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| SFReader Forums > The Real World > Non-Fiction Books > God is not Great | Forum Quick Jump
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy
      
Date Joined Aug 2003
Total Posts : 4515
| Posted 7/3/2007 1:21 PM (GMT -4) |   | | Anyone read Christopher Hitchens' latest book, "God is not Great"?
I saw him on Meet the Press (opposite Al Sharpton!) and the Tim Russert Show doing the rounds for his atheist's manifesto.
Here's a link to some excerpts:
I'm not an atheist, but I find Hitchens' latest project and cause admirable.
Anyone else have any thoughts on it?
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction." Daniel | | Back to Top | | |
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MichaelEhart
Sage
Date Joined Jul 2005
Total Posts : 2324
| Posted 7/3/2007 4:20 PM (GMT -4) | | Hitchens is a drunk, a liar, a contrarian, and a genius. He is almost always wrong, brilliantly.
"Darkling I Listen; and for Many a Time" , Fear and Trembling, coming soon!
"The Scarlet Colored Beast" The Sword Review, September 2007
"Nothing But Our Tears" The Sword Review. August 2007
"Weaving Spiders Come Not Here" The Sword Review, July 2007
"The View From the Shotglass Floor" Ray Gun Revival, Feb 2007
"Six Zombies Doing That Mick Jagger Strut" Damned in Dixie, July 2007
"The Death of Number 23" Dark Krypt, Fall 2006
"Servant of the Manthycore" Sword Review, April 2006
"Voice of the Spoiler" Sword Review, up now!
"Dancing with the Elder Gods"-- Thirteen Magazine, October 2005
"It's a Living" Byzarium---November 2005
"An Exorcism Straight, Hold the Elvis" The Sword Review, October 2005
Host, 2005 Nebula Awards Live Chat, sff.net
http://mehart.blogspot.com/ | | Back to Top | | |
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy
Date Joined Aug 2003
Total Posts : 4515
| Posted 7/3/2007 4:29 PM (GMT -4) | | | Hitchens is a drunk, a liar, a contrarian, and a genius. He is almost always wrong, brilliantly.
***
That's it!!!! That's it exactly. 
His short article from Vanity Fair on T.S. Eliot's "The Wasteland" is a perfect case in point!
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction." Daniel | | Back to Top | | |
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Bill Ward
Biblioholic
Date Joined Jul 2006
Total Posts : 1670
| Posted 7/3/2007 4:56 PM (GMT -4) | | I've read it and agree with it, but then he's preaching to the choir in my case. I don't think it contains anything too new, but Hitchens writes with beautiful scorn and perception, and doesn't miss too many chances to tip some sacred cows. He does condem 'the faithful' for sticking together, as in the Pope's apparant sympathy with some muslim excesses (like the danish cartoon row). Hitchens bascially states that religion, faith, and unreason are inimical to western liberty and freedom, and don't offer the sort of leadership needed in a modern society.
As for the 'almost always wrong' Michael states above we'll have to disagree, as I find he's almost always right, once he grew out of his childish communist flirtations (which is something else he addresses in god is not Great, his loss of faith in a religion as silly as any other, communisim). Most of his fellow travellers took huge exception to this, strange they think its a virtue to keep a deathgrip on one's juvenille beliefs into adulthood rather than let reason and moral sense guide a person's opinions as they mature. People love to call Hitchens all sorts of names because of that, because he broke with the radical left and doesn't call his shots along the party line, but the best word I can think of to describe someone like that is 'adult.'
It is interesting that he has a brother who disagrees with him on almost everything, a web search should turn up some of their refutations and counter arguements.
I'm looking forward to read Hitchen's biography of Thomas Jefferson, as I think he's a writer and thinker of vast ability. | | Back to Top | | |
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy
Date Joined Aug 2003
Total Posts : 4515
| Posted 7/3/2007 6:18 PM (GMT -4) | | keep a deathgrip on one's juvenille beliefs into adulthood rather than let reason and moral sense guide a person's opinions as they mature
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Interesting. I think some "juvenile" beliefs are better than others. And everything according to its *function*, lol!
Certainly, I don't disagree with letting one's "moral sense" and "opinons" evolve through time and experience, to so disagree would be a form of dogma, right? Neither do I think anyone is ever truly free from their juvenile beliefs altogether, nor do it think this is altogether a bad thing as there are certainly aspects of childhood which form a sound basis for beliefs held by a person in their maturity.
Equating the belief in God with "juvenile" strikes me as specious. Certainly for someone raised in an environment in their childhood which promoted dogmatic beliefs, their evolution may take them "out" of this particular belief or set of beliefs; on the other hand, I was raised by an atheist (though never subjected to or really influenced by this view as "dogma") and have found myself becoming more and more convinced of the existence of God as I mature; not in terms of any particular religion, OR dogma, mind you, and that's an important distinction.
I'd imagine others have had (or will have) simlar experiences to my own in this wide, wide world.
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."
Daniel | | Back to Top | | |
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Bill Ward
Biblioholic
Date Joined Jul 2006
Total Posts : 1670
| Posted 7/3/2007 6:52 PM (GMT -4) | | Daniel B., Actually the juvenille belief I was refering too was Marxism, still fashionable among the Che Guevara t-shirt crowd. That whole paragraph was about Hitchen's break with the radical left, not the book or religion per se.
Daniel A., Hitchens' didn't write the book as a philosophical or metaphyscial examination of God, but as a study of how faith and unreason distort human activity. The purview of the book is essentially world events and society, whether or not gods exist is actually quite secondary to the arguement, it's unreasoning faith and tribalism that Hitchens is focused on, which manifestly and demonstrabley do exist.
The concrete nature of Religion is the focus of the book, not philosophical speculation; which may clear up some ideas you guys are having about it. | | Back to Top | | |
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Bill Ward
Biblioholic
Date Joined Jul 2006
Total Posts : 1670
| Posted 7/3/2007 8:54 PM (GMT -4) | | Hitchens just remarked in the book that he understood faith and loss of faith to some extent from his own experience with Marxism, and I got a bit off on a tangent about the radical left that never grew up despite the undeniable reality of the soviet experience and confused my post somewhat.
I believe the original title of the book was Religion is Poison, which is similar to the subtitle, and that would have probably suggested a bit more precisely the scope of it. It's definitely not a 'god doesn't exist because of this, this, and this' book (at least that's not his thesis, Hitchens assumes it as fact and moves on, with occasional reflections back toward the issue); its a 'religion is bad for humanity because of this, this, and this, and by the way how can these crazies claim some kind of divine sanction when they behave like that, and who would want to worship such a monster that demands this, this, and this of his supplicants, etc.' You get the idea.
So yea, you definitely couldn't give it to someone and say 'ha, this disproves god!' its not about that; but perhaps a religious moderate or 'independant' might change his mind to some extent as to the essentially beneficial nature of organized religion, or faith without reason. | | Back to Top | | |
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy
Date Joined Aug 2003
Total Posts : 4515
| Posted 7/4/2007 12:16 PM (GMT -4) | | |
I've never heard a good argument that history would have turned out different if people were "reasonable" for the last few thousand years, holding to no religious or superstitious beliefs. Would the outcome have been any different if the excuses had changed?
***
Ah, a confirmed cynic!
Of course, we've had examples of atheistic and secular governments and nations: Nazi Germany, Communist Russia and China, communist Spain (though they were crushed by Franco), North Viet Nam, and --- go back to classical cultures -- there was Sparta.
And then , of course, supposedly, America itself, which enjoyed an Age of Reason.
Anyway, here's a chart (can't vouch for its credibility) which shows the breakdown of atheists by nation; looking it over one might conclude atheistic nations do run more efficiently?
| Country |
Total country
population (2004) |
% Atheist/
Agnostic/
Nonbeliever in God |
Number of Atheists/
Agnostics
Nonbelievers in God
(minimum - maximum) |
| Sweden |
8,986,000 |
46 - 85% |
4,133,560 - 7,638,100 |
| Vietnam |
82,690,000 |
81% |
66,978,900 |
| Denmark |
5,413,000 |
43 - 80% |
2,327,590 - 4,330,400 |
| Norway |
4,575,000 |
31 - 72% |
1,418,250 - 3,294,000 |
| Japan |
127,333,000 |
64 - 65% |
81,493,120 - 82,766,450 |
| Czech Republic |
10,246,100 |
54 - 61% |
5,328,940 - 6,250,121 |
| Finland |
5,215,000 |
28 - 60% |
1,460,200 - 3,129,000 |
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."
Daniel | | Back to Top | | |
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Bill Ward
Biblioholic
Date Joined Jul 2006
Total Posts : 1670
| Posted 7/4/2007 1:47 PM (GMT -4) | | Jeff, the crux of the book isn't so much that history would be different, but that our future may be because as we are no longer living in a world of spears and horses or even cannon and steam but mass media, mass travel, and nuclear weapons. As for whether people would behave any better if the 'excuses had changed' consider that relgion is often not an excuse but a primary motivator, or that when it is an excuse it amplfies things to a profound degree. Religion is in many ways tribalism institutionalized.
I don't recall Hitchens view on this, so this is all me, but I often find it useful to articulate a modern fallacy that seems at the heart of many misunderstandings western educated people have about the world, history, and humanity, something traceable to a marxist view of history (that fusty remant of Victoriana that won't go away), and that is the interpretion of humankind as rational economic actors that need to secure 'excuses' to act in ways that benefit them concretely. The reality is that very often, perhaps most often, human history is made by individuals and groups that don't understand their interests, and act irrationally and for the satisfaction of some imagined neccessity, whether it be holy war, building a socialist paradise, or securing lebensraum -- none of these things is rational. To view humanity as rational is irrational, and this is yet one more reason why the marxist-leninist-trotskyist-maoist messianic religions completley failed to accomplish anything but misery until they were swept into quiet corners but a new generation of rulers who saw the destruction wraught by true believers.
As for these secular regimes that turn out bad they are condemned for unreason as well in Hitchens book, for the 'god' of a communist utopia for example. If anyone doubts communism was a religious ideology just consider how much of it had to be taken on faith, or think about nazism's messianic triumphalism and secure belief in providence. These poisonous ideologies are religions, indeed amongst the worst religions mankind has produced.
Daniel: interesting chart. Vietnam is a puzzle, I'd wager that's a lot of people still trumpeting the party line over there go home to light joss sticks to buddha in private. European atheism is interesting, I think in most cases its more a case of secure government producing the conditions for atheism, and I've noticed anecedotaley that the irrationality that might manifest itself as superstition or worship in more orthodox settings becomes an almost mystical belief in government and a strong inclination toward conspiracy theory type beliefs in europe (government is all powerful ergo nothing can happen by accident, the government [or a government, the US is popular in this capacity] did it secretly: the same thing as someone saying its all part of god's plan). I think humans naturally look for patterns that aren't there and try to find sense where none exists and want to put their trust in a tribal father-leader, and all of that comes out no matter how supposedly enlightened a group is. | | Back to Top | | |
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy
Date Joined Aug 2003
Total Posts : 4515
| Posted 7/4/2007 2:00 PM (GMT -4) | | | I've noticed anecedotaley that the irrationality that might manifest itself as superstition or worship in more orthodox settings becomes an almost mystical belief in government and a strong inclination toward conspiracy theory type beliefs in europe (government is all powerful ergo nothing can happen by accident, the government [or a government, the US is popular in this capacity] did it secretly: the same thing as someone saying its all part of god's plan).
***
Great post, Bill!
You make a lot of important and highly-persuasive points here. I agree with most of what you say.
A few questions: do you see "mystical belief" always as a fallacy? Are you suggesting that "pattern making" among the masses (making patterns from chaos, or projecting them onto chaos) is always compensatory and irrational?
Subquestion: does science -- quantum physics, forex,-- partake of this "tribalism" or is science in some ways immune from trying to find "sense where none exists?"
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."
Daniel | | Back to Top | | |
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy
Date Joined Aug 2003
Total Posts : 4515
| Posted 7/4/2007 3:27 PM (GMT -4) | | | I find it meshes nicely with Christianity
***
LOL
Wasn't Christ spreading the "Good News?" Or more accurately, "discovering" it.
You can count on people to corrupt anything: medicine, science, commerce, art, sex, friendship, love.
Though I am not a Christian by any means, I find the idea of a "forgiving god" and eternal life optimistic-at-heart. But then again I am a romantic! And mystically inclined to boot!
The practice of Christianity may be cause for some cynicism, I suppose. But even then, it is a learning curve, even Hitchens would grant that, I assume, to some degree.
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."
Daniel | | Back to Top | | |
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MichaelEhart
Sage
Date Joined Jul 2005
Total Posts : 2324
| Posted 7/4/2007 3:43 PM (GMT -4) | | Perhaps he would, but don't count on it. I always love to read what Hitchens has to say, but one of the pillers of his style is he never grants anything unless it bolsters his argument. He is especially passionate about creating stawmen. Hitchens is not a critical thinker in practice; everything is in support of his current religion. Like every apostate he loaths his former faith with the same irrational passion as he loved it.
That he would have been a passionate Marxist is a peek into his soul--- that particular religion is just as cult-like as any bunch waiting for a comet to take them away to the planet Xenon. Not many of them around, and their ineffectualism just feeds into the persecution complex that makes the whole experience so tasty.
No, Hitchens didn't suffer an enlightenment, he just changed religions. Now he is the most talented member of the Order of Blowhard Drunkards. If any of his views coincide with yours, it is just a random hit, most likely unsupported by any underlying philosophy of his.
"Darkling I Listen; and for Many a Time" , Fear and Trembling, coming soon!
"The Scarlet Colored Beast" The Sword Review, September 2007
"Nothing But Our Tears" The Sword Review. August 2007
"Weaving Spiders Come Not Here" The Sword Review, July 2007
"The View From the Shotglass Floor" Ray Gun Revival, Feb 2007
"Six Zombies Doing That Mick Jagger Strut" Damned in Dixie, July 2007
"The Death of Number 23" Dark Krypt, Fall 2006
"Servant of the Manthycore" Sword Review, April 2006
"Voice of the Spoiler" Sword Review, up now!
"Dancing with the Elder Gods"-- Thirteen Magazine, October 2005
"It's a Living" Byzarium---November 2005
"An Exorcism Straight, Hold the Elvis" The Sword Review, October 2005
Host, 2005 Nebula Awards Live Chat, sff.net
http://mehart.blogspot.com/ | | Back to Top | | |
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