Correspondence with John Denham

Dr Evil?

After this interview with the Sunday Telegraph, I sent an email on 16th November to John Denham, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government.

Dear Mr Denham

I read the interview you gave to the Sunday Telegraph yesterday, on the role of faith based organisations in politics. You are quoted as saying:

"We should continually seek ways of encouraging and enhancing the contribution faith communities make on the central issues of our time.
Faith is a strong and powerful source of honesty, solidarity, generosity – the very values which are essential to politics, to our economy and our society."
If two or more faith communities made opposing claims about an issue, how would government decide which group to listen to? For example, the Catholic Church is adamant that the sin of contraception is more important than protecting people from HIV; should government listen to this honest, solidly held and generous view?

You continued:

"I don't like the strand of secularism that says that faith is inherently a bad thing to have and should be kept out of public life"

Secularism seeks to separate state and religion to *protect* private beliefs. Enshrining blasphemy laws for one particular faith, for example, would threaten the private views of the faithful of other religions. In the west, secular government has increasingly been seen as the only way to avoid persecution of religious minorities. Are you looking to limit this protection of people's private beliefs? Do you think the UK government should be more, or less, secular? Many people understand 'faith' as meaning 'believing something with insufficient evidence'. This is fine for comparatively trivial matters, such as 'which football team is the best?', but surely this is 'a bad thing' when it comes to matters of state? You may have a different definition of faith to me, so, if so, I would appreciate hearing it to better understand your comment.

I'm aware that newspapers sometimes misquote, so if that is the case here I would be grateful for any clarification you can offer.

Kind regards

Mark Jones

I received the following reply from his office:

24 November 2009

Dear Mr Jones

Thank you for your email of 16 November 2009 about John Denham’s decision to appoint a panel of advisors on faith issues. I have been asked to reply.

As Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government responsibility for the Government's engagement with faith communities lies with him. He has therefore, recruited a panel of advisors on an expenses-only basis to provide him with informed advice on relations with these communities.

The Government recognises that religious belief is of immense importance to millions of citizens, and believes that this fact should be respected. Many issues which concern governments cannot be tackled solely by regulation or spending. Governments and faith communities share an interest in the values which lead people to act the way they do. Campaigns for international development, peace, decent housing, living wages and many others have often been sustained by those of faith - not alone, but as key participants. On these issues, and others including climate change and the values of our economy, people of faith have views and values that deserve a hearing.

I hope I have reassured you on this matter.

Yours sincerely,

Marina O'Neill

Cohesion and Faiths Unit

Not being reassured I sent a reply:

Dear Ms O'Neill

Thank you very much for the response to my email of 16th November.

However, I really need a response to my specific questions; in particular you haven't responded to clarify why Mr. Denham thinks that faith is *not* an inherently bad thing to have.

I need to understand how this Government judges what is a good basis for policy, and what is not. As I said before, faith is usually defined as 'believing something with insufficient evidence'. I want to know why Mr. Denham thinks this might be a good thing, or, at least, why he thinks that Government should listen to groups *specifically* because they think this is a good thing. Because that is what this means, from your letter:

"Campaigns for international development, peace, decent housing, living wages and many others have often been sustained by those of faith - not alone, but as key participants. On these issues, and others including climate change and the values of our economy, people of faith have views and values that deserve a hearing."

To reiterate, I'm happy for you to seek advice from people who have expertise in the areas you mention, including of course people of faith, but I'm not happy for you to seek advice from people of faith simply because they are people of faith; but that appears to be what you are saying. Could you confirm this, or, preferably, deny it.

Your reply doesn't seem to extend beyond restating what Mr. Denham has said in his speech at The Methodist Church Offices, so could you confirm that it's OK for me to make this correspondence public? If I don't hear back within a couple of days I'll assume that is the case.

Kind regards

Mark Jones

I was anticipating radio silence, and sure enough there's been no reply. It would be nice to know if they have a policy on this sort of correspondence. Presumably they cannot answer every email that arrives, but a simple acknowledgement of this should be a matter of good manners.

What concerns me greatly is the possibility that Government policy could be decided after input by faith groups based on nothing but *dogma*. It is imperative that policy should be informed by *evidence*, and we see that is not the most important factor for people of faith. Their input to the public square is quite acceptable when arguing their corner with reason and evidence, but quoting revelation and unjustified authority should not be allowed.

The Chilcot report into Iraq is under way now, and there is a very real sense that the major players, Bush and Blair, invaded Iraq because of an article of *faith*, rather than reasoned argument. It's beginning to look more and more difficult to determine Tony Blair's thinking as he approached the conflict. The reason that *Parliament* voted for the conflict certainly wasn't persuasive to him. He said "...this was obviously the thing that was uppermost in my mind - the threat to the region" (not WMD). But many regimes pose a threat to their regions, and we don't invade them.

So it will be interesting to see if the inquiry can uncover how he arrived at his decision. It's difficult not to come to the conclusion he simply 'felt intuitively' that it was the right thing to do; a hallmark of *religious* thinking.

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Intelligent Design Shows God Was Intelligently Designed, Shock

Intelligent Design is the latest incarnation of Creationism, attempting to gain a patina of scientific integrity by doing sciencey type things, but not quite managing it. I found this document by one of its proponents, William Dembski: Ten Questions to Ask Your Biology Teacher about Design. Running through its attempts to shoehorn some God into science, it's clear that this is an excellent contribution to refuting the existence of God prior to the appearance of homo sapiens. Consider:

Proponents of intelligent design argue that they now have formulated a precise criterion that reliably infers intelligence while also avoiding Kepler’s mistake— the criterion of “specified complexity.” An event exhibits specified complexity if it is contingent in the sense of being one of several live possibilities; if it is complex in the sense of allowing many alternatives and therefore not being easily repeatable by chance; and if it is specified in the sense of exhibiting an independently given pattern. For instance, a repetitive sequence is specified without being complex. A random sequence is complex without being specified. A functional sequence, like DNA that codes for proteins, is both complex and specified, and therefore designed.

"Specified complexity" certainly seems to apply to God; how could he not be complex? His behaviour is functional, therefore, yeah, specified complexity applies.

Life is special, and what makes life special is the arrangement of its matter into very specific forms. In other words, what makes life special is information. Where did the information necessary for life come from? This question cannot be avoided. Life has not always existed.

God must have information; if not, then he has no life? Perhaps he doesn't? Nevertheless, a *being* containing no information is surely non-existent, so we must conclude that God has information. Another tick for ID.

Do any structures in the cell resemble machines designed by humans? How do we account for such structures?

Here ID wants to infer design from the machine like quality of cells. Well, there's certainly a parallel there; God makes lots of things - he's the industrial revolution and then some. An uber-factory. Tick one more up to intelligent design.

What are irreducibly complex systems? Do such systems exist in biology? If so, are those systems evidence for design? If not, why not?

IDers love their irreducible complexity, despite its pretty obvious stupidity. But let's humour them and assume that a thing can really be irreducibly complex. Would it apply to God? It would be a bit of an insult if it didn't, I would think. I suppose they might say, no, God is an extremely simple miasma, and nothing more. Is it this that they want us to worship; something less complex than the bacterial flagellum (but still capable of designing it!)? Surely not. We must all agree that God is irreducibly complex, if irreducible complexity means anything at all.

Reusable parts... By adopting an engineering approach to biological structure, intelligent design explains similar structures in terms of common design.

Excellent! God wrote about this himself, through the Bible:

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them - Genesis 1:27

Clearly He has reusable parts; another tick.

To refute intelligent design, it is enough to display specific, fully articulated Darwinian pathways for the complex systems that, according to intelligent design, lie beyond the reach of the Darwinian mechanism (systems like the bacterial flagellum in question 5).

Well, I have to admit I find this impossible for God. Yet another tick for His intelligent design!

Finally:

But the identity and characteristics of a designer lie outside the scope of intelligent design.

Oh well, if you say so; let's just leave it hanging there. I think we can all guess who designed God, though, can't we?

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Waterloo at Wellington for Theists

Another debate organised by Intelligence Squared, this time at Wellington College in Berkshire. The motion was 'Atheism is the new fundamentalism', proposed by Richard Harries, former Bishop of Oxford and Charles Moore, opposed by A C Grayling and Richard Dawkins. Moderated by Anthony Seldon, headmaster at the school. He's a professor at the College of Teachers. Who teaches them, one wonders. This one was streamed online, so I won't go into too much detail; I think it should be available to watch very soon.

EDIT: watch the debate here.

Outside the venue

Celeb watch; two sightings. Seventies chanteuse, Lynsey De Paul (who'd have thought?) and Jeremy Paxman.

Richard Harries

The very *motion* is an ad hominem response to atheism, in my opinion; rather than address the arguments, cast 'new' atheism (they tend to qualify the atheism) as the new fundamentalism, and consequently dismiss it as worthless. This implicit notion fed through to both Harries' and Moore's opening statements, which addressed what fundamentalism is, and why it's a bad thing (no argument from me there), but also name-called Richard Dawkins, sitting bemused opposite them. Harries called him an 'attack dog' and Moore described a scene in which 'Commandant Dawkins' would have theists all gunned down, presumably for daring to object to rational argument.

A C Grayling

The tenor of both presentations was that atheism, as represented by Dawkins, adopted a *certainty* about the truth that was not justified. I think Harries called it "not allowing for the great 'perhaps'". This seems very odd to me, because faith in god is surely about banishing doubt from one's belief - I blogged on this some time back, prompted by an article by a Catholic priest.

Charles Moore

For me, this is a straw man; whilst new atheist scientists consider that the Christian God is almost certainly non-existent, they cannot discount any god's existent, nor the existence of Russell's teapot, and Dawkins corrected them on this point. Harries made the point that The God Delusion doesn't mention the 'balance of probabilities', but chapter 4 includes quite a discussion on this. Interestingly, Grayling as a philosopher seems less bound by this scientific principle, and happily confirmed his certainty about God's non-existence. This I could only agree with if he's talking about some concept that suffers from non-cognitivism. Which might apply to God.

Richard Dawkins

After many demonstrations of good sense from Grayling and Dawkins, Harries was left grasping at the value of the numinous, as if this was the heart of the matter. Moore complained that such debates never analysed the more complicated ideas that were at issue (this after a question on consciousness, I think). A pretty vacant comment, after he had spoken for a motion that 'atheism is the new fundamentalism', an approach that is *calculated* to dismiss the arguments of one's opponents.

The final score: 363 for, 1070 against, 85 don't knows. Predictable from the feeling I got inside the hall.

Oh, and I said to Jeremy Paxman in the moving throng on the way out, 'Can I ask you how you voted?'. 'Well, there you are then', he replied, cryptically. I should have pressed him, but I imagine he gets fed up with that in public.

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Garrow and the Gallows

An absolutely splendid series ended tonight on the BBC - Garrow's Law, created by Tony Marchant.

It told the tale of the early career of Sir William Garrow, a little known barrister of Georgian times, whose combative style practically invented the adversarial system. Justice for defendants was rarely served at that time - they often had no representation, and when they did matters of fact could not be disputed and the jury could not be addressed directly. Thief-takers were common and unscrupulous. Punishments were extremely harsh.

With clever and witty counsel, Garrow achieved justice for many lowly defendants. Without him we may not have many of the features that seek to ensure *fairness* in the application of the law. His case transcripts can be read online at the Old Bailey archive. Well worth a browse.

The final episode was a timely depiction of a trumped-up charge brought by the state against an innocent individual - a state seeking to hold on to undemocratic powers at the expense of its citizens. The parallels with the authoritarian actions of the present government were palpable. I suspect this case wasn't based on a real life case, but I could be wrong (I couldn't find it in the online archive). It seemed to me a call from the creators for us all to take more seriously the curbs on our civil liberties being introduced under the guise of protection from terrorism. We must stand up at some point and fight these, before we become as bad as those we are fighting.

The BBC should be making more shows like this. Bravo.

EDIT: An interview with creator Tony Marchant here reveals that Garrow was responsible for coining the term 'innocent until proven guilty'. A remarkable man indeed. A pity that principle has become muddied recently.

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Maher Snubs Shermer

What a weird article from Bill Maher. Throughout 'it's' is spelt 'its'. That's not the worst thing about it, but it's not a good sign. It's a response of sorts to this letter from Michael Shermer.

It's a textbook example of how to get an issue wrong. He says he's a reluctant (fundamentalist?) spokesperson on anti-vaccination, and others are more qualified - is he qualified *at all*? - but then ploughs on regardless. Here's the perfect recipe for scare-mongering a potentially controversial issue.

1) Find something that you know nothing about, but about which you have a vague sense of unease.
Vaccination - check

American diet - check
2) Make sure that lots of people share this sense of unease.
Anti-vax polls - check
No-one likes their 'smartie tube' punctured - check
3) Add some known provisos or grey areas.
Over-vaccination is a bad thing - check
Immune system problems make vax dangerous - check
4) Cite people with personal stories to tell as credible data.
Barbara Loe Fisher - check
5) Cherry pick 'experts' in the minority.
Dr Russell Blaylock - check
Dr Jay Gordon - check
6) Pretend you're just trying to publicise a little known problem.
"I'm just trying to represent an under-reported medical point of view in this country" - check
7) Find something dangerous sounding that can be blown out of all proportion.
Formaldehyde - check
Mercury - check
8) Insist you and your cohorts are not anti-whatever it is.
"Anyway, Ms. Fisher is someone who says she is not "anti-vaccine," but just has a lot of questions about the long term effect of using a lot of vaccines." - check
9) Exaggerate for effect.
"Is it worth it to get vaccines for every bug that goes around? Injecting something into my bloodstream? I'd like to reserve that for emergencies." - check
"If one side can say anything and its not challenged, then of course dissent becomes heresy in the minds of many." - check
"There are consequences to vaccines and antibiotics. Some people want to study that, and some, it seems, want to call off the debate." - check
"Ms. Fisher said 'If we want to create a society that is dependent on shots for immunity -- the same way we are getting dependent on prescription drugs, antibiotics, and surgery -- this is the path we should keep going down.'" - check
10) Deny there is a conspiracy, whilst implying there is one.
"In fact, when Howard Dean asked me that, my response was "I wouldn't call it a conspiracy." Any more than there's a conspiracy for the Pentagon budget to be obscenely bloated and operated largely for the corporate welfare of defense contractors." - check
"Is it conspiracy theory to believe that American medicine too much treats symptoms and not root causes of disease? " - check
11) Disingenuously spread misinformation thanks to one's high profile job.
Chat show - check
Twitter - check
Huffington Post - check

And stir. And stir again. Whatever any experts say, do *not* go back and change the ingredients. That would be too scientific, and wouldn't serve the agenda.

Two more things shock me about this article. One is how *parochial* his attitude is; he needs to get out and about and away from the particular obsessions that Americans have; no doubt there are some reasons to be paranoid in the States, and no doubt there are issues with 'big pharma' the world over. But that isn't an excuse for pretending one knows better than the scientific community, when one doesn't. The second is the suggestion that scientists want to close down any argument surrounding vaccinations. I see no evidence of that; just authorities concerned about know-nothing slebs endangering people's lives.

EDIT: See KWombles similar piece! And a useful round-up of blog criticism, here.

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Why the New Atheists are Bad

There seem to be a lot of articles like this recently. In summary they say something like this:

I want to draw your attention to the evil new atheists that swarm among us.

They refuse to entertain doubt about their beliefs. They are rampant ego-maniacs. They loudly proclaim that anyone who doesn't believe what they say will go to the dogs. Their philosophy leads to conflict and depravity. They are pre-occupied with sex. They are rude and dismissive of opposing views. They are dogmatic and closed-minded. They meet up and worship their community leaders. They follow their leaders religiously. They want to teach our children what to think. They want to direct government policy to their own ends. They want to tell other people they're wrong. They organise and form lobby groups. They want to sell their books. They want people to read their books. They demand money from their followers for merchandise.

You and I as pious theists understand that such behaviour should be the sole province of the religious.

For some strange reason, the things of which they accuse the new atheists are more accurate descriptions of *religious* behaviour. Even if any of it were true (and often it isn't), why do they complain about behaviour in which they indulge?

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Ruse's Seven Deadly Sins

A simply appalling piece from arch-faitheist Michael Ruse in today's Guardian. Not for the first time, I find it hard to understand how an intelligent, educated man (certainly more intelligent and educated than me) could commit such howlers to print. Consider:

First, non-believer though I may be, I do not think (as do the new atheists) that all religion is necessarily evil and corrupting.

Fail no. 1. I don't know a new atheist who thinks that; perhaps a reference to where all the new atheists say that or write that would be in order? The closest I can see is Hitchens saying that religion poisons everything; not the same thing, of course, as any 10 year old could surely see, let alone a philosopher.

Dawkins and company are ignorant of such claims and positively contemptuous of those who even try to understand them, let alone believe them. Thus, like a first-year undergraduate, he can happily go around asking loudly, "What caused God?" as though he had made some momentous philosophical discovery.

Fail no. 2. Just because a first-year undergraduate can ask the question doesn't mean *it has been answered*. The argument is about the inconsistency of the uncaused cause claim. It rests on nothing existing without a cause (we don't know that) and then uses *that* as a foundation for a single uncaused cause, which (guess what?) is shaped like their god, that they've been rabbiting on about for years. Who'd have thunk it? A 10 year old child could see the problem with this logic, let alone a philosopher.

...how dare we be so condescending?

Fail no. 3. Treating claims seriously is not being condescending. Hand waving away atheists who object to religious claims as spoil sports and then claiming some kind of Kuhnian epistemological equivalence *is* condescending. A 10 year old child could surely see this?

I can explain their faith claims in terms of psychology; they can explain my lack of faith claims also probably partly through psychology and probably theology also. (Plantinga, a Calvinist, would refer to original sin.)

Fail no. 4. Which is the more likely explanation? The psychological, or the Calvinist? Or the Scientologist? Or the Pastafarian? Come on, don't be so *patronising*. A 10 year old child could *make up* a possible explanation, but that wouldn't make it valid, as she would surely understand.

I just keep hearing Cromwell to the Scots. "I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken."

Fail no. 5. *What* does this tell us? To *where* does this lead us? Knowledge is *tentative* and *doubtful*. What does faith require? Banishment of doubt. What do religions teach? Certainty, through divine knowledge. You've guessed it; a 10 year old child could see the contradiction, let alone a philosopher.

If, as the new atheists think, Darwinian evolutionary biology is incompatible with Christianity, then will they give me a good argument as to why the science should be taught in schools if it implies the falsity of religion? The first amendment to the constitution of the United States of America separates church and state. Why are their beliefs exempt?

Fail no. 6. And sinister with it. Is he seriously suggesting that *if* science showed the falsity of religion then secularism would dictate it should not be taught? That it should be suppressed? Unfortunately this is the logical conclusion of allowing epistemological equivalence between knowledge derived scientifically and other 'knowledge', betrayed by his last line; 'Why are their beliefs exempt?' Until fools masquerading as martyrs abandon this nonsensical position then religious knowledge will be allowed to continue in its unjustified position of privilege. Many religions explicitly declare the falsity of religious knowledge; *just not their own*. How does Ruse choose the most valid body of knowledge from the cornucopia available to him? I suggest a 10 year old child could see the problem in Ruse's position, let alone a philosopher.

But, of course, the point of secularism is to protect the right of people to believe what they like, not to introduce thought-crime. If some facts imply the falsity of *anything*, then those facts should still be taught, but the pupils allowed to come to their own conclusions. *That* is surely the aim of the First Amendment?

But don't worry. In the God Delusion, we have a message as simplistic as in The Genesis Flood. This too will solve all of your problems. Peace and prosperity await you in this world, if not the next.

Fail no. 7. And finally, it's the rank dishonesty that shocks. As if TGD claims to 'solve all of your problems'. A 10 year old child could read the book and understand *that*, but not, apparently, Michael Ruse.

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