The Tall Tales of Hoffmann

"Hic!"

I'm not sure if this Hoffmann's first love was Olympia, the automaton, (or was it Ophelia? She's certainly no automaton.) or if his further loves were Antonia and Giulietta, but there is more than a whiff of the old Hoffmann about this New Oxonian. It's as if some gnu atheist Lindorff has gone off with his Stella,  leaving him drunk in the tavern crying into his beer, "Muse whom I love, I am yours!". I've been that drunk too, though in humbler company than Hoffmann. He certainly loves the Muse, but perhaps he has spent too long musing while nimbler, more successful courtiers of Stellar Street have taken the plaudits and bouquets. That seems to be part of the complaint (h/t Screechy Monkey):

Part of that has to do with (as I suggested) a record that goes back long before most Americans had heard of Richard Dawkins. Some of us older and old atheists remember what a lonely battle that was. Many who came to the movement since 2000 will not. And that is precisely the pojnt. Without saying jealousy is involved, there are many (not just me) who know that the Dawkins revolution could not have taken place without th almost invisible work of many of my associates in and out of the academy over many many years. On the one hand, we need to be grateful that the New Atheists have been successful in garnering support; on the other hand, and I know this from experience, nothing ensured the death of a book in this country before 1995 like putting the word atheism or humanism in the title. So, there were laborers in the trenches.

But in his latest offering he is far from a-musing, letting off at every gnu he can think of, like a drunk sending texts to former lovers. He starts off with the usual suspects and regurgitates well-worn non-arguments against the Four Horsemen (three of whom he might call Gnu Oxonians?). Interesting that he seems to admire Hitchens the most ("the only true intellectual and by far the best-read of the group"), since Hitch's arguments were always the worst of the four, even if his polemics were the best. More ire is aimed at the gnu bloggers who dare to offer an opinion on religion that has not been informed by years of study in the Divinity School at Harvard. He starts with Jerry Coyne, quoting him comparing religion to leprechauns in their compatibility with science, to which he responds:

Just a flash: While leprauchauns didn’t copy the books that were turned into the books that led to the science Dr Coyne eventually studied, monks and rabbis did. Why does the perfectly reasonable opposition to religious craziness have to descend to this caricaturing of the history of religion?

Strange, isn't it, that religion has morphed into the history of religion? What a befuddled argument. It's difficult to know what Hoffman's point is here. Is it that a deep and complex history justifies an ontology? But Coyne doesn't deny religion's history. It's as if he thinks the involvement of religious people in the history of science invalidates the Conflict Thesis, but none could be that dumb. Leprechauns don't exist so they couldn't have copied early science books, so Hoffmann's comparison doesn't work. Coyne, on the other hand, is pointing out that religion is a superstition, like leprechauns, not that religion doesn't exist, or, even more foolishly, that the history of religion doesn't exist or isn't complex. Hoffmann's argument wouldn't pass muster at infant school, sadly, let alone any philosophy department.

A Gish Gallop of mud-flinging follows, aimed at PZ Myers ("If ever atheism got dumber and less impressive, it is in the work of this dissolute insult- monger"), Greta Christina ("She sees everything as a weird sexual joke"), Ophelia Benson ("...has turned her once-interesting website (I used to contribute regularly) into a chat room for neo-atheist spleen"), Eric MacDonald ("doesn’t seem to know bloody anything about the academic study of religion") and Jason Rosenhouse ("I sometimes wonder why people whose only contribution to blogdom consists of sentences like “Most religious rituals leave me beyond cold,” find themselves titillating?"). Like one or two other misguided critics of new atheism, Hoffmann is often pragmatically self-refuting!

But Hoffmann has an illustrious history, if not an illustrious future, so I do wonder what has got under his skin so much about people who aren't guilty of the things he thinks they're guilty of. Apart from the self-confessed jealousy above, he gives a clue to one of his concerns in a comment below his latest rant:

The new atheists don’t oppose the study of religion. Not true: in fact the famous “Pinker Intervention” at Harvard in 2006 prevented religion from becoming a part of Harvard’s core curriculum, on the premise there was no difference between theology and religion-studies, though Harvard was the first university in America to introduce such study in the 1930′s, apart from its Divinity School. Read all about it here: http://www.somareview.com/godandmanatharvard.cfm Stephen Pinker (who is far more considerate of religion in general) is not the issue here, btw; a number of the newbies have gone on record as saying that the study of theology does not belong in a university, though in some places like Harvard, Yale, and Chicago, this would mean closing down their divinity schools where the study of religion is alive and well. That’s half the problem: the other half is that rank amateurs like the newbies have already pronounced their verdict on such study by mixing up the objectives. Frankly if this confusion is any indication of the state of their information, they’d better hold off on the God thing for a few years. If you want to see the nadir of this imbecilic conversation, here you go:http://www.newstatesman.com/2011/06/dawkins-myers-religion-faith

Interesting. The New Statesman piece compares religion to knitting, which is presumably what upsets Hoffmann, but this is nothing more than Myers's view of what religion's status should be in society, not a judgement of its historic worth, I think. Despite people like Dawkins and Hitchens regularly supporting the study of religion, he genuinely believes they don't, and his evidence is the "Pinker Intervention" and a throw away remark from one of the more strident new atheists. I'm not familiar with the background to the Pinker story, so it would be good to hear some more about this other than what Hoffmann's written, cloaked in dense references as it is ("Pinker Intervention" throws up just one link on Google, to Hoffmann's piece).

So maybe his concern is that divinity schools should not be closed down? But opposition to divinity schools is not opposition to the study of religion, so it's still not clear why he is so exercised about this. In the piece he links to, about the study of religion at Harvard, he says:

In short, all the wrong reasons for studying religion—because it is popular, widespread, and personally significant—triumph over the good reasons for studying it.

I confess, though, that I'm not clear from the piece what the good reasons are for studying it. I could guess at a few. Hoffmann does say earlier:

But religion puts itself forward as something that ought to be studied in its own right, not because in doing so the student learns to value its influence or validate its claims, but so that the student will be able to evaluate it within a particular analytical frame of reference. And it is in providing that context that Harvard excels.

This may be true, but it does not go any way to justifying separate divinity schools - religion can still be studied in its own right without that - so I'm still left struggling to understand the nature of Hoffmann's complaint, once again. Unless he thinks that the only frame of reference that is sufficient for good religious study is in divinity schools? Maybe, but he would have to be clear why he thinks this, or it's just special pleading for religion; something that new atheists are (obviously) against.

I dare say he has other complaints; if only he could write clearly, without so many distracting straw men and errors of fact, then we might have a better chance of understanding them. Maybe one day he'll sober up and tell us fellow drunkards what he means.

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You Really Aren't Helping

The curious case of the You're Not Helping (YNH) blog (now defunct, so I can't link to it) highlights a particular sort of human irrational behaviour. It starts from a good intention, I think, but is derailed by simple lack of reasoning.

For a recent history of YNH, this post from The Buddha Is Not Serious gives a good breakdown, in more ways than one. You're Not Helping is a blog started by a faitheist; that is, an atheist who sees value in faith or, at least, that some respect for their beliefs is in order. Even more particularly, a faitheist thinks that some atheist behaviour (typically labelled 'new atheist') is driving a wedge between 'moderate' theists and the rest of rational society. Their complaint is obviously not about the arguments put forward by the new atheists - I show in this post how their arguments are in fact the same ones put forward by the old atheists - and the faitheist is an atheist so presumably must concur. No, their complaint is about the tone; they think a better tone will achieve better results, politically, I think.

Tone is important, we know. Russell Blackford writes intelligently about it here. But it's not all-important. Further, it's not evident that one tone is always the right tone to deliver an argument. I like to think I'm quite reasonable when putting forward my point of view, but I dare say some would call me strident, and others would call me soft on the faithful, depending on their own stridency. I don't see that as a problem. I would encourage a variety of tone for the delivery of these arguments.

The faitheist position is that the tone adopted by the new atheists is unhelpful, and therefore they should not use that tone or, failing that, be silent. There are a number of problems with this:

1) There seems to be no evidence presented to support their hypothesis - it's just common sense, they think.

2) They fail to demonstrate that there is a way of delivering the atheist message without falling foul of the 'tone' accusation. Massimo Pigliucci is a leading faitheist, whose philosophical writing I've often admired, but hilariously is accused here of failing in the tone wars himself ("Tone matters. And sarcasm is not science."). Should he tell himself to be quiet?

3) And finally, their commentaries on the new atheists adopt the same snark and sarcasm that they are demanding the new atheists remove from their commentaries on theism - just consider the antics at YNH and The Intersection.

This really is an impossible and incoherent position. I'm not going to tell them to shut up, however (that's their line). No, I'm just going to keep pointing it out, whether they like it or not, and in whatever tone I choose to adopt. That, I think, is my right.

Incidentally, it's ironic here, that YNH complains about being told to shut up, on a site calculated to shut up new atheists:

If you were aiming to shut up and silence an individual trying to express his opinion by digging deep for personal information and not caring what collateral damage you leave along the way in the form of incorrect allegations, you've succeeded.

Well, I certainly don't want YNH to shut up, but there are justifiable reasons for folk wanting to know who an anonymous blogger is who's telling them to how to behave. There's always a suspicion of ulterior motives; it's useful to know where someone is coming from, since it backs up their opinions and gives them some colour. It's not vital to know, but can be helpful. Imagine if YNH was simply a blog set up by churchmen to sow dissent amongst the atheist community? That would be pertinent. Not that that would ever happen, of course.

But this is really a ridiculous diversion from the everyday battle to promote rationalism in the public sphere. Nevertheless, as long as we are wired as we are, some of us will go off on irrational tangents. Here's hoping William at You're Not Helping will see the error of his ways one day.

UPDATE: Gurdur, another prominent accommodationist, clearly spots the problem that YNH exposes; one cannot demand folk behave according to certain rules whilst one flouts the very rules one demands. This first commenter, defending YNH says:

He may have conducted himself badly, but it does not diminish the validity of the message.

Let me just complete that sentence to highlight its asininity:

He may have conducted himself badly, but it does not diminish the validity of the message that one mustn't conduct oneself badly.

Sigh.

FURTHER UPDATE: A full and frank (?) apology has been made for the conduct of YNH by William. I confess it comes over a little too neat for my liking, but others are giving him the benefit of the doubt. It is only teh interwebz, so let's consign it to history and experience.

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The 'New Atheist' Fallacy

There is a flaccid thread of thoughtless commentary on the new atheists these days, exemplified by this self-important diatribe by David B. Hart. Consider the source of his gloom:

The principal source of my melancholy, however, is my firm conviction that today’s most obstreperous infidels lack the courage, moral intelligence, and thoughtfulness of their forefathers in faithlessness.

But there is little new under the sun when it comes to arguments against theism, and the new atheists are using the same arguments as their 'forefathers'; how could it be a source of his melancholy? He carries on in similar vein, mounting various straw men in place of actual new atheist positions, before discussing in tedious detail the problem of infinite regress, which, for some reason, he thinks is the new atheists' favourite argument. One could equally say it's the theists' favourite argument, since that is where the prime mover springs from, but his discussion reaches no conclusion one way or the other, so he agrees with the new atheists! Bizarre. He then babbles on about Nietzsche in even more tedious detail, as if he was the final say on all matters divine.

His problem, as with all faitheists, is to misunderstand the new atheists as absolutist fundamentalists, when, as any fule kno, they are the very opposite; contingent agnostics prepared to admit they're atheists, and to understand the consequences of that admission.

A few quotes from some non-believers:

And, in these four things, opinion of ghosts, ignorance of second causes, devotion towards what men fear, and taking of things casual for prognostics, consisteth the natural seed of ‘religion,’ which, by reason of the different fancies, judgments, and passions of several men, hath grown up into ceremonies so different that those which are used by one man are for the most part ridiculous to another.
(...)
Lastly, amongst the points by the Church of Rome declared necessary for salvation, there be so many manifestly to the advantage of the Pope and of his spiritual subjects residing in the territories of other Christian princes that, were it not for the mutual emulation of those princes, they might without war or trouble exclude all foreign authority as easily as it had been excluded in England. For who is there that does not see to whose benefit it conduceth to have it believed that a king hath not his authority from Christ unless a bishop crown him? That a king, if he be a priest, cannot marry? (...) That the clergy and regulars, in what country soever, shall be exempt from the jurisdiction of their king in cases criminal? Or who does not see to whose profit redound the fees of private masses and vales of purgatory, with other signs of private interest enough to mortify the most lively faith, if, as I said, the civil magistrate and custom did not more sustain it than any opinion they have of the sanctity, wisdom, or probity of their teachers? So that I may attribute all the changes of religion in the world to one and the same cause, and that is, unpleasing priests; and those not only amongst Catholics but even in that Church that hath presumed most of reformation.¹

I have often wondered, that persons who make a boast of professing the Christian religion, namely, love, joy, peace, temperance, and charity to all men, should quarrel with such rancorous animosity, and display daily towards one another such bitter hatred, that this, rather than the virtues they claim, is the readiest criterion of their faith.²

Hence the greatest crimes have been found, in many instances, compatible with a superstitious piety and devotion: Hence, it is justly regarded as unsafe to draw any certain inference in favour of a man's morals from the fervour or strictness of his religious exercises, even though he himself believe them sincere.³

When anyone tells me, that he saw a dead man restored to life, I immediately consider with myself, whether it be more probable, that this person should either deceive or be deceived, or that the fact, which he relates, should really have happened. I weigh the one miracle against the other; and according to the superiority, which I discover, I pronounce my decision, and always reject the greater miracle. If the falsehood of his testimony would be more miraculous, than the event which he relates; then, and not till then, can he pretend to command my belief or opinion.⁴

I am thus one of the very few examples, in this country, of one who has, not thrown off religious belief, but never had it: I grew up in a negative state with regard to it. I looked upon the modern exactly as I did upon the ancient religion, as something which in no way concerned me. It did not seem to me more strange that English people should believe what I did not, than that the men I read of in Herodotus should have done so.⁵

Given, a man with moderate intellect, a moral standard not higher than the average, some rhetorical affluence and great glibness of speech, what is the career in which, without the aid of birth or money, he may most easily attain power and reputation in English society? Where is that Goshen of mediocrity in which a smattering of science and learning will pass for profound instruction, where platitudes will be accepted as wisdom, bigoted narrowness as holy zeal, unctuous egoism as God-given piety? Let such a man become an evangelical preacher; he will then find it possible to reconcile small ability with great ambition, superficial knowledge with the prestige of erudition, a middling morale with a high reputation for sanctity.⁶

Gentlemen [believers], we can only reply, wait till you have some show of agreement amongst yourselves. Wait till you can give some answer not palpably a verbal answer, to some one of the doubts which oppress us as they oppress you. Wait till you can point to some single truth, however trifling, which has been discovered by your method, and will stand the test of discussion and verification. Wait till you can appeal to reason without in the same breath vilifying reason. Wait till your Divine revelations have something more to reveal than the hope that the hideous doubts which they suggest may possibly be without foundation. Till then we shall be content to admit openly, what you whisper under your breath or hide in technical jargon, that the ancient secret is a secret still; that man knows nothing of the Infinite and Absolute; and that, knowing nothing, he had better not be dogmatic about his ignorance. And, meanwhile, we will endeavour to be as charitable as possible, and whilst you trumpet forth officially your contempt for our skepticism, we will at least try to believe that you are imposed upon by your own bluster.⁷

There will always be a fungus, a star, or a disease that human science does not know of; and for this reason it must always behove the philosopher, in the name of the undying ignorance of man, to deny every miracle and say of the most startling wonders,-the host of Bolsena, the star in the East, the cure of the paralytic and the like : Either it is not, or it is; and if it is, it is part of nature and therefore natural.⁸

The pulpit assures us that wherever we see suffering and sorrow which we can relieve and do not do it, we sin, heavily. There was never yet a case of suffering or sorrow which God could not relieve. Does He sin, then? If He is the Source of Morals He does - certainly nothing can be plainer than that, you will admit. Surely the Source of law cannot violate law and stand unsmirched; surely the judge upon the bench cannot forbid crime and then revel in it himself unreproached.⁹

It is not well worthy of note that of all the multitude of texts through which man has driven his annihilating pen he has never once made the mistake of obliterating a good and useful one? It does certainly seem to suggest that if man continues in the direction of enlightenment, his religious practice may, in the end, attain some semblance of human decency.¹⁰

Do not all theists insist that there can be no morality, no justice, honesty or fidelity without the belief in a Divine Power? Based upon fear and hope, such morality has always been a vile product, imbued partly with self-righteousness, partly with hypocrisy.¹¹

Throughout the last 400 years, during which the growth of science had gradually shown men how to acquire knowledge of the ways of nature and mastery over natural forces, the clergy have fought a losing battle against science, in astronomy and geology, in anatomy and physiology, in biology and psychology and sociology. Ousted from one position, they have taken up another. After being worsted in astronomy, they did their best to prevent the rise of geology; they fought against Darwin in biology, and at the present time they fight against scientific theories of psychology and education. At each stage, they try to make the public forget their earlier obscurantism, in order that their present obscurantism may not be recognized for what it is.
(...)
Toplady, the author of "Rock of Ages," moved from one vicarage to another; a week after the move, the vicarage he had formerly occupied burnt down, with great loss to the new vicar. Thereupon Toplady thanked God; but what the new vicar did is not known.
(...)
I am sometimes shocked by the blasphemies of those who think themselves pious-for instance, the nuns who never take a bath without wearing a bathrobe all the time. When asked why, since no man can see them, they reply: "Oh, but you forget the good God." Apparently they conceive of the Deity as a Peeping Tom, whose omnipotence enables Him to see through bathroom walls, but who is foiled by bathrobes. This view strikes me as curious.
The whole conception of "Sin" is one which I find very puzzling, doubtless owing to my sinful nature. If "Sin" consisted in causing needless suffering, I could understand; but on the contrary, sin often consists in avoiding needless suffering. Some years ago, in the English House of Lords, a bill was introduced to legalize euthanasia in cases of painful and incurable disease. The patient's consent was to be necessary, as well as several medical certificates. To me, in my simplicity, it would seem natural to require the patient's consent, but the late Archbishop of Canterbury, the English official expert on Sin, explained the erroneousness of such a view. The patient's consent turns euthanasia into suicide, and suicide is sin. Their Lordships listened to the voice of authority, and rejected the bill. Consequently, to please the Archbishop-and his God, if he reports truly-victims of cancer still have to endure months of wholly useless agony, unless their doctors or nurses are sufficiently humane to risk a charge of murder. I find difficulty in the conception of a God who gets pleasure from contemplating such tortures; and if there were a God capable of such wanton cruelty, I should certainly not think Him worthy of worship. But that only proves how sunk I am in moral depravity.
(...)
We are told that sin consists in acting contrary to God's will. This, however, does not get rid of the difficulty. Those who, like Spinoza, take God's omnipotence seriously, deduce that there can be no such thing as sin. This leads to frightful results. What! said Spinoza's contemporaries, was it not wicked of Nero to murder his mother? Was it not wicked of Adam to eat the apple? Is one action just as good as another? Spinoza wriggles, but does not find any satisfactory answer. If everything happens in accordance with God's will, God must have wanted Nero to murder his mother; therefore, since God is good, the murder must have been a good thing. From this argument there is no escape.
(...)
As soon as we abandon our own reason, and are content to rely upon authority, there is no end to our troubles. Whose authority? The Old Testament? The New Testament? The Koran? In practice, people choose the book considered sacred by the community in which they are born, and out of that book they choose the parts they like, ignoring the others.
(...)
Self-importance, individual or generic, is the source of most of our religious beliefs. Even sin is a conception derived from self-importance.
(...)
Since evolution became fashionable, the glorification of Man has taken a new form. We are told that evolution has been guided by one great Purpose: through the millions of years when there were only slime, or trilobites, throughout the ages of dinosaurs and giant ferns, of bees and wild flowers, God was preparing the Great Climax. At last, in the fullness of time, He produced Man, including such specimens as Nero and Caligula, Hitler and Mussolini, whose transcendent glory justified the long painful process. For my part, I find even eternal damnation less incredible, and certainly less ridiculous, than this lame and impotent conclusion which we are asked to admire as the supreme effort of Omnipotence. And if God is indeed omnipotent, why could He not have produced the glorious result without such a long and tedious prologue?¹²

Of the proposed solutions of the problem of evil which we have examined, none has stood up to criticism. There may be other solutions which require examination, but this study strongly suggests that there is no valid solution of the problem which does not modify at least one of the constituent propositions in a way which would seriously affect the essential core of the theistic position. Quite apart from the problem of evil, the paradox of omnipotence has shown that God's omnipotence must in any case be restricted in one way or another, that unqualified omnipotence cannot be ascribed to any being that continues through time. And if God and his actions are not in time, can omnipotence, or power of any sort, be meaningfully ascribed to him?¹³

Who are these dreadful , strident, militant new atheists? - you may wonder, if you are a sensitive believer, or believer in belief. They certainly reflect many of the arguments of the current so-called 'new atheists'.

All long dead before the year 2000. So much for New Atheism.

EDIT: And one last quote, this time from a theist:

But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood. - King, M.L. Letter from Birmingham Jail

¹ Hobbes, T. 'Of Religion' from Leviathan.
² de Spinoza, B. Preface to Theological-political Treatise.

³ Hume, D. The Natural History of Religion.

⁴ Hume, D. Of Miracles.

⁵ Mill, J. S. Moral Influences in Early Youth.

⁶ Eliot, G. Evangelical Teaching.

⁷ Stephen, L. An Agnostic's Apology.

⁸ France, A. Miracle from 'Le Jardin d'Epicure' .

⁹ Twain, M. Thoughts of God.

¹⁰ Twain, M. Bible Teaching and Religious Practice.

¹¹ Goldman, E. The Philosophy of Atheism.

¹² Russell, B. An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish.

¹³ Mackie, J. L. Evil and Omnipotence.

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Times New Atheist

I've been following the dust-ups on the blogosphere around the various issues to do with 'New Atheists' and accommodationism, and trying to make some sense of it.

Recent 'anti-neo-atheists' include Terry Eagleton, Chris Mooney, Karen Armstrong, Madeleine Bunting and H.E. Baber. These include theists and 'faitheists'.

The targets of/responders to the attacks include Jerry Coyne, P.Z. Myers, Ophelia Benson and Russell Blackford.

The anti-neo-atheists seem a little taken aback by some of the responses to their criticism, and think the New Atheists are being a little thin-skinned, a little hypocritical; it's just the rough and tumble of debate - you dish it out, so don't complain when you get some criticism yourself.

This isn't quite the situation as I see it; the New Atheist complaint is not the criticism, per se, it's the *type* of criticism. The New Atheists are attacking accommodationism with various arguments that may or not be correct (I happen to be anti-accommodationist myself, so I agree with them). But the criticisms thrown at the New Atheists aren't about their arguments; they're about the actual act of criticism. Consider Chris Mooney's comments about Jerry Coyne; he's talking about what Barbara Forrest said about science v religion:

Coyne took on Kenneth Miller and Karl Giberson, two scientists who reconcile science and religion in their own lives. Basically, Forrest’s point was that while Coyne may be right that there’s no good reason to believe in the supernatural, he’s very misguided about strategy.

And he goes on to give three reasons why atheists should not alienate religious moderates (a question-begging assertion itself): Etiquette, diversity and humility. An astonishing claim! In what other area of honest debate would these points be cited? The clarification for 'etiquette' simply places religious belief beyond criticism; 'diversity' argues that moderates shouldn't be argued out of existence as long as there are fundamentalists around, I think; 'humility' exhorts us to acknowledge our inability to disprove god. Well, one does, but does one have to *keep* acknowledging it?

So Mooney apparently agrees with Coyne's argument, but doesn't want him to press it home with moderate theists, in case they are alienated, and, er, what? Become fundamentalists, I guess. I cannot think of any other way to summarise Mooney's blog.

Now consider some quotes from H.E Baber's article in the Guardian:

Most people I know are atheists. But they're atheists of the old kind who have no particular interest in proselytising because they do not believe that anything of importance hangs on whether or not people believe in God and because they recognise that theological claims are controversial. Unlike the New Atheists they don't think they have discovered, or invented, something new and interesting.

A straight forward snide ad hom, and, of course, New Atheists don't think that anyway. From what I can deduce, they admire Hume, Russell and Mackie.

New Atheists believe in unbelief. For some reason they think it important to assure their followers in the village that religious belief is not merely false but uncontroversially false and that educated people who profess to be religious believers or claim that theism is compatible with science are out to dupe them.

Note the patronising 'in the village'; why can't the arguments be addressed in a grown-up manner? New Atheists *cannot* think that religious belief is *uncontroversially false* otherwise they wouldn't be applying so much time to arguing their case. They think that religious belief has not shown it is reasonable to think it true - at least the religions they are familiar with. It's possible there are true religious beliefs floating around somewhere.

I would be very interested in hearing why the New Atheists and their followers believe, with such manifest conviction, in unbelief.

So rather than address the anti-accommodationist argument, pretend the New Atheist 'believes in unbelief'. It's a real shame. One of my least favourite tactics - argument dodging.

For me the New Atheists attack on religion is more an attack on the religious way of thinking; their motives are to ensure that public policies are determined with full possession of the facts of each matter. Many religions have survived by privileging their dogma and punishing dissent. The motives of many religious leaders are, and have been, to maintain control over a constituency, and to direct public policies according to their dogma of choice. Now this may not, by chance, be a bad thing - they may have dogma that happens to be good. But if there is bad dogma it's difficult to change it through reason, because of the privileges and punishments which have developed to *protect* the dogma. So the very reason the religions have survived successfully is the reason we must deny them privilege in the public arena.

Anti-accommodationists point out that moderate theists subscribe to this *religious way of thinking* just as fundamentalists do. Thankfully the moderates don't make the errors that the fundamentalists do, and they should be applauded for that. I prefer a moderate to a fundamentalist. I'd encourage fundamentalists to be moderates and moderates to be agnostics, and so on. But too often the anti-neo-atheists cry wolf at atheists pointing out faulty thinking, as if we should not do it when the believer is 'moderate'. That is simply *not good enough*, and indefensible.

Finally, Jerry Coyne has 'coyned' (see what I did there) a new term for atheist-butters - 'faitheist'. More complaints of hypocrisy have flown from faitheists, suggesting that this is pejorative, in the same way as 'New Atheist' has been denounced as pejorative by the New Atheists. There may be an element of truth in this, but I *think* there is a clear difference. The purpose of 'New Atheist' seems to be to differentiate a certain type of modern, vocal atheist from those nice, 'umble atheists of the past, who knew their place - witness Habel's comment above "Unlike the New Atheists they don't think they have discovered, or invented, something new and interesting." There's an agenda, and it is to define the New Atheists as something they're not. 'Faitheist' actually defines the target group accurately; they are atheists who *do* demand respect for faith. Any pejorative in 'New Atheist' is based on a false attribution of what they think. If 'faitheist' becomes pejorative it will simply be because folk come to find atheists who demand respect for faith objectionable. At least, that is how it should be. If things turn out differently, I'll amend my view.

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