Bad Pinker and Good Pinker

Regular readers of this blog will know that I am a big fan of Steven Pinker, especially his book The Blank Slate. He has generally steered clear of the new atheist controversy, preferring positive advocacy of his own ideas rather than attacking others. Of course, there has never been any doubt about where he stood on the question of religion, but he has tended to keep his language temperate. More importantly, he has played ideas and not the man. Sadly, all that changed last week, as fellow clerk Humphrey of St Andrews has noted over in the discussion forum. Pinker launched an unprovoked and, to my mind, unacceptable attack on the geneticist Francis Collins. As well as being a renowned scientist, Collins is an evangelical Christian and author of the book The Language of God (which probably did much better in the US than it has done over here in Britain). It's this public advocacy of Christianity that Pinker seems to find so offensive. But demanding that people should keep their religious beliefs, political views (Pinker and Collins are both outspoken Democrats) or even their sexual orientation in the closet amounts to discrimination. Furthermore, Pinker's use of the usual new atheist boo-words (superstitious, iron age and medieval dogmas) demeans him and lowers him to the level of Dawkins and Grayling. That is not where I want to see one of the world's most important scientific thinkers.

As if to cheer me up, Good Pinker was also in evidence this week. We've known from some time that his next book would be on violence. He probably knew that the chapter on this subject in the Blank Slate was one of the weakest (together with his treatment of art). So it is great to see that he has revisited it for a book length treatment. On the basis of this teaser article in a magazine called Greater Good (spotted by Daniel Finkelstein) the new book should be an interesting read. The central fact that Pinker identifies about violence is that it has been declining throughout history. The twentieth century, even allowing for both world wars, was far less violent than those that proceeding it. There are inevitable upticks from time to time, but the trend is clear. The question is what has caused it? Read Pinker's article for some clues. Finkelstein highlights one aspect of modern life that might make us less violent – television. Because this brings the world into our living room, it makes the alien seem familiar. This makes it less frightening and so might reduce the chances of our reacting violently when we come across it in real life.

Let's hope that Bad Pinker is put back in his box so we can enjoy the work of Good Pinker uninhibited.

Merrie 'Unscientific' England

‘One question is always asked, one objection is always those who show curiosity about nature, when ill-educated people see natural philosophers examining its products. They ask, often with contemptuous laughter, ‘What use is it?...such people think that natural philosophy is just about the gratification of curiosity, just an amusement to pass the time for lazy and thoughtless people’.

Carl Linnaeus 1707-1778

Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum have just released a new book entitled ‘Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future’. As the authors lament, science and scientists have declined in the popular culture of the U.S. since their heyday in the years following WW II. For every five hours of cable news, less than a minute is devoted to science. The number of newspapers with science sections has shrunk from 95 to 34 since 1989. Bn contrast, virtually every newspaper now runs a daily astrology column. On the other hand, while the demotion of Pluto from it’s status as a planet produced sacks of hate mail, it did also ignite a wave of interest in astronomy.

This type of strained relationship between science and society is nothing new and one finds an interesting parallel to it in Early Modern England, not least because the public had trouble seeing what use natural philosophy could possibly be. In his ‘Emergence of a Scientific Culture’ Stephen Gaukroger points out that ‘the image of natural philosophy as a worthwhile enterprise was not something that was secure in the Scientific revolution’. As a result, the recently formed Royal Society almost collapsed soon after its inception due to a lack of attendance and funding. Having failed to secure an endowment from the king, the society was forced to rely on the joining fees and subscriptions paid by men of high wealth and status, many of whom made a very small contribution to natural philosophy.

The society itself was to come under sharp criticism from figures such as the Public Orator Robert South, who (a bit unfairly) referred to it’s members as:

‘the profane atheistical, rabble, whom the nation rings of, and who have lived so much to the defiance of God...a company of lewd, shallow brained, huffs making atheism and contempt of religion, the sole badge of wit, gallantry and true discretion; and then over their pots and pipes, claiming and engrossing all these wholly to themselves; magisterially censuring the wisdom of all antiquity, scoffing at all piety, and, as it were, new modelling the whole world.. the truth is, the persons here reflected upon are of such a peculiar stamp of impiety, that they seem to be a set of fellows got together and formed into a kind of diabolical society for the finding out of new experiments in vice’

Gaukroger quotes the Royal Societies patron King Charles II, laughing at the Royal Society for, according to Samuel Pepys, ‘spending time only in weighing of ayre and doing nothing else since they sat’. Things were so bad that Henry Oldenburg lamented to Robert Boyle that if only the Royal Society had made the most of their part in Wren’s plan for rebuilding London after the Great Fire, for this ‘would have given the Society a name, and made it popular, and availed to silence those, who aske continuously, what have they done?’. This was a sentiment echoed elsewhere in Europe. As Linnaeus complained in 1740:

‘one question is always asked, one objection is always those who show curiosity about nature, when ill-educated people see natural philosophers examining its products. They ask, often with contemptuous laughter, ‘What use is it?...such people think that natural philosophy is just about the gratification of curiosity, just an amusement to pass the time for lazy and thoughtless people’.

One of the most interesting public responses to the emergence of scientific societies documented by Gaukroger was Thomas Shadwell’s popular comedy ‘The Virtuoso’. This scathingly depicted Natural Philosophers as needlessly obsessive about obscure features of nature. The character of Sir Nicolas Gimcrack, based on Robert Hooke, is described as one ‘who has broken his brains about the nature of maggots; who has studied these twenty years to find out the various sorts of spiders and never cares for understanding mankind’. In one speech Gimcrack remarks ‘Tis below a virtuoso to trouble himself with men and manners. I study insects’. Hooke attended a performance and was so offended he wrote in his diary ‘Damned dogs. Vindica me dues (God grant me revenge’.

In 1709 a William King decided to publish a series of parodies of the Royal Societies ‘Philosophical Transactions’ in which the members are given instructions on how to write unintelligibly. Not that that there wasn’t something in King’s critique. Issac Newton once told a friend that ‘he designedly made his Principia abstruse’ to ‘avoid being baited by smatterers in Mathematicks’ and a spokesperson for the Royal Society celebrated it’s members lack of ‘ambition to be cry’d up by the common herd;’. In another publication by Thomas Brown, natural philosophers are depicted as trying to cure a boy who had swallowed a knife and deciding upon a more ‘philosophical remedy, and therefore better approv’d; and that was to apply a loadstone to his arse and so draw it out by magnetick attraction’.

In the event the Society was more than capable, through such members as Sprat and Dryden, of dishing out ridicule in return and does not seem to have suffered too greatly. Natural philosophy would eventually capture the imagination of the populace and the attitude would shift in the 19th century to a more respectful one. As a report in the Gentleman’s magazine of 1745 noted, demonstrations of electrical phenomena were ‘so surprising as to awaken the indolent curiosity of the public, the ladies and people of quality, who never regard natural philosophy but when it works miracles’.

See - The emergence of a scientific culture - Stephen Gaukroger p35-39

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Neo-geocentrism

A big part of the claim that Christianity is at war with science is geocentrism, the belief that the earth is at the center of the universe. As readers of this blog are aware, this issue is almost entirely misunderstood: in the ancient/medieval cosmology, the closer you were to the center of the universe, the less privileged and esteemed you were. This is precisely why hell is even closer to the center of the universe than the surface of the earth, and why Dante placed Satan at the exact center of hell (and thus of the entire universe), immobilized in a field of ice.

The misunderstanding is that since the premoderns thought the earth was at the literal center of the universe, they must also have thought it was the metaphorical center as well. It confuses geocentrism with anthropocentrism. But this can only be maintained by completely ignoring their Aristotelian cosmology, according to which the universe was arranged in concentric spheres, with God on the outside as the prime mover. The furthest place in the universe from God, therefore -- the furthest place in a sphere from what is outside the sphere --, is at its center. Of course, this ignores the fact that in Christian theology God is not merely transcendent to the universe but omnipresent within it as well; nevertheless, the premoderns maintained that the closer you were to the center, the less valuable you were. This has been amply demonstrated by Dennis Danielson in his essays "Copernicus and the Tale of the Pale Blue Dot", "The Great Copernican Cliché", and chapter 6 in Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths About Science and Religion; Humphrey wrote an enlightening post on this issue as well.

But I find it interesting that when Christians are told that their worldview requires a belief that conflicts with science, some respond by embracing the belief in question. Thus, there are geocentric ministries today which argue that being a Christian requires belief in a geocentric universe -- although they prefer the term "geocentricity" as it doesn't have as much historical baggage. The Geocentricity website is the official site of the Association for Biblical Astronomy, "biblical astronomy" meaning Aristotelian/Ptolemaic astronomy. The second link takes you to a collection of the publications of their journal.

There's another site that bothers me more. When I was in (Protestant) seminary, my favorite theology professor used a book for one of his classes written by a Protestant-turned-Catholic entitled, Not by Faith Alone. I didn't take that class, but I did plan to someday study this book, maybe together with Alister McGrath's Iustitia Dei, and see where I came out. However, the author of Not by Faith Alone has also published a two volume work entitled Galileo Was Wrong: The Church Was Right, volume 1 of which deals with "the scientific case for geocentrism", thus absolving me of any requirement to take him seriously. (Update: Just to be clear, I'm not tying the Catholic doctrine of justification to geocentrism. I'm only saying that particular author is not credible.)

The Geocentric Bible is essentially an online book arguing for geocentrism; he says he first heard of this view from a young-earth creationist ministry. This leads to another point: most young-earth ministries have embraced a neo-geocentrism in order to account for the problem of starlight travel time. They argue that the universe we know is actually a white hole -- a black hole so crunched that light begins to escape via quantum tunnelling -- with our galaxy (the Milky Way) at its center. They call it "galacto-centrism" since the earth is only approximately at the universe's center. I critiqued the scientific case for this claim here. For now I'd just like to point out that in arguing for this view, they appeal to the idea that if we're important to God, we should expect to find ourselves at the center of the universe. In other words, they accept the conflation of geocentrism with anthropocentrism, a conflation which is not only unhistorical, but which was invented in order to mock and ridicule Christianity. This strikes me as an extremely unwise concession: when fighting the spirit of the age, you shouldn't let it define the terms of the debate. Moreover, the fact that they have to appeal to geocentrism in order to defend their belief in a young earth makes the latter even less plausible than it already was.

(cross-posted at Agent Intellect)


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Some Interesting Stuff over the Weekend

If you haven't already, take a look at Tim O'Neill's detailed review of Charles Freeman's Closing of the Western Mind over at Armarium Magnum. Tim largely agrees with my own assessment of a couple of years ago which also gave rise to some correspondence with Charles Freeman himself. Freeman has a book out from Yale in September called A New History of Early Christianity which they have kindly promised to send me a review copy of. Perhaps this book will plug some of the gaps that Tim identifies in Closing of the Western Mind.

Some of the papers are noting that Richard Dawkins is subsidising a summer camp for atheists' kids. That's fine by me and I hope they have a good time. My only query is, why is it OK for Dawkins to give money to this while attacking the Templeton Foundation for using its resources to spread its own message? Can you imagine the fuss if Templeton started running camps for kids instead of journalists? As always, a foolish religious person was on hand to criticise Dawkins but I can't imagine many people will have any objections.

Finally, I am pleased to announce that God's Philosophers has gone to print. The team at Icon have been working extremely hard and the resulting book looks great. I only hope that the writing lives up to the quality of the production. Publication is on schedule for early August.

Lawrence Krauss and Stalin

Lawrence Krauss has written an article on the accommodation controversy for the Wall Street Journal which is almost sweet in its naïveté. He takes J.B.S. Haldane (1892 – 1964) as his example of a man of reason whose science led him to accept atheism in everyday life. Krauss notes,

J.B.S. Haldane, an evolutionary biologist and a founder of population genetics, understood that science is by necessity an atheistic discipline. As Haldane so aptly described it, one cannot proceed with the process of scientific discovery if one assumes a "god, angel, or devil" will interfere with one's experiments. God is, of necessity, irrelevant in science. Faced with the remarkable success of science to explain the workings of the physical world, many, indeed probably most, scientists understandably react as Haldane did. Namely, they extrapolate the atheism of science to a more general atheism.

But there is a problem. Krauss appears to be ignorant of where reason led Haldane. Because Haldane didn’t just become an atheist, he became a lifelong supporter of one of the greatest monsters of history – Josef Stalin. Right at the moment that Haldane was founding population genetics, his hero was depopulating the Ukraine. And when Stalin put the geneticist Nikolai Vavilov on trial for challenging the notorious Trofim Lysenko, Haldane refused to utter a word of condemnation.

I very much doubt that Lawrence Krauss approves of this behaviour. But I have to ask why he thinks holding up Haldane as a paragon of rationality is going to advance his argument that scientists ought to behave like atheists. Haldane was a very great scientist. He was also an apologist for mass-murder and an ardent follower of one of the most inhumane doctrines ever to come from the mind of man. If that is where reason gets you, I don’t think we need worry about scientists being a bit irrational in their spare time.



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Accommodating Coyne

What should we say to Jerry Coyne, P.Z. Myers and others who claim evolution and Christianity are incompatible? Coyne has been arguing that organisations that promote evolution, like the National Centre for Science Education (“NCSE”) should be neutral on the issue and say nothing to promote accommodationism. This reminds me of the pleas of creationists that schools should be neutral on the issue whether Darwinism or intelligent design are true.

By the way, ‘accommodationism’ is the term now used for the argument that there is no reason why a Christian cannot be a Darwinist. Christian Darwinists, like me and Ken Miller, obviously believe that this is the case. So do some atheists like Michael Ruse. Jerry Coyne disagrees, as he is entitled to do. But he goes further and says that educational and scientific organisations should stop using accommodationist arguments in their campaign to promote Darwinism on the grounds that he and some other atheists disagree with the philosophical foundations of accommodationism.

There are two issues here. The first is whether or not Coyne is correct to say that evolution and Christianity are irreconcilable. The second is whether we should stop using accommodationist arguments to promote Darwinism and combat creationism. I’ll deal with the second issue in this post.

It would be a poor reason for abandoning accommodationist arguments because Jerry Coyne says we ought to. And abandoning them because P.Z. Myers says we should is a downright bad idea. They have whinged that the NCSE does not reflect their dissenting views. Again, they sound just like the Discovery Institute complaining that Intelligent Design is never given a fair crack of the whip. If accommodationism appears to be a useful tactic for promoting Darwinism, we should use it. We should not fail to use it because extremist atheists or fundamentalist creationists think that we should not.

When a dispute comes down to whether something is permissible because it is useful or forbidden because it is doctrinally impure, it is the fanatic who refuses to compromise on the grounds of utility. I think accommodationism is true. But even if I didn’t, I’d recognise that my own views were unhelpful for the campaign against creationism. I’d also note that some Christians are very good scientists and so if there is an incompatibility, it probably doesn’t matter much in practice. So I’d respect the opinion of those who disagree with me and help promote Darwinism in some other way. Only if I was more interested in campaigning for atheism than evolution would I take the line of Coyne and Myers that accommodationism should be removed from the anti-creationist arsenal.



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Some Reflections on Comment is Free

Following on from below, as commentators here have kindly pointed out, I’ve been given a kicking by Jerry Coyne, Ophelia Benson and PZ Myers. But I’m grateful for the discovery of Butterflies and Wheels which looks among the best of the neo atheist blogs, both in terms of articles and commentators.

One thing I’ve learnt is never descend to PZ Myers’s level. It will only get you into trouble. Another thing is that replying to some comments annoys the people to whom you don’t reply. But since its impossible to respond to everyone, I suppose that is unavoidable.

Finally, it is nice to see my name on the Guardian website’s front page and nice that over six hundred and fifty comments have accrued to my article (so don't click on that link unless you have a broadband connection). I’m very grateful to the editors for using my piece and hopefully I’ll be able to contribute another one soon.



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A Science Writer in Trouble

Simon Singh is an author of popular science books. I remember I enjoyed Fermat’s Last Theorem over a decade ago and he has had success with various other books in the meantime. Recently, however, he has landed in hot water.

It started with an article in the Guardian to promote a book of his called Trick or Treatment. This is one of the attempts by well-meaning journalists to debunk alternative medicine – efforts which have no effect on its popularity whatsoever. In the Guardian article, Singh described as ‘bogus’ some of the claims made for a treatment called chiropracy. ‘Bogus’ is a label I would attach to almost all forms of alternative medicine, although I’m generally quite tolerant of people who choose to use it. I won’t bore you with what chiropractors do or what they think they can cure. The point is that Singh was sued for libel by an organisation called the British Chiropractic Association (“BCA”). The Guardian offered to settle out of court but Singh does not want to see science dictated to by the libel laws.

Singh and I probably don’t see eye to eye on a lot of things. But his case is important for all of us who want to see science based on the free investigation of nature and not decided by judges. You’d hope that the BCA would be laughed out of court, but alas they have already won the first round. Mr Justice Eady (who last year decided the Mosley case against the News of the World) has ruled that the word ‘bogus’ suggests that chiropractors are deliberately dishonest rather than just wrong. This makes Singh’s case much harder to win.

I think this matters because if the BCA succeed, it would restrict valid criticism of people whom you think are wrong if they are acting in good faith. So, Singh deserves support and the fact that the neo atheists are on his side does not detract from that. My microscopic show of solidarity was to include the word ‘bogus’ in my own Guardian article. Perhaps if that became a meme then it might even help (while ruining a perfectly good word).

There is much more on Singh’s website and here’s a good article on the background from Nick Cohen.



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Me on Comment is Free

The Guardian's Comment is Free has plumbed new depths with an article by some bloke called James Hannam on the conflict between science and religion. Apparently, Hannam thinks the conflict is a myth, but luckily plenty of better-informed commentators are on hand to set him straight.



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Sumption on the Hundred Years war

A small treat for medievalists: an interview with Jonathan Sumption QC. Sumption is an extremely expensive barrister much favoured by the UK Government. He represented them at the Hutton Inquiry into the death of David Kelly after the Iraq War. He also successfully fought of a small army of private investors who were trying to sue the Government over the collapse of Railtrack.

However, even if he’s taken on some questionable cases in his legal career, he is an excellent narrative historian. The Albigensian Crusade is a masterpiece of prose and research. I have not read any of the massive volumes of his history of the Hundred Years War, but I am looking forward to having the leisure time to do so. The release of the latest volume, Divided Houses, is the occasion for the interview linked above. One story from Sumption’s research was completely charming:

I once read in the Public Record Office the records of an enquiry into the alleged treachery of an English garrison commander accused of taking a bribe to surrender his castle. The case ended in his acquittal. Some weeks later I found in the French archives the actual receipt he had given for the bribe.

There is nothing like handling the primary sources and no way to get closer to history.



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