Six days ago, I received an email with the subject “Bruce, a Press Release for: The Thinkers’ Podium“. Normally, people release press releases on their own websites, so you can imagine my surprise that an unfamiliar book from an unfamiliar author on an ambiguous topic, had a press release for my blog.

It started off with a somewhat benign explanation of why I was picked out.

“Greetings Bruce,

Looking over your website, you seem to present yourself as a rational thinker with liberal, humanist views. It is for this reason that the following Press Release may be of interest to you.”

Okay. Fair enough, I am a small-l liberal (social liberal specifically), with humanist views and reason is a priori for me. What’s in it that would interest me?

“And yet, for all the widespread literacy, numeracy, and vast range of intellectual application advances in all forms of industries and fields of research, a simple but irrefutable fact remains: that humans, as a species, are no more humanely civilized today than they were thousands of years ago.”

Valuing corrigibility over dogmatism, I couldn’t possibly consider this irrefutable and indeed, as a “rational thinker” with an interest in human nature, it’s the kind of claim I’d want critically analysed, not simply asserted and accepted! Everything that makes me liberal and humanist is at odds with both the claim, and moreover the way it is simply asserted!

Indeed, how could this claim be known? One would have to possess knowledge of the entire history of humanity to make comparisons. Wouldn’t you know, the author has such knowledge!

“Still, an obvious question arises: how could an ordinary human know all that the, so-called, greatest of all human thinkers in all of human existence never knew? The only method by which this query can be resolved – so as to be perfectly understandable – is by reading the Revelations of a Human Space Navigator. In this book there are all the answers to means by which this knowledge had been obtained by Victor Senchenko.”

(Victor Senchenko, 2008 )

Want to know if the book is worth reading? Just buy the book and it will tell you!

You know what? I think I’d want a bit more in a press release, or in advertising pap, or in the blurb than self-referential endorsement by the book itself. I’d want to know that the book was worth reading before I spent a single cent.

The pre-emptive evasion of scrutiny or critical analysis, as evidenced throughout Senchenko’s self-promation isn’t a good sign. Claiming fairly questionable assumptions as irrefutable and engaging circular reasoning are never good in debate, and are usually tactics employed by people who don’t want a genuine, intelligent discussion.

Often it’s simply ego defence, other times more cynical; they may have wealth or political power resting on the acceptance of indefensible concepts. Sometimes it’s all three and more. Religious apologetics, especially of the popularist variety from the Bible Belt of the US, is rife with this. But the religious don’t have a monopoly of course.

You can prop up any theme with this kind of gainsay and sophistry.

Now, in all fairness, I was going to contact Victor Senchenko and ask him to explain his terms. I’ve already written about one unsolicited email as a part of a book promotion, assuming that it was purely spam, and had that blow up in my face some what. I don’t want to have that happen again!

However, someone has already beaten me to the punch. I wanted to question Senchenko on his claim that there is no such thing as time, specifically about his proposed experiment which seemed in blissful ignorance of the concepts he was criticising.

Another blogger got there first though, and I have to say, did a good job. Indeed, everything that I was going to ask has been asked, and everything I suspected about Senchenko has been revealed; he doesn’t like his ideas being critically analysed and goes quite ballistic in response to sincere and fair lines of questioning. Before telling you to go read the book of course.

So, it is with some degree of appreciation that I direct you towards Skeptico: Victor Senchenko - Time Does Not Exist. Be sure to pay attention to the meltdown part and the entirely fair line of questioning that provoked it. I’ll be adding Skeptico to my blog roll as well.

Skeptico, you’ve saved me a job and the wrath of another in a line of angry people who don’t appreciate critical thinking. Thankyou!

~ Bruce

There is a quote by Popper that I’m quite fond of using that illustrates my utilitarian position on liberty in discussion.

“If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.” - Karl Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies.

Taken to inform my comments policy, the implication is that freedom of speech isn’t an absolute, that tolerance to intolerance will lead to the destruction of tolerant and open discussion. Such intolerance of open discussion includes spam, trolling and general abuse, and in as far as it is disruptive, lying, red herrings, disinformation and intellectual dishonesty in general.

A recent participant in discussion, “LaVallette”, in addition to characterising my criticism of some of his (rather vapid) points as some kind of intolerance to different opinion, making childish remarks like “My My My, we are so so clever and intellectual” and my personal favourite “So pick up your ball and go home where mummy will protect you. Byeeeeeeeeee!!!“, “LaVallette” has accused me of being anti-Catholic simply through bare assertion.

Now, I have banned several participants for behaviour not as poor as this and if they are reading this and feeling a little ticked off, well I can understand that and yes I am giving “LaVallette” special treatment. This is because I have chosen him, on somewhat of a whim, to be a guinea pig of sorts.

“LaVallette” claims he is looking for robust debate, specifically ” I will find somewhere else where robust debate is appreciated.” Well here is some robust debate for him.

He has alleged that I am anti-Catholic, without a shred of evidence, so given this slur, it’s not at all unfair that I expect him to make an effort to prove it, or to show some intellectual honesty and retract.

He’s set himself a hard task though, considering that in the post that provoked this allegation, I;

1) Concede that while the issue of corpse veneration is a bit weird, that ultimately it’s not an important issue for non-Catholics and that nobody is getting hurt by it;

2) Pondered if secularists dwelling on the perceived weirdness are doing so out of ressentiment and not focusing on more important and more difficult issues (a criticism of atheists and other non-Catholics who have been mocking the veneration of corpses of late). This was the central point of my post, and quite clearly not anti-Catholic.

3) Expressed concern that the philosophy of theocratic entitlement welcoming the largesse of the state (particularly the notion of “Normative Democracy” championed by George Pell) could backfire on Catholics and see a return to the bad old days when being Catholic in Australia necessarily meant being discriminated against (given that not all of the norms of Catholicism are norms shared by the greater populace, nor greater Christendom).

4) Acknowledged that there is greater diversity in Catholicism, and that the views held by Pell et. al. that I criticised, weren’t necessarily held by all Catholics.

5) Pointed out that I assumed that Catholic High Court judges involved in the assessment of a writ, weren’t opposing it because of their Catholicism, but rather either due to pragmatic concerns (upon which the writ was eventually rejected) or in the case of one judge, political bias (as shown by the importance she placed on the political nature of the complaint, yet ignoring the political nature of that which the complaint was levelled against).

But, just because it’s difficult, doesn’t mean that “LaVallette” isn’t obligated to back up allegations made. Defamation is by definition, at least in Australia, harmful slurs that are made without due care to the truth. You don’t get much more serious than an allegation of anti-Catholicism, nor does blind assertion show any care for the truth.

But rather than focus on “LaVallette’s” defamation of my person, I just want to see this as an intellectual exercise. LaVallette wants it robust, so I issue the quite reasonable challenge that the allegation against me is substantiated, or that it is withdraw in the spirit of intellectual honesty (and not just so the challenge goes away).

I’m setting a deadline, not out of spite (indeed, I am being charitible by allowing this to continue) but because of my ability to accomodate “LaVallette’s” intolerance of my criticisms (as clearly evidenced by the spittle flecked invective). Popper, in following up on the above quote, stated that suppression wasn’t wise if such intolerance could be countered with rational argument.

I’m only willing to use rational argument with “LaVallette” up until Friday, after which I will be using rational argument on topics of importance. This is still, i think, very charitible considering “LaVallette’s” behaviour and if you recall how “Corey’s Thread of Doom” turned out, if reasonable, you will thank me for putting the end in sight already.

So if our latest troll here hasn’t risen to the challenge and shown us just how intellectually robust they are, then they will get banned like the rest of the trolls. Not that further abusive behaviour won’t attract a ban after that.

Oh, and “LaVallette”, don’t go fouling up the comments threads on other posts with your childish personal attacks. That’s what this thread is for.

Now have at me, “LaVallette”. You fight for the dignity of your fellow trolls on the Australian blogosphere!

~ Bruce

P.S. - Others who want to help “LaVallette” out in accusing me of anti-Catholicism, you have until Friday as well, unless you have already been banned for similar sillyness.

I’m just doing a wee bit of a security check, in a similar vein to what was done to check up on (rubbish) identicons a while back. Posts on this thread won’t be on any particular topic, so feel free to use it as an open thread (within reason).

~ Bruce

Okay, thanks Mikey.

The instructions as I can gather go; repeat instructions so the next clod in-line can repeat them when you tell them to repeat them (you didn’t tell me to repeat them did you Mikey!); turn to page 123 of the nearest book to you (I’m assuming with 123 pages in it) and write out the 5th sentence.

The nearest to me is God is Not Great, by Christopher Hitchens, which trumps out The Little Red Writing Book, by Mark Tredinnick by a measly 4cm.

Here goes…

“And here again there is a vast commentary of doubtful anecdote about the actual doings and sayings of the Prophet, this time known as the hadith.”

Raising doubt over the teachings and example of Muhammad. That won’t tick anyone off.

In turn I tag Ninglun and AV and just so AV can’t tag them as always, I tag Sean, OzAtheist and Matt.

~ Bruce

I haven’t posted anything for just over a week, so I thought I’d give you a blog/behind-the-blog report and to be frank, myself a break from the monotony of exam revision.

I still have drafts in the work for the last two in the much belated “Atheism and Theory of Justification” series, a draft of the “The Political Correctness Conspiracy” post and a very skeletal “A Priori Concept of Harm” draft, all of which I hope to spit and polish up for release in July.

Following somewhat of a faux pas on my part, I have agreed to write a review a copy of Greater Than You Think by Thomas D Williams. Given that it’s being released this Monday, I’ll have to be quick off the mark with a review to catch the first wave, but no so quick as to be careless.

I want to do a good job of it, so I’ve also bought my own copy of God Is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens (which I have read albeit quickly) and The Little Red Writing book by Mark Tredinnick. The latter, after a suggestion by Ninglun, will be for my prose (and my enjoyment as well as a bit of guidance on some short fiction I’m writing.) The former for a bit of background given the play on words in the titles.

The review will come first, as quickly as can be done with due care after either my last exam (next week) or after receiving the book, whichever comes second. I will follow up with an essay (which I will append to the review) to deal with points of contention, and a deeper critical analysis than can be provided in a single review.

As for some of the few people witnessing my first thoughts on the topic of Greater Than You Think, said faux pas not withstanding, consideration as to the role of the question mark in the title in addition to a lack of conclusing statements really needs to be addressed in their criticisms. How can I be accused of prejudging if I haven’t come to a conclusion?

“By the title you applied to your post one might think you actuallyread (sic) the book, but you indicate you are unwiulling (sic) to look. You simply trash the author.”

(”Jack Picknell“, 2008 )

Firstly, one needn’t necessarily assume from the title that I had read the book. The title (”Greater Than You Think, not so great?”) posed a question about a book that hadn’t yet been released, an airing of suspicions, it was not a statement. Secondly, I didn’t “trash” the author and thirdly, I hadn’t ruled out the option of reading/reviewing the book and I had actually agreed to do so by the time “Jack” had made his comment.

Then there was this rubbish…

““My gut reaction is meh…BS” If that’s not a biased opinion before even reading the book, I don’t know what is. I chanced upon this site just cause I wanted to know what the reviews were on the book, and yes the Jack dude was right on the mark - the title DOES lead one to believe that you actually read the book… But I digress, I’m going back to search for reviews and not waste time on biased opinions.” - Emphasis added.

(JP , 2008 )

Except, it wasn’t me who said “My gut reaction is meh…BS”. That was Mojoey, and he had already received the book, so one can’t simply assume that his gut reaction was prior to any reading. On the other hand, I only made an exploration of the background of the book, I didn’t pass judgement. As for the title, AV sums it up well.

“”If you’re claiming that Bruce deliberately set out to mislead, then you ought to provide sufficient evidence. (And no, the fact that the expectations of Jack Picknell and JP were not met does not constitute sufficient evidence of Bruce’s evil intentions. OTOH, the fact that Bruce in the very same post explains his misgivings about reviewing the book, coupled with that question mark in the title, is ample counterevdence.)”

(AV, 2008 )

Their expectations being a rather pertinent point. JP was out looking for reviews and mistakenly though mine was a review, which it was not nor pretended to be. Somehow, I’m to blame for this error. This is ironic. JP prejudges the content of my post, then has the gaul to call me biased when their preconceptions aren’t met.

The fact that “Jack” made the same error is no more basis for accusation either.

Makes you wonder what it’s going to be like when I write the actual review, doesn’t it?

See you after my last exam.

~ Bruce

I’ve just had reason to recall something that I witnessed at the University of South Australia quite some time back. Given that it’s on a topic that has had much discussion, I thought someone may be interested.

I won’t name the academic or the subject that this occurred in and indeed, it didn’t even take place in one of my classes, but rather a class a friend was enrolled in. It just happened to be in the same room I was going to have a lesson in, in the next session.

The tutor, for whom I otherwise have had no reason to quarrel and indeed who on most counts I consider a good academic, was telling the class that the narrative of scientists being persecuted by religion during the 17th century was simply dogma that was repeated simply because nobody was being critical of it.

Now, said academic is vaguely Christian culturally speaking and both secular and politically progressive with strong humanist beliefs, so historical revisionism about religion and science isn’t something that you would necessarily expect. Not the usual suspect, at least as far as the culture wars have been concerned.

One thing that did stand out was their occasional misuse of science I witnessed in other circumstances. Particularly opining that neo-Darwinism argued that humans are at “the top of the food chain” and thus justified in eating animals and that vegetarians may be the next step in human evolution (with the implication of being superior in a non values-neutral way).

Aside from getting the basics of evolution wrong, biology (or science in general) doesn’t dictate or produce values. As far as values as an outcome of science is concerned, science reports on the is so that philosophy can make informed decisions about the ought.

One can fairly describe said academic’s very common treatment of Darwinian theory as an example of the humanities’ abuse of science.

Fortunately, their work isn’t really predicated on this, at least not necessarily so, nor have I reason to believe that dissent would negatively affect anyones grades.

But back to the historical revisionism.

Galileo was the example given to the class, and his treatment at the hands of the Church was both critically analysed, but sadly also discounted. The students presumably didn’t know a full account and hence the tutor was the soul source of information. The foibles of Galileo (e.g mocking the Pope and in general behaving like Phillip Adams) were played up, documented reasons for his sentence were glossed over and the details of his punishment were altogether missing.

No mention at all was made of his daughter, Maria Celeste, with whom his relationship was even further isolated (she lived in a convent) during his house arrest (and with whom Galileo had a very close bond). There was no mention of the changes in her living arrangements while taking upon some of the burden of her Father’s punishment, nor mention of how their isolation made her untimely death all the worse for her father.

All under the aegis of a church supposedly friendly to science.

Nor was the trial of Giordano Bruno (some thirty years earlier) mentioned. The popular version of the story goes that amongst a list of reasons, Bruno was denounced as a heretic and burned at the stake, amongst these reasons being that he believed in a heliocentric solar system (i.e. that the Earth revolved around the Sun). What isn’t in dispute is that Bruno, an early scientist, was charged with heresy and burned at the stake (with his jaw clamped shut and a spike rammed through his tongue, presumably so the kiddies didn’t have to hear him scream).

The original, primary documentation for his execution has long since been lost and certainly enough time has passed since its loss for all sorts of conspiracy theories and fanciful narratives to have arisen and attained popular status. Who’s to say that the popular account isn’t in a large part romanticised?

With no great surprise, various parts of academia have fixated upon the role of heliocentrism in Bruno’s trial. Supposedly, with the loss of the primary documentation there is nothing to say that heliocentrism was a part of Bruno’s trial.

Up until Pope John Paul II got up and set a few things straight in 2000, it was common Catholic doctrine that Bruno was executed for offenses not including heliocentrism. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy apparently takes the same position to this very day. Perhaps part of Galileo’s story just got mixed in over subsequent re-tellings.

Well, there is a problem with this line of reasoning. In 1940 documentation that directly cited the lost, original primary documentation was found, including the line of inquiry that Bruno was subject to.

In response to questioning about his cosmology, Bruno replied in defense;

“Firstly, I say that the theories on the movement of the earth and on the immobility of the firmament or sky are by me produced on a reasoned and sure basis, which doesn’t undermine the authority of the Holy Sciptures […]. With regard to the sun, I say that it doesn’t rise or set, nor do we see it rise or set, because, if the earth rotates on his axis, what do we mean by rising and setting[…]“

(Vatican Secret Archives, retrieved 2008 )

So if Bruno wasn’t charged with heresy at least in part on the grounds of his heliocentrism, why was he defending heliocentrism from his inquisitors?

Of course, even prior to the fact of the role of heliocentrism in the trial, one has to ask why heliocentrism is suddenly discounted, but not Bruno’s belief that Mary wasn’t a virgin. Why not his belief that Jesus wasn’t the son of God? Why aren’t the his theological beliefs being similarly discounted as heresy criteria when they are subject to the same loss of evidence as the role of his scientific beliefs?

It’s quite obvious really, even without considering the evidence of the discussion of heliocentrism in his trial. The people applying the double standard between evidence for Bruno’s scientific views and his religious views are the same people trying to conclude that the Church’s hostility to science is an overblown narrative.

I’m not saying that there isn’t an exaggerated “Martyrs of Science” narrative out there, nor that the Church has been universally hostile. Indeed, both the previous Pope and the Vatican Secret Archives have done well in dealing with the religion-science schism (I especially commend the ethos of “Documents belonging to history”, espoused by the VSA). What I am saying is that the discounting of the facts demonstrates a massive anti-science bias.

Following the “Science Wars” of the nineties, Bruno Latour, writing in Critical Inquiry (2004), showed concern at methods of critical studies of science being used for cynical political means. He also laments the teaching of students for “wars” with “enemies” that aren’t there anymore, which given the popular insistence of much of the science-critical humanities on dealing with the supposed positivism and certainty of science, is at least heartening.

Perhaps when the Latour’s of the humanities realise that positivism was dealt with by philosophers of science before Kuhn’s thesis was published and that certainty was first eroded by Galileo himself and more decisively so by Popper, Latour may realise his mistake. The main enemies of science studies were dead and buried before science studies was even conceived.

Science is today and for some time has been defined as necessarily corrigible and positivism was never more than a often ignored, passing fad in the scheme of things.

Which brings us back to incredulity in the “Church versus Science” narrative. What has the critical humanities brought to this discussion other than to point out the valid but somewhat obvious? History is ambiguous and certainty of historical truth isn’t attainable (and I stress a distinction between certainty and confidence).

I’m not and can’t be certain of the degree that heliocentrism played in Giordano Bruno’s persecution if it did at all, but I am confident that it did play a significant part. Just as I am confident that anti-heliocentrism persecution led to significant, unjust suffering by Galileo.

Bruno Latour, in relation to scientific fact questions “Should we rather bring the sword of criticism to criticism itself and do a bit of soul-searching here: What were we really after when we were so intent on showing the social construction of scientific facts?” I think the revisionists of the “Church versus Science” narrative should take this advice on board as well.

What are they after when criticising the narrative? Are they just commenting on the ambiguity of history (something which many take for granted anyway) or is there another bias? In church versus science, which party best embodies the humanities? Is theology and philosophy in general a science, or is it of the humanities?

It’s not just global warming denialists or young Earth creationists manufacturing anti-science controversies with the aid of the science-critical humanities. Oh no.

A certain new Pope has been at it as well. Undermining some of the more noble deeds of his predecessor, and fomenting further unnecessary conflict between science and the church.

~ Bruce

Islam isn’t a race. So what?

You’d think with the amount of times we’ve all probably heard this that the statement would at least be meaningful. Of course it isn’t. It’s just stating the obvious and stating it in retort to an assertion nobody ever made (i.e. that Islam is a race).

It’s been a part of the cut and thrust of the pettier end of the culture wars ever since 9/11, you probably heard it from some bigot after Cronulla and I’ve myself had a few discussions on the topic recently over the whole Camden incident which has brought Australia international shame.

The word “racist” comes up when discussing the xenophobic hysteria that is the product of weaker minds, each time they get their stimulus. Said stimulus being if a Muslim does something wrong, then it’s all about keeping them out or making them all like us, but if a white westerner does something wrong somehow it’s an individual case.

Outgroup homogeneity bias is for a good part the culprit. “Sure, in western culture (queue march of 300 Spartans with rousing incidental music) we have the occasional bad egg, but that’s because we are a diverse lot. Those Mussies! They’re all the same! So if one does something wrong, it’s because they are all bad.”

There are a few terms one can associate with the common xenophobic line. “Middle eastern”, “Grubs”, “Lebos”, “Indos” and so on. Boiling just under the surface of the anti-Muslim xenophobia is a recourse to ethnicity, although just stating “Muslim” saves the racist a breath or two.

The popular Islamophobia as a cultural artifice is innately racist, with Muslim or Islamist being both a reference to religion (usually in overly generalised terms) and a byword for (but not limited to) whatever ethnicity is being demonized. In and around the Cronulla riots, it was the Lebanese copping it before, during and after the riots with religion and race conflated by the xenophobes themselves.

Callers to talkback radio, especially to Alan Jones made this abundantly clear. These are of course the same members of the peanut gallery that make up the target audience of the Ackerman, Bolt, Blair, et. al. diatribes and the once rather more uncensored blog of Tim Blair paid testimony to this.

Whenever any of the crooks involved in planning and implementing the Bali Bombings so much as looks like getting out early, in spite of the matter of avoiding retrospective legislation (which is overlooked as a mere technicality rather than a protective measure against tyranny), the bile rises and you get the same clowns complaining about no gratitude for the aid Indonesia has received. Naturally, religion and ethnicity get conflated as well.

So when some progressive comes along and mentions the mass Islamophobia phenomena and calls it racist, they aren’t saying that Islam is a race. They are talking about the implicitly (or sometimes explicitly) racist nature of the phenomena. Pointing out that Islam isn’t a race does nothing to rebut this because there is no contradiction.

So why do the xenophobic right keep on repeating “Islam is not a race!” Two reasons really, and they are related.

Firstly, straw men make up a mainstay of right-wing argument. For the better part of the last decade at least, sophistry and deception have been an integral part of Australian right wing philosophy. Kids overboard, Weapons of Mass Destruction, false accusations of social Darwinism leveled against scientists, manufactured immigration statistics (see Pauline Hanson vs Maxine McKew in the 90s), Australian Wheat Board memos, the coverage of the toppling of the statue of Saddam, “The Great Global Warming Swindle” fraud, non-core promises and so on.

The right’s political sphere has been dominated by fabrications and massively contorted interpretations of fact so much that memes like the “Islam isn’t a race” rebuttal are able to easily propagate.

Secondly, while a deceptive meme in its deployment, “Islam isn’t a race” is clearly a fact. Consider this in light of the law of supply and demand. Truths in the Australian right intelligentsia (and I coin the term loosely) are in short supply, meaning that when an honest, clear fact comes along it attacks premium value.

Of course, only an a fact barren political culture could a banal factoid like “Islam isn’t a race” be seen as anything worth harping on about. It’s beside the point, which is one about bigotry.

Finding a two dollar coin down the back of the couch may seem like a small miracle to someone on a pension, with a lot of bills and an empty fridge on the day before payday (some baked beans and marked-down stale bread to get by on). To someone with their mortgage paid off an above average income, it’s not such a big deal.

Similarly, although to a more pathetic degree, watching the right repeat the mantra “Islam is not a race!” is like watching Gollum put on a ring and dance around singing “my precious”, except the prize is a stale Burger Ring and Gollum is still happy about it.

The prevalence of this meme, and incidences of its use by the right can tell you a few things. Firstly, that they aren’t interested in engaging with other people’s arguments but prefer to wrestle with men of straw. Secondly, that they are in a state of deep intellectual poverty.

~ Bruce

It’s all getting a bit old really this culture war business, at least in as far as theism versus atheism, and sectarian versus secular is concerned.

There’s the little things like the religious trolls who have carbon copied propaganda ad nauseum, giving a never ending supply of red herrings. The pseudo-skeptic atheists who loiter around popular skeptics are a bit of a nuisance as well, especially when they try to out-bright you (and it becomes obvious they haven’t read nearly enough enlightenment philosophy to be lecturing anyone on the topic).

The ex-fundie atheists can be a pain as well if they’ve kept their epistemological baggage from their non-free-thought days.

But the worst part I’d have to say, still comes from the theism side of the divide. At least, from people of stature within religious institutions.

The closest think I can really think of to a nasty atheist leader (who’s leadership stems from their atheism rather than them being a leader who happens to be an atheist - a few dictatorships have the latter) would be Christopher Hitchens. Of course, unlike on the theist side of things (theology schools and churches), Hitchens is more or less self-appointed.

The rational response squad, who can be entertaining <i>at times</i> and supportive of atheists subject to discrimination by theists, don’t speak for anyone other than themselves. They simply aren’t exemplars of atheism.

There simply isn’t anyone within the world atheist population that speaks with representative authority on atheism the way a Pope, or a Cardinal, or a Mufti can about theism. In academia, you have theology majors (dominated by theists) but not atheology majors (which given the negative position wouldn’t have much content - I’m not asking for such a major to be introduced).

Like him or loathe him, Richard Dawkins isn’t an atheologist. He’s just an atheist who happens to have an high academic profile.

There is no institution nor group motivation driving atheism in general, nor the supposed “new atheism”.

In lies the problem of the justification for the demonization of atheists for the past few years.

The general justification goes that a somehow instantly motivated “new atheism” is on the attack against religion. Somehow, the motive and the necessary organisation to conspire just arose from an entirely disorganised and generally unmotivated group of people.

There are specific variations of course. Anything between it being a movement seeking to overturn the Church’s sense of entitlement to taxpayer largess (a version conspicuously ignoring the fact that many theists campaign for this themselves - see Americans United) to Atheists wanting to control the government to oppress theists and make Atheism a state religion.

At the most moderate, this justification is an extreme conspiracy theory.

What has really happened? Basically, the sectarian politics that has always been around since day squat, got a whole lot more organized back in the 1960s (with the initial campaign for state support of creationism in schools as well as teacher-led prayer in school) and again in the 1980s until now with greater ties to conservative political parties (including the importation of the political technique and much of the policy in Howard’s Australia).

In the UK, things were a bit different. The UK has less of a constitutional separation between church and state than in Australia, and much less so than the US. During the founding of both the US and Australia, sectarian divisiveness and deprivation of liberty seen in old Europe were taken into consideration when constitutions were drafted (more so in the case of the US).

Political sectarianism therefore could just walk in the door in the UK, which is how the current faith schools (far more innately discriminatory than your worst-case, run of the mill, old-school theist private school) managed to get implemented without the culture warfare. Tony Blair is responsible for a good part of this initiative.

This has ticked off quite a few theists, either discriminating against them or at least offending their principals. Atheists naturally have been somewhat more affected by this.

There is also the great big elephant in the room. The religious nutters who flew planes into the Pentagon and the World Trade Center in 2001 and particularly their sectarian motivations have caused people concern. Sure, there has been much in the way of Islamophobic paranoia, attributing these motives generally to Muslims, but all the same, there is a legitimate topic of discussion here.

Sectarianism of all colours for some reason (I suspect to be something along the lines of the suspension of existential reasoning) has been fertile ground for violence.

I’d like to take this opportunity to clarify something that I think is an important point. Much is made of the “atheistic” atrocities of Mao and Stalin and I take issue with two things. Firstly, the attrocities didn’t follow from the atheism, the atheism was an ad hoc justification for pre-meditated acts.

Secondly, I object to these regimes being called either secular or “secular fundamentalist” or some variation of “secular”. They weren’t secular. These regimes had no respect for the separation of church and state, evidenced through their total deprivation of the liberty of the church.

Indeed, Soviet Russia was sectarian. The only substantive difference between their sectarian nature and that of any other sectarian regime is that they discriminated against one more sect.

This however, is a far cry from the worst published by Dawkins, Hitchens or Ayaan Hirsi Ali - none of these authors are as extreme nor as representative of the phenomena surrounding their beliefs (Stalin can speak for Soviets on Soviet dogma with far more authority than Dawkins can for atheists on atheism). These kinds of associations are profoundly hyperbolic, yet they still persist in popular, exemplar theist tracts.

As are the shrill cries about the existence of a “new atheist” menace to religion.

The “rise” of this threat is nothing more than an understandable interest in critiques of both theism and sectarianism. An interest sparked by the advance of political sectarianism in the second half of the 20th century, stamped with a great sectarian exclamation mark on 9/11/2001.

Books have been sold and Internet forums abuzz. This is all quite reasonable to expect without recourse to paranoid delusions about some imaginary “new atheism” bogeyman.

Only two things have changed substantially. People are interested in criticisms of religion far more than they once were and secondly, it’s no longer considered as impolite to do so as it once was.

The Flying Spaghetti Monster is seen more often as a respectable and valid reductio, not as a slur against religion. Even amongst more than a few theists.

Yet, I’ve seen one prominent and respected moderate theist (I can’t quite recall the exact details so please forgive me) refuse to enter into debate unless flying teapots, invisible pink unicorns and flying spaghetti monsters aren’t mentioned on the (supposed) grounds that they are disrespectful. Or in other words, “I won’t debate with you if you are going to use valid reductios”.

The implication was that in debate, said theist and his beliefs was entitled to not be subjected to these lines of argumentation. This is what the fear of the “new atheism” boils down to I think; rather than an actual rising threat (which the accusers have had great detail in substantiating), the accusers feel threatened through a loss of undeserved privilege they wrongly mistook as entitlement.

It’s probably not the kind of thing that a theist taking this line would want to dwell on, if only because of its embarrassing allusion to a weakness of character. But that’s not all it entails, I think.

From this self-inflicted state of threat, intellectual impotence and loss comes an understandable ressentiment. The obvious external agent of evil being the “new atheism” and atheists in general, or at least coming from that general direction.

Speaking of Father Jeremy Davies, author of Exorcism: Understanding Exorcism in Scripture and Practice and personal exorcist to the Archbishop of Westminster (boss cleric over Catholics in England and Wales - hardly a marginal theist), The National Secular Society Reports (HT: AV);

“The priest, who is based in Luton, said that key among the transgressions that have a “special affinity” with Satan was “rebellion against God” — which included the sins of blasphemy, atheism and attacks on Christ and the church — as well as sins against the light, when people resisted God’s grace.”

(Terry Sanderson, 2008 )

He really takes a literal approa