just a few lines into this review we get our first, glaring clue that the reviewer hasn't got a clue about the theory of natural selection:

"since there is no selective advantage to a creature in being altruistic..."

thus proving that this fellow hasn't even got as far as the 'Prisoner's Dilemma' chapter in Dawkins' first book.

of course there are selective advantages to being altrustic: in those situations where altruistic people stand a better chance of reproducing than non-altruistic people.

like everywhere, for example

Surprisingly, Michael Shermer and William Dembski (at the spearpoint of the Intelligent Design Movement) are friendly towards one another despite their polar-opposite worldviews. They've been known to share a beer.

And IIRC, Ayn Rand thought she could derive 'ought' from 'is'. She failed, although her disciples will hear none of it. And please, Randians, don't write back and pollute OJ's blog.

If you study any of the "absolute" moral codes of religion, not so much in what the code says but in how it is understood and applied by its followers, you will find all sorts of provisions. It is meaningless to say that you believe that moral rules are absolute if you then follow a provisional, situational version of those rules.

"Thou shalt not murder" sounds absolute enough, but the definition of murder cannot be absolutely established outside of the situation that it is applied to. If you kill one Siamese twin to ensure the life of the other, is it murder? Some would say so.

The problem is that people do not recognize the provisional moral judgements that they make as such, to them it is the obvious judgement that everyone should make. "Why, of course it would be murder to kill the twin!", someone would say in absolute terms. Like our own body odor, we do not recognize our own set of provisional moral judgements, it is invisible to us.

Everyone does this. Such a situational morality, which recognizes both rules and the need to sensibly apply the rules, is a superior method of morality then the sort of absolute, by the book morality that the proponents of absolutism imagine that they are following. If the opposite were the case, then we could program a computer to sit in judgement over us. It would always apply the rules consistently and absolutely.

Careful, Brit, Harry and Jeff have officially read Dawkins out of Darwinism because the Selfish Gene theory leads so obviously to incoherence.

Explain this statement, OJ of Ockham.

http://www.royalinstitutephilosophy.org/articles/stove_new_religion.htm

See here for their myriad statements disavowing him:

http://www.brothersjudd.com/cgi-bin/mt-search.cgi?IncludeBlogs=1&search=dawkins

I don't remember throwing Dawkins out. I remember throwing out the bog-standard misunderstanding of Dawkins. You know, the one which people make when they only read a few paragraphs and essays and jump to immediate wrong conclusions. The one where they think the word 'selfish' is literal. Sound familiar?

I also remember writing this:

Dawkins and morality, lesson 1:
1) 'selfish' genes are not actually consciously 'selfish'. they don't have little geney minds. The word is a metaphor to help you understand replicating genes and their relative success in the environment.

2) 'the selfish gene' theory says the following: one can make powerful predictions about the process of natural selection by IMAGINING that the gene has a selfish motive to make copies of itself

3)Here is the misinterpretation: People think that genes are our deepest hidden self, our essence, so if our genes are selfish, that means that deep down we're selfish

4) But there is no claim that the metaphorical motives of the genes are somehow a more fundamental or honest version of the real motives of the entire person.

5)Consider: sometimes the most "selfish" thing a gene can do, in this metaphorical sense of selfish, is to build a brain that is not selfish -- not selfish at an unconscious level, not selfish at any level - even if the genes are themselves metaphorically selfish.

6) Consider: When we help a stranger, behave with honesty or love our children we aren't at any level of the brain calculating that it will increase our inclusive fitness. The love can be pure and in and of itself in terms of what's actually happening in the brain. The metaphorical 'selfishness' of genes only explains why we have that pure emotion.

7) The idea that morality itself would be a fiction if our moral reasoning came out of some evolved moral sense is a non sequitur.

[b]Robert D:[/b]

Christianity is a religion which obstinately retained its distinctive absolute moral codes. Surprisingly, then, it appended them with another: "Nobody can follow these perfectly, nor do they even really desire to".

Therefore, I think your description is a very lucid explanation of why Christianity is the world's most popular religion-- because it seems to fit what people, as you do, intuitively perceive.

The deception to which you refer is certainly real, and is mirrored in the biblical warning: "if anyone thinks they have no sin, they deceive themself, and God is not in them."

Brit:

As I said--the coherence quotient is minimal. At the point where you have genes "building" brains you've become a religion.

I don't have time to go through that extensive list. I do remember attacking some of Dawkin's more inflammatory statements, but I don't remember reading him out (largely because all I have read of Dawkins is through Bro Judd Industries).

It is fairly well established that the likelihood of engaging in an altruistic act is directly proportional to the degree of relatedness with the recipient of the act's benefits. I am much more likely to run out onto broken ice to save my own child than the child of a complete stranger.

Which sounds pretty obvious, and it also sounds exactly like what evolutionary theory would predict. Because there is a reproductive fitness advantage in saving my own offspring, even at the cost of my life.

Oh lordy, I've just had a revelation...you're someone who buys what David Stove has to say on Darwin????!!

I didn't realise it was that serious.

Sad to say, Stove is a staggering ignoramus when it comes to evolution. The article you link to above is one of the all-time classic pieces of basic intellectual blunder. It should be read to all Darwinists as pure comedy.

Yet rescue workers ran into the WTC and AMERICANS LIBERATED Iraq.

So much for gene theory.

OJ. Have you read The Selfish Gene?

And I don't mean a paragraph here and there, or the blurb on the back of the book. Or the first page of the introduction. Or David Stove's little classic of a critique.

Have you actually read the book from cover to cover and come to a considered opinion on its contents? Be honest.

Of course--I've a dog-eared copy right here--next to my half-read Mayr, my book of Stove essays, etc..

Brit:

The funniest part of the altruism chapter is when he says he tested his theory that altruism works by running a computer program--thereby proving designe just as surely as evolution.

what do you think of his stuff on the prisoner's dilemma?

and are you of the opinion that Dawkins literally thinks genes 'make us do stuff' in their own selfish interest?

Robert:

"It is meaningless to say that you believe that moral rules are absolute if you then follow a provisional, situational version of those rules."

No, you are confusing apparent conflicts between rules of morality and disagreements as to their meaning with relativism. Complexity is not a synonym for relativism. The fact that people are confused and disagree about what to do when a situation appears to involve conflicts between, say, the Commandments, doesn't mean their authority is relative to time, place and circumstance(or level of self-esteem!). If the only way I can stop my father from killing is to kill him myself, that says I am caught between two Commandments, not that their authority is relative. The latter would mean whether killing him is wrong or not would depend upon a host of exogenous factors relating to him, me, society etc., and could only be determined perfectly by a never-ending comprehensive inquiry into all of those.

The Siamese twin example is an apparent internal consistency within the prohibition against murder. It calls into question the exact definition of murder, not whether murder is sometimes ok. We all sat in undergraduate seminars debating whether killing to save a life is good or permitted. Why do you think there are so many priests and rabbis grappling with such questions? Do you think they all believe in moral relatism?

Look at your criminal code. You will find many offences and lots of rules about them. They give rise to all kinds of conflicts and questions of interpretation that demand trials to find answers. Does that mean you consider the authority of the criminal law to be relative?

Brit:

The Prisoner's Dilemma l;ikewise is a resotrt to reason, not to genes.

But yes, I do think he believes his rhetoric about genes just as you believe Darwinism--everyone has to have an unreasoning faith in something.

" by running a computer program--thereby proving designe just as surely as evolution."

heh heh... your ability to grab firmly hold of the wrong end of nearly every evolutionary stick is quite remarkable.

the computer program is merely an illustrative way of demonstrating that altruism can be the most beneficial outcome for all parties.

you have a genuine problem separating the literal from the illustrative or the metaphoric.

which is understandable if you haven't actually read any dawkins. but less so if you have read him, since he frequently reminds the reader that he is speaking metaphorically.

that's why Stove's stuff is considered so funny. no refutation is required: it yells "blunder!" from every line.

unfortunately you make the same basic error, that is, an error of category.

Well, fine then, if it's all just a metaphor that resembles what you'd get from intelligent design but disguises that fact from the creatures within the system then I agree with him.

Well, I've read Dawkins out, but to be more precise perhaps I should have said I think he is about the world's worst popularizer. If Huxley was Darwin's bulldog, Dawkins is Darwin's tapeworm.

Robert stated the situation very well with regards to moral choices, I think.

Other animals make choices, too, like pushing the weaker birds out of the nest, but we do not call those moral choices, but birds are not (we suspect) introspective.

That you can have altruism without monotheism, or any other kind of theism, is sufficiently demonstrated by ants, whether you think they were created or evolved.

Hobbes was a bit imprecise. He said the war of all against all was among individuals, but it would be more accurate to say that it was among groups.

Humans have a greater ability to form groups that are not genetically-based than other species, although there is some evidence that other mammals (the big-brained ones) can do it to some extent, as Robert says.

Humans can not only bring in outsiders into their groups, they can eject genetic members.

Thus you get both adoptions and Nazis.

Nevertheless, to accept this does not mean accepting group selection. As Mayr says, species evolve by selection among individuals.

This is obvious enough. If competition selects out every single individual, with the exception of one breeding pair (which happened in myth with Noah's ark and in reality with the northern fur seal), the species still survives (and, if that coincides with a founder event, may also give rise to a new species).

Peter,
You are also confusing what Shermer espouses with moral relativism. To quote the article "He devotes much of the rest of his book to promoting his own secular system of morality -- "provisional morality" in his words -- that stands somewhere carefully unspecified between complete moral relativism and the absolute systems of dos and don'ts espoused by various religions.He thinks there are fundamental moral rights and wrongs that hold in almost all situations, but he is wary of absolutism in all its forms."

To me, absolutism with regard to morality means that men strictly defer moral judgements to an unchanging external source, and make no judgements based on their own sense of right or wrong. Like a computer, we would faithfully carry out the instructions of the "code". Once matters of interpretation arise, then another source is being consulted, a non-absolute, subjective source. Absolutism cannot co-exist with any level of interpretation. Whatever you call it, it falls short of the absolute.

Does that assume relativism? No, to me moral relativism is very similar to moral absolutism, in that it assumes the person cannot make moral judgements, but must defer. In the case of relativism, he must totally defer to the situation. The situation is as it is, we cannot judge it.

There is an in between, where moral decisions are based on stable, enduring principles but must be made in a specific context by human judgement. I don't know what you call it, but it is neither absolute nor relative.

Robert:

Have you not set up a bit of a straw man by defining absolute morality in a way that takes it right outside all of human experience, if not capacity? Whoever behaved like a computer in enforcing moral codes?

Peter, I don't believe Robert is the one who did that. I remember endless teachings in Catholic school about the various outcomes of dying unbaptized.

Harry:

No one can link seemingly disparate topics quite like you. Weren't we talking about codes of moral behaviour?

Well, Peter, how would you define absolute morality? I am giving you my definition. If your definition differs from mine, then in what way is it absolute?

Doesn't God have to be moral, too, Peter?

Harry:

Of course not--what a strange idea.

Shermer relies on anthropology. Not good news. Almost all anthropology is ideology with grass skirts. I have a book to cite but it is in the bedroom and the W is asleep there. Every attempt to construct a system of ethics without recourse to the divine is doomed. At the end of the first such attempt Plato's Republic, the author recounts the vision of the divine judges of the dead.

Harry. Hobbes does discuss the relations of nations as the primary example of the state of war.

Peter

I don't think you and Robert are too far away from each other. As you said, in the Siamese twin case "it calls into question the exact definition of murder, not whether murder is sometimes ok...". And Robert says "the definition of murder cannot be absolutely established outside of the situation that it is applied to".

So in both your views we recognise that day to day morality involves not just rules but decisions in how to apply them.

Remember that the anthropologist starts by recognising that we are moral creatures: ie. that we (usually) follow and (unusually) break moral rules, and we argue over whether one course of action is more moral than another. But where you think these morals come from the Bible etc, the anthropologist hypothesises other origins.

If the religous man can escape the caricature of absolutism, then the anthropologist can escape the caricature of relativism.

-------

Harry:

"I think Dawkins is about the world's worst popularizer..."

That's a bit harsh: in terms of bringing evolutionary science to the public consciousness, he's a terrific populariser. Certainly 'the selfish gene' was my introduction to natural selection, though with hindsight i'd recommend 'the blind watchmaker' to the first-time reader.

But where I (increasingly) agree with you, is that his metaphoric and teleological language, (which give the books their novelistic force and popular readability), can lead to horrendous confusion. As OJ amply demonstrates on this site.

But again, in his defence, in my experience you can spell out the non-teleological approach step-by-step in words of no more than one syllable - and many people still won't get it....

Robert:

Absolute in the sense of emanating from an eternal, all-knowing, authoritative source independent of man. Not absolute in the sense of "Is that absolutely clear? Now, no more questions!" What is so confusing about the proposition that mankind understands the divine Will imperfectly because of his imperfect nature?I think you are confusing G-d with Donald Trump.

Harry:

If you insist G-d has to be moral in your terms in order to exist, then you are the god and He is just the faithful assistant, to be dismissed at your whim.

Brit:

Why does something as mundane, observable and objective as scientific inquiry require metaphors and teleological language in the first place? Genes change and mutate, some fast, some slow. Some survive, some don't. End of story. Why the poetry?

Brit:

"But where you think these morals come from the Bible etc, the anthropologist hypothesises other origins. If the religous man can escape the caricature of absolutism, then the anthropologist can escape the caricature of relativism."

Certainly, but the anthropologist claims to rely on scientific observation and proof for all his authority. Surely he has to do something more than just hypothesize before he can claim our attention or respect. Otherwise he is no more authoritative than the nice, confused old lady who claims it is turtles all the way down. By its own terms, belief in science shouldn't lead to any special credence to the untested musings of scientists, right? It seems to me evolutionists spend a lot more time musing and hypothesizing than actually proving anything.

"It seems to me evolutionists spend a lot more time musing and hypothesizing than actually proving anything."

Indeed. But then, that's what science is all about: you posit a theory based on observations, then you test it with further observations. And you refine or discard the theory according to these further observations.

"belief in science shouldn't lead to any special credence to the untested musings of scientists, right?"

I guess this crystallises the reasons for a lot of the arguments on here. Maybe its just personality types. If you are someone who likes to start with solid answers, then no, you're not going to give any credence to any 'untested musings'. In fact, you're probably going to yell down anything someone says until he has a complete, undeniable explanation for absolutely everything.

But if, like most scientists, you're quite comfortable saying "we don't know...yet", then you will give be happy to afford some credence to 'untested musings', in that you'll accept them as possibilities, and investigate them further armed with occam's razor.

(incidentally, OJ makes the mistake of thinking that occam's razor means being close-minded. it doesn't: it means being extrememly open-minded to all possibilities, but being very strict about why you let something in)

In other words, if you're the first type of person (generally religionist, it seems to me), you see a theory's incompleteness as a reason to scoff at it, or reject it outright.

But if you're the second type of person (generally more scientifically-minded) you see a theory's incompleteness as grounds for futher investigation.

-----

re Dawkins' poetry:

Good question, but not too difficult to answer, i think:

1) Metaphors: dry, dull science textbooks tend not to make it into the bestseller lists. but sexily-titled books like "the selfish gene" do

2) Teleological language: it's shorthand. it's just easier and quicker to write "natural selection gave these finches the ability to dig out grubs with their beaks, and these ones the ability to grind down fruit ..etc", then it is to go: "finches in geographical area A with beaks of proportions x y and z, following mutation M have a 0.2% increased chance of reproducing in generations g h and i over timeframe t....etc"

finally, it's only my opinion, but evolution is far from 'mundane'...it's an endlessly fascinating subject and a constantly improving science.

Brit:

"dry, dull science textbooks tend not to make it into the bestseller lists. but sexily-titled books like "the selfish gene" do"

I know what you mean. I think that's why Hitler called it "My Struggle", rather than "Rantings of a semi-deranged, failed Viennese Artist." It's a much more effective to way convince the plebs you know what you are talking about when you don't.

As to your other point, I understand that we respect the "hypothises" of learned people and assume they have some context to guide their musings. But you may have been absent last week when we had a chat about Dawkins' calls to eradicate religion and declare the teaching of it to children to be in the nature of a crime. Our materialists on this site rushed to disown him as a fruitcake, but I note his rehabilitation by some didn't take long.

Yes, science is obviously endlessly fascinating to a lot of people. So is astrology. As Heisenberg said: "The world outside is ugly, but the work is beautiful". It is the persistent, unyielding refusal of so many scientists to understand, in both scientific and non-scientific terms, the connection between the two that damns them and their craft.

"that damns them and their craft" ?

so are you anti-science? anti-research? a luddite? i don't understand how anyone who sits at a computer, or drives a car, or takes a pill when he's got a headache, can howl down 'science' - it seems absurd. maybe you don't mean that....

----
re Dawkins.

I'm aware that he has some extreme views on religion in eduction. he's on the hard-core wing when it comes to that stuff. i don't happen to share these views.

but when it comes to the essentials of natural selection, he does know what he's talking about and i do share his views.

i'm not in the habit of dismissing everything a man says because i disagree with one thing that he says. that would be illogical. after all, i think OJ is pretty hopeless on evolution, but i respect his views on all sorts of other things.

Every time I get a chance to say something, I discover Brit, Robert & Harry have already done so, only far better.

Peter:

Dawkins is entitled to his opinion on matters of religion, and just as entitled to voice it. I'm sure you wouldn't have to search too hard through the realm of religionists who espouse the very same thoughts with regard to areligionists. At least Dawkins isn't advocating burning anyone at the stake.

Brit:

You are aware it's called a raxor because it shaves away other lines of thought?

Brit:

Also, you're confusing technology with science.

Jeff:

Sadly stake burnings have gne out of style, but when they were in Dawkins would have worked the bellows.

Brit:

DATELINE: OTTAWA, FEBRUARY 6TH, 2004:

In a statement that perplexed secularists around the world, Peter B made clear today that he thinks science is a good thing and that scientists have benefitted us a lot.

"When it comes to health and prosperity, scientists are my kind of guys. Indeed, I give nightly thanks for the four D's--drugs, drinking water, dentistry and deodorant", he said, munching on a genetically modified snack. "Central heating and mosquito repellant too."

However, he stated that, despite his admiration and gratitude, his reservation was that he felt a smidgeon of unease at the derivative claim of some scientists and their faithful followers that science explains everything and is the sole repository of truth, and that only scientists possess the capacity to distinguish truth from error. "That really sucks", he opined knowledgably.

He went on the plead for the secular world to respect his and his family's need for privacy and not to deluge him with strawmen and reductio ad absurdum.

-30-

Jeff:

"At least Dawkins isn't advocating burning anyone at the stake."

High praise indeed.

Peter:

Very good, but curse you for making me choke on my tea :)

I take your point gracefully...But but but.... "science explains everything and is the sole repository of truth"...I wouldn't dream of saying that.

Just "science potentially COULD explain everything....". Sorry!

-----

As for "only scientists possess the capacity to distinguish truth from error"...I agree that's nonsense. Leave it to the philosophers!

Here's a joke:

A scientist, a mathematician and a philosopher are going on a train to Scotland. As they cross the border and look out the window they see a brown cow in a field.

The scientist says "Look, the cows in Scotland are brown."

And the mathematician says: "No. There are cows in Scotland of which one, at least, is brown."

And the philosopher says: "No. There is at least one cow in Scotland, of which one side appears to be brown."

Brit:

Very good. Here's one in return from the currnet edition of First Things. A notice on the church bulletin board says:

Morning sermon: "Jesus Walks on Water."
Evening sermon: "Searching for Jesus."

"Certainly, but the anthropologist claims to rely on scientific observation and proof for all his authority. Surely he has to do something more than just hypothesize before he can claim our attention or respect. Otherwise he is no more authoritative than the nice, confused old lady who claims it is turtles all the way down."

Unh, Hunh. Like I said. Ideology in grass skirts.

BTW I found the book, "Constant Battles: The Myth of the Peaceful, Noble Savage" by Steven A. LeBlanc and Katherine E. Register. Dr. LeBlanc is director for collections at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology of Harvard University.
ISBN: 0-312-31089-7 [remove "-" for Amazon search]

God has to be moral so we can preserve self-respect. Otherwise, you might as well commit suicide.

He's God--He gets to bind us, not we Him. You put the leash on your dog, not vice versa.

Harry:

You are getting very close. But, for your profound insight above to work, He doesn't have to be moral, He just has to exist.

"Absolute in the sense of emanating from an eternal, all-knowing, authoritative source independent of man." Peter B

OK, but here is my question. Are you saying that to be moral, we have to assume that this authoritative source exists, or that we have to act in accordance with its rules? There is a difference. Say, for argument sake, that the absolute source says that C is true an B is false. Person 1 says "B is true because it is the will of the absolute source." Person 2 says "C is true, because my conscience tells me so." Which person is acting morally? Is morality in the act or in the justification for the act?

Robert:

Morality requires only that we behave as if the Authority existed--but morality can only exist if we assume such. Thus, somewhat paradoxically, a belief in morality leads to a belief in God just as surely as vice versa.

Robert:

Morality is generally about actions. If person 2 gets it right for the wrong reasons, good for him. If you are asking whether non-believers can behave more morally than believers, most definitely. Happens all the time.

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Well, most societies have invented gods that are capricious and non-moral. But they don't make moral claims for them.

If morality-deity is a kind of Feynman diagram and you can go either way, then the god has to be moral. In particular, the God you guys invented makes promises, so he has to be moral enough to keep them.

But, true, most gods do not make promises.

Harry:

Why would God have to obey rules he set for His creatures?