesting, which is good versus evil)
In this case, if what you’re comparing is the effectiveness of ideas to explain, say, biology, chemistry or physics, then clearly the evidence-based approach is “good,” and the faith-based approach is “bad.”
So when you say: “If one accepts physicalism as true, then one has no basis for considering things good apart from personal preference,” I would reply that we’re talking past each other. You’re basing your question on the meaning of good as the opposite of evil, whereas I’m basing my statement on the meaning of good as the opposite of bad. Because, for me, accepting physicalism/materialism/naturalism as true leaves plenty of basis for considering things good apart from personal preference. You simply ask yourself “Does [insert idea here] accomplish or explain what it is supposed to?”
Lastly you ask, “Why should anyone care what you (or Dawkins or whoever) feel is good?” You shouldn’t care about an idea simply because someone likes it. You *might* however care whether it appears correct. For Dawkins, I presume you mean his (and my) position on atheism. And you have to ask yourself – do you care about whether he is correct or not? I imagine that you don’t really care whether he’s correct, and you’ll happily go on believing without concerning yourself with evidence (that’s what faith is, afterall – the strong conviction in something irrespective of evidence).
A quick clarification to begin with. I didn’t mean to indicate you were supporting the thesis that effectiveness =
goodness, just that effectiveness is good (that goodness includes, but is not exhausted by, all effectiveness). Fortunately my failure to make this distinction clear didn’t affect the rest of your comment.
I have a few different thoughts about your comment, and even though numbering one’s points usually makes one look like a jack-ass, for the sake of clarity I think I’ll go ahead and do it here.
1. Good is a judgment
Let me motivate why I think an atheistic, non-personal notion of good needs motivation. With a traditional monotheistic deity a non-personal good is easy to produce. What is good is the god’s will, or at the very least the god’s understanding of what is good. This makes perfect sense, because good is a judgment, a god is capable of making judgments, and a god, qua creator, provides telos to his creation and has the knowledge to judge it according to that telos (i.e., has authority).
In a physicalist universe however, there is no telos, the fulfillment of which is good. Now, you may choose levels of good other than personal gain when you judge what is good, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s you who is doing the judging.
The problem is brought into sharp focus by disputes. If you and I dispute what is good, in a purely physical universe we have nothing external to appeal to. We try to find something like what has the greatest utility for humans, what increases human survival rates the most, what gives humans the best chance to survive… but all of these would simply be common groundings, personal judgments upon which we happen to agree. I could say from the outset that I will only accept the external grounding of the Bible, and you could say that you will never accept the external grounding of the Bible, and then where would we be? Stuck with our personal judgments and nothing to adjudicate between them.
2. L-NOMA
“…if what you’re comparing is the effectiveness of ideas to explain, say, biology, chemistry or physics…” Is there really anyone who is comparing this? Is there anyone (with any cache or support, not just someone off on his own that’s gone off the meds) who is out there saying that the way to learn about supernovae is to have faith that they are bluish purple and taste like kittens?
I’m sure you’re familiar with Gould’s idea that science (which is at least a large faction of “evidence-based approach”, if not identical with it) and faith are NOMA (Non-Overlapping MAgisteria). Well, I don’t agree with him per se, but I will say that science and faith are L-NOMA, with the L standing for “Largely.”
After all, if what you’re comparing is the ability to describe the soul or explain how a dualistic mind and body interact then the evidence-based approach is up a very muddy creek. But people aren’t trying to use science to do those things any more than they are using faith to do the things you’ve listed.
Of course, there is the issue of why the two are only L-NOMA, and what happens when they do overlap. (in #1 I addressed why I think you don’t have much to say when they do). But anyway, it would appear to me that the argument you really want to make is that an evidence-based conclusion should always trump a faith-based conclusion.
3. Faith and evidence are not exclusive
And this brings us to another significant point. The difference between the argument that I think you really want to and the argument that you actually make boils down to this parenthetical of yours: “that’s what faith is… the strong conviction in something irrespective of evidence.”
But of course that’s not what faith is. Or, better said, that is only one way in which a person can act on faith. Take for example the hundreds/thousands of people who flock to a place in the desert in the American Southwest because when they point their cameras at the sun there they see images of Mary in the resulting pictures. I saw some interviews with people who do this on the episode of This American Life (tv) called “God’s Close Up.” It was clear that these people had their faith strengthened and even increased according to the evidence of the photographs.
Now I’m sure that you and I agree on the fact that they are poorly interpreting the pictures they take to provide evidence for their beliefs. But that is irrelevant to this issue. The relevant aspect is that this is a situation where faith and evidence are interacting to support one another. Therefore, it is only when faith and evidence interact in ways that contradict one another that the conflict you are proposing is real.
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Okay, so what’s the point of all this? Basically I’m running two lines in this comment. One line (from #2 and #3) is simply arguing that that you are misconstruing the relations between faith, evidence, science and religion, and that a misunderstanding of faith is at the bottom of this. The other line (from #1) is attempting to culminate my argument running through these comments in the claim that in a purely physicalist universe atheists have no basis to call for people to abandon parochial faith except their personal desires. And of course it then follows that if the parochial decide they don’t share your judgments of good, your desire for them to abandon said faith has no hold on them, no matter what arguments or evidence you bring to bear.
1 – So you’d argue that objectivity cannot exist, if everything is arbitrary? I would strongly disagree…
2 – To your examples specifically… you don’t actually think that the mind can exist outside of a brain, do you? Or the soul outside of the body?
3 – Sure, faith and evidence are not exclusive. But the do not correlate with each other either. On “that’s what faith is… the strong conviction in something irrespective of evidence,” yes, that’s exactly what faith is, as laid out in the dictionary. This leads directly to the other aspects of faith that you and others have described. For instance, you say “Take for example the hundreds/thousands of people who flock to a place in the desert in the American Southwest because when they point their cameras at the sun there they see images of Mary in the resulting pictures.” What part of that doesn’t fit in the description I gave? As you say, their faith was strengthened, and the credibility of the evidence (or lack thereof) didn’t effect that.
1. I’m not convinced that one can get anything better than intersubjectivity. And if you can, then you still have to demonstrate specifically that notions of good can be more than intersubjective.
2. Okay, let’s play by your rules. If you can provide evidence that the mind cannot exist outside of a brain or the soul outside of a body then I’ll gladly give up those views. (Not that I hold mind-brain dualism that tightly, but still).
3. One may act in faith when there is a dirth of evidence, but this is very different than the nature of faith being action/belief irrespective of evidence (even if sometimes people act on faith despite evidence). My example doesn’t fit your description because the faith of those people is not irrespective of evidence, it is strengthened with respect to evidence. And again, it doesn’t matter if they’re interpreting the evidence wrongly. No one is ever able to know if they’ve interpreted evidence correctly. They can only have their interpretations strengthened or disconfirmed (but of course, both of these require interpretation themselves).
And it should also be noted that scientists interpret evidence wrongly all the time, and often because they expect to see certain things. Phenomena such as the theory-ladenness of observation are impossible to get rid of (and actually can be beneficial a lot of times, because of radical underdetermination of theories by evidence, which is yet another problem for a purely evidence-based epistemology).
1. So things like gravity, electromagnetism, the efficacy of therapeutic drugs, and all the rest of the natural sciences are subjective enterprises that are only true if you believe in them? Hogwash.
2. If that’s the argument you want to play, I’m going to have a tough time taking you seriously.
3. If you’re basing an action on a dirth of evidence, that’s not faith, is it?
1. Be careful. I said INTERsubjective, not subjective. And the onus is on you to provide an account of objectivity that is more than intersubjectivity.
But that’s actually a bit of a rabbit trail, and it would be better to get things back on track by saying that, for the sake of argument, I’ll grant you the objectivity of all of science. You still have to provide an account of objective good! Again–my claim is that no physicalist can do that, because good is a judgment, and to provide an objective account of what’s good one must appeal to an authoritative judge.
2. ME? That’s your line isn’t it? You want evidence based-claims to automatically trump faith-based claims and I’m granting that for this point. So if you can provide me evidence that the that the mind is wholly defined by the brain, then I will concede the falsity of mind-body dualism.
If you can’t, then what does that say about your seemingly deeply entrenched belief in mind-body monism? Is it faith-based? At best it could be based on philosophical arguments (the standard arguments, or Occam’s razor, whatever), but then religious claims are often based on philosophical arguments, cf. Anselm, Aquinas and a host of others. And that would mean that to justify a “war” on the parochially faithful you would need to do a lot more philosophical work trumpeting scientism* (which was really my point from the beginning).
3. Let me try to rework this point.
There are three states of evidence: evidence that something is true, evidence that something is false, neutral/lack evidence. There are three states of faith: faith that something is true, faith that something is false, absence of faith. One can construct a valid decision calculus or belief system (note: valid, not necessarily sound) with any combination of states of faith and states of evidence. Because of this, an attempt to oppose faith and evidence commits the fallacy of the excluded middle. I.e., there are states in between ‘evidence always trumps faith such that faith is eschewed’ and ‘faith always trumps evidence such that evidence is eschewed’.
The example of the photographers was intended to demonstrate this point by showing an example of people employing both faith and evidence.
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*Okay, so the word scientism usually gets used as an epithet by one group of fundamentalists to label another group of fundamentalists. I just mean here to use it to denote that school of thought, of which the new atheists all seem to be a part, which holds that science is the be-all, end-all of epistemology.
1. Great, we agree that objectivity exists. To objective good, however, I never said that such a thing existed in the absolutist sense. I said the best we can do is approximate objective good (that is, reality or perfectness), or describe the relative good normalized to some arbitrary standard. That is, good IS subjective (and perhaps intersubjective), and depends on the observer and what “good” is defined as for the given circumstance.
Generally though, I’m glad we can agree that gravity and other concepts are evidence of objectively real phenomena.
2. Again, I’m having a tough time taking you seriously on this one. “Thinking inanimate matter” is a contradiction in terms. No, I must say that I think you’re absolutely foolish on this one. That some people believe in magic and non-corporeal spirits does not make their views intellectually respectable.
3. I said “not correlated,” not “negatively correlated.” That is, faith exists completely independently of whether evidence exists for the faith. Further, I’m claiming that for the believer, evidence and matters of credibility of that evidence are of zero concern, whether such information is available or not.
1. ‘Objectivity’ is all ajumble here, and the analytic philosopher in me really wants to parse it. But I don’t think that’s actually necessary.
If one sets standards (subjectively determines what is good) then of course it is theoretically possible to objectively determine whether or not that standard has been met. My point from the beginning has been that it is the setting of the standard that is subjective and has no hold on others. This is the case when you argue that an evidence-based approach is more effective than a faith-based approach. Ignoring whether or not that is true, ‘the faithful’ are completely justified in saying, “I don’t accept effectiveness as the good for me.” And in that case your argument that they should abandon their parochial faith holds no sway whatever.
But then I guess that’s why it’s a war and not an argument… I don’t suppose you could call an attempt to conform others to one’s subjective standards could be called anything else.
2. “Thinking inanimate matter” would indeed be a contradiction, and I’m not sure where you thought I endorsed this.
I don’t even have to hold a position on this one (and in fact I’m far from convinced by anybody on monism/dualism). YOU are the one holding a position–that the mind is nothing more than the brain. What is the basis for this position? All you’ve given to support it so far is incredulity, and that incredulity is based in your *philosophical* position of physicalism. But that’s a philosophical position, not an evidence-based position.
3. Some people have faith in a way that is not correlated with evidence, but that is a choice that they make and is not an attitude necessitated by faith. It is possible for faith to be strengthened or shaken by evidence. In fact many people refer to events like these. Such cases falsify the claim that faith is held irrespective of evidence.
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By the bye, while writing that last bit I realized that in my previous comment I should have described faith as being in three vectors, not three states. The three vectors could be labeled strengthened, shaken, and unaffected. And obviously not all combinations with evidence are realized. People do not have their faith shaken by positive evidence, nor do they have their faith strengthened by negative evidence.
One last check in before going to bed (I’m 7 hours ahead of you)…
1. I think we’re relatively on the same page here, more or less, so I’m going to drop this bit.
2. I don’t think that your position is intellectually respectable. Sorry – the age of mysticism is past.
3. Oh, it’s possible for faith and evidence to intersect here and there, I haven’t suggested otherwise. But the believer generally doesn’t care about evidence, and just continues on happily believing. I say generally, because sometimes they start to care, or stop caring, about whether something is factually correct or not. They want to believe more than they want to know.
Anyway, I must bid you goodbye – I’m not getting much out of this discussion, and I’ve made my point, so I’ll leave you to your blog.
Cheers.
Okay, a quick final follow-up then.
1. Hmmm…
2. I defend no position here. My argument is solely concerned with attacking the consistency of your positions.
3. I think my original point here was that faith does not necessitate a position towards evidence, therefore your position needed to be reworded. As far as I can tell we agree here.
Thanks for the interaction Dan!
[...] itself. That is, until I watched 2 minutes of choice YouTube courtesy of Richard Dawkins. “the Hawk” explains that the Pitcher Plant is actually way better adapted to process bugs than I had [...]