atheism
Physicalism: Rejected on the Grounds of Unintelligibility
Physicalism is the view that everything is physical. Every thought, mental state, etc. we experience is reducible to physical explanations. It can be said, according to physicalism, that neurons firing or chemicals being released are an emotion or mental state.
I believe physicalism can be rejected on the grounds of unintelligibility. One reason for this is that physicalism forgets the idea of causation. It equates a cause with an entire process. One can agree that there are physical causes for a mental event, but does not have to accept that this means that a mental event itself is physical. An emotion is not a firing of a neuron or some amalgam of chemicals. Mental states are described from a first-person subjective viewpoint, and cannot be equated with the physical world, which is described in physical terms.
The most commonly used argument for physicalism is the “argument from causal closure”:
–“If an event e causes event e*, then there is no event e# such that e# is non-supervenient [edit: supervenient generally means dependent] on e and e# causes e*.” (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy).
The problem with this view, of course, is that it can be countered by simply rejecting premise 2 “there is no event e# such that e# is non-supervenient on e and e# causes e*.” One can simply point out that it is possible for there to be an event e# to exist.
Further, what exactly does it mean to say that mental states are wholly physical? I believe that is ontologically untrue. One can simply examine one’s own thoughts and realize that, say, thinking about a pink elephant is not ontologically a pink elephant. Physicalists would have to try to describe this mental image wholly in physical terms, for that is all there is to the world according to their methodology. But it is then almost impossible to distinguish between the image of a pink elephant and the pink elephant itself. Try that thought experiment. Describe yourself “thinking about a pink elephant” in wholly physical terms. Do not slip into saying such words as “mental state”, “mental”, “thinking”, “I”, and the like. It may be possible, but it ends up being something utterly ridiculous which doesn’t seem to really describe the event (thinking about a pink elephant) at all. It describes the things that are causing one to think of a pink elephant.
Physicalism also leads inevitably to determinism. If all things are wholly physical, there cannot be any kind of freedom of the will. All things are determined by physical processes, meaning there is simply no individual to possess freedom.
Physicalism can be faulted for either not adequately explaining or completely rejecting: mental states, the will, individuals, liberetarian freedom, freedom of permission, freedom of personal integrity, and freedom of moral and rational responsibility.
What exactly does it mean, within physicalism, to have the “want to do something?” For example, I am moving my things from one room to another. I want to lift up and move my couch on my own, but I cannot. Physicalism does not seem to have an adequate explanation for this. Wanting to do something could be causally linked to certain parts of the brain showing activity, but it could not explain the desire itself.
What would it mean if, say, a scientist could monitor the brain and know every thing a person was thinking about? Imagine being able to do such a thing. Looking at a screen, one could see that a person could think about a “dog” and one would not actually know what that person is thinking. Or, perhaps the technology is such that the dog which the person was thinking of would be entirely described. It’s a black lab the person owned in his or her childhood, it has a scar on its nose from a fight with a cat, its fur has a bluish sheen in certain light, etc. It still does not mean that one could literally read this person’s mind. For the mental image of a black lab, down to the tiniest detail (i.e. fur length, etc.) will be different from one person to the next. Even if we could literally think of every detail, including the length of each individual hair on that lab, etc., the mental image we had would be different, for we all think of such details in different ways. Descriptions of colors, scents, sounds, etc. vary widely from person to person.
But then, what if we could project an image onto the screen of that dog, in every detail? Two things would prevent this from allowing an identical image: 1. any emotional attachment to the image, and 2. the subjective interpretation of sensory imagery.
Another way to try to explain this scenario into possibility for the physicalist would be to say that technology could allow us to transfer that image, with its emotion, etc. into someone else’s mind. But then, we still have problems. 1. Even if we could project the exact image, along with it’s emotional responses, into someone else’s brain, that person’s brain would still interpret that image for itself. It would be presented with certain emotional states, sensory details, etc., but it would be filtering all of those through its own system. 2. There’s no clear way to say that even if we could eliminate problem 1, the image would be exactly the same with both people.
Even if one could project all the emotion, history, details, and the like of an image from one person to the other, it would not be the same. Why not? Because of another problem with physicalism: emotional states are not the same. What one person experiences as pain can be entirely different for someone else. Let’s say that, sticking with the black lab, subject A has a positive experience of this animal. This brings with it the feeling of pleasure at recalling the image, and calmness related to feeling protected by the dog. When it is projected into the brain of subject B, these emotions may not be the same. For even if one could capture the intensity of these feelings, there’s no way to say that the conotations they’d carry would be the same. Subject B would have pleasure related to recalling the image projected into his or her brain, but this pleasure would have to be intepreted by Subject B before it was presented as an image. The pleasure could feel different from subject A to person B, despite the exact same physical processes involved.
But what if we could project literally every aspect of this image into someone else’s mind (from person A to B)? What if we could somehow get past the interpretation problem? Would this then prove physicalism has weight? I don’t believe so. The problem here is threefold: 1. The problem of “self” in regard to the image. If the image were projected in such a way from person A to B, would it then be person B’s thought/image or would it still be person A’s, just projected into another brain (or mind)? For physicalism to be true, the image would have to be person B’s and identical to person A’s, but it seems like this is not the case, both by the nature of the whole experiment and by the fact that the image exists within person A’s brain originally. Not only that, but 2. it ignores the fact that there is such a thing as the image itself. Even if 1. were not a defeater of physicalism in this case, it seems to be defeated by the fact that the image is itself not made itself all the factors that go into making the image, but is simply an image. The image itself is different from the causation. There is not a black lab within someone’s brain. There is the image of this black lab within their brain. The fact that it must be discussed in such terms goes against physicalism. Cause is not equal to effect. 3. If this entire scenario were about an image that was imagined in person A’s head, rather than a real black lab he or she owned, it runs into a whole host of other problems. What does it mean to have something that doesn’t actually exist, existing in two people’s brain/minds? How is it that physical explanations give rise to a non-physical thing (something that is imagined does not exist physically, so it does not have physical space, qualities, etc., and cannot therefore be reduced to physical qualities, as it does not posess any)?
The point of this scenario is to point out that physicalism discounts some of the most self-evident qualia we experience. Physicalism cannot account for such differences in pain, pleasure, and other feelings or emotional states. It cannot account for the differences in experience when the physical causation is the same.
Point 3. has in it yet another blow against physicalism. What of imagined things? It seems possible that we could physically explain how we bring forth the image of something that is imagined (such as a flying pig), but that does not explain in physical terms what exactly that imagined thing is. What is it, in terms of physicalism? It is not real or physical, so how can it be reduced to something physical? And we certainly cannot say the image does not exist, because anyone with an imagination can think of a flying pig! But even if we were to assign it physical properties (i.e., wings, pigs feet, curly tail, etc.), it would not actually possess any of these. It is something that simply does not exist physically, and it would beg the question to assign it physical properties.
Ontologically speaking, physicalism seems shot full of holes. It can be simple to talk about all mental states, images, and the like as if they were merely physical, but in the real world, does it really mean anything to say that? It is evident from one’s own experience that one can think in terms of self, in terms of intentionality, and in terms that defy physical explanation. What does it show to say that such things don’t actually exist? It makes our personal experiences meaningless.
It is unintelligible to embrace physicalism, for it means nothing to say that our “self” is not a “self” but a mixture of physical explanations. It means nothing to say that our emotions don’t exist except in physical terms. It means nothing to say that the mind is not a “mind” but a physically reducible thing. It means nothing to say that imagined things don’t exist (they exist within the brain [or mind] of anyone with an imagination), and it begs the question to say that they possess physical properties.
Physicalism, at best, can serve only as a causal explanation of mind states, mental images, and the like. Yet the thesis itself claims to have superior explanatory power in that it can explain everything (via physical means). Finally, physicalism has inadequate explations for, or outright rejects, things that are evident simply through introspection (imaginary objects, the concept of “self,” etc.). Its claims about such things are either meaningless or unintelligible. I therefore reject it on the grounds of unintelligibility.
Debate Part 2
Part 2 of a continuing debate. Part 1 can be found here. This is a debate between an atheist and myself. The non-bolded text is his (when he’s quoting he is quoting my responses in part 1). The bolded text is my response.
“He then argues that Jesus does not remove responsibility from the law by quoting Matthew 5:18ff…leaving out (5:18 – I understood) “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.””.
I didn’t intend to argue that point (the fulfillment of the law), and have at least a rudimentary understanding of this. I was attempting to interject some connective tissue into your original comment to more accurately reflect what I thought Harris was referring to. I will at least mention a couple of points that I’ve questions about to get your take on them.
Indeed, Jesus said “I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” (It’s impossible for me to think Harris is not aware of this. I wouldn’t speculate as to why it was omitted. Being that he and likely any of his readers know full well the concept and the passage, it seems something dubious was unlikely).
I would ask how you reconcile the next line, “I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear,…” with the one before it that you mention? ‘Until heaven and earth disappear’ – surely this has not yet happened, and it would follow that the rest of the verse, then, still applies today and until that does happen (“…not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law…”). It seems that that which must come to pass before the law he spoke of would be fulfilled, has not.
I notice as well as the verses continue that Jesus in fact, quite opposed to rendering these laws somehow null by fulfilling them, seems to systematically magnify and amplify each. It follows logically that he has not yet ‘fulfilled’ them in a sense of completion. Anger is elevated to the sin of murder and a lustful look elevated to that of actual adultery. It seems he not only didn’t relegate these laws to the past, but raised the bar quite a lot on what actually constituted sin.
The first and easiest thing to point out is that you’re assuming knowledge you don’t have: what Harris is or is not aware of, and that his readers “know full well the concept and the passage.” How is it that you know this information? Are you suggesting that everyone who reads Harris knows what comes before the verses he cites, and that they know enough of Scripture to interpret it in light of context and other verses?
But your claims to knowing of others’ background knowledge aside, this argument from Harris and others seems to show a misunderstanding of both the concept of justification and the concept of the separation of Law and Gospel. A simple response can be found in one of the greatest Doctrinal works of the Lutheran Church: Pieper’s ‘Christian Dogmatics,’ Volume I, page 532 “Holy Scripture also determines exactly which laws applied only temporarily and locally, for instance, only to the Jews under the covenant of the Law, and are therefore not the divine norm for all men of all times. A great and harmful confusion of the consciences of men is, even to our day, caused by generalizing temporary and local laws. With reference, for instance to the commandment given Exodus 31:14-15 “Ye shall keep the Sabbath… everyone that defileth it shall surely be put to death,” and Leviticus 19:26 “Ye shall not eat anything with the blood,” and Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 (the catalogue of clean and unclean beasts), the New Testament distinctly says: “Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days,” Colossians 2:16. We get this result: Only that is divine Law for all men which is taught in Holy Writ as binding on all. Not even the Ten Commandments in the form in which they were given to the Jews (Exodus 20) are binding on all men, but only the Ten Commandments as set down in the New Testament, as we have them… Commandments given to individuals, e.g. the commandment received by Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, do not obligate others. In general, the rule to be applied to the life and acts of the saints is, in the words of the Apology [to the Augsburg Confession]: ‘Examples ought to be interpreted according to the rule, i.e., according to certain and clear passages of Scripture, not contrary to the rule, that is, contrary to Scripture.’”
Acts 10:15 is another example: “’Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.’”
To say that Jesus expanded the Law is inaccurate. He clarifies it and outlines largely which laws God intended for all peoples. Surely one would not suggest he does so for all of Levitical law and otherwise. One of the rules of Biblical interpretation is to interpret scripture in light of scripture, and when one does so in the case of the Law, one can see that to argue that all people are to follow the ceremonial laws and others is not formed on the basis of a Scriptural argument, but on pulling only certain verses and ignoring others.
As far as reconciling “Until heaven and earth disappear,” with what I’ve said, it becomes clear after the previous explanation. Jesus is affirming the presence of the law which continually acts as a mirror to show us our sin and need for Him. He is not abolishing the Law, but affirming it. He’s fulfilling it on our behalf, because we all inevitably fail—especially when compared to the standards He sets in Matthew 5:21ff. His statements must be taken in light of the rest of Scripture. The ceremonial laws set in Leviticus were for the Hebrew people in the Covenant of the Law. We are not bound by these laws, as stated in other passages (Acts 10:15, Colossians 2:16, Galatians 5:6, and elsewhere). To argue otherwise is to argue against Scripture. It is to argue by selective observation (a logical fallacy).
**I’ve taken a question out of chronological order here, which I generally don’t do, as it felt a bit like a summation to me. As this will likely be the final formal response from me in this particular debate, I thought I’d use it as a conclusion of sorts. It is now the final response**
“Arguing against Christianity by saying it’s bad does nothing to its claims of truth, making the argument an ad hominem attack on the character of Christians rather than an attack on Christianity.”
You mention two separate things here;
1) Arguing that Christianity is bad, and
2) arguing that Christian’s are bad.
Though I would suggest that there is no way to disassociate one from the other. You need only imagine everyone that self labels as a Christian suddenly vanishing from existence – does the religion remain? Of course not. The people ARE the religion.
Arguing that Christianity is bad does indeed call into question the claims of its truth, as it is claimed to be good. If it is shown that it is bad, it is also shown that it is false. Showing that Christians are bad, at best, would show that either the message is terribly unclear (and after two millennium, likely undecipherable to the degree that anything more than a negligible consensus can be achieved), and at worst that it simply, as a system, doesn’t work.
To illustrate with analogy; I imagine a company manufacturing some product. It is shown, let’s say, that none of this company’s worker’s produce anything of merit (or very few if you prefer). Perhaps they are lazy, have a poor work ethic, or arrive to work drunk each day. Whatever the reasons, they each produce substandard products that make it out the door. An outsider visits the company site, and sees all of the substandard products and remarks that the company is substandard. How could one maintain that this company is good despite it continually turning out inferior products? I argue that they couldn’t. Reverse engineer the old garbage in, garbage out saying. If after thousands of years there is still no consensus as to the meanings contained in the bible, and evil is still routinely performed in its name, it is time to reevaluate the merit of the texts.
This is an example of a false analogy. It also again shows a misunderstanding of the core of Christianity. Just as you feel the need to correct me by saying atheism is not a belief, I must correct you by saying that Christianity is not about being good people. To argue against Christianity on the basis that its people are bad is to ignore the central claim of Christianity, that we are sinful, that Jesus washed away our sins in His fulfillment of the law and offering as a sacrifice for our sins, and that Jesus Christ is Lord God over all.
If you want to argue against the track record of the organized religion of Christianity, one can do it in the fashion Harris is doing. But that is to ignore the truth claims of Christianity. Not only that, but Christians acknowledge their own sinfulness that has been around since the fall into sin. It sets up a straw man in place of the truth claims of the argument by saying “you claim to be good [I don’t], and your religion claims to make people good, so you should all be good or your religion is wrong” Christianity is about the core beliefs I outlined above, not about being good. To say a Christian sins is to confirm what the Christian knows: all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). The institution of the church itself is not inerrant.
“(i.e. condom use, etc.) could be valid against Catholicism, which is not the Christianity I (and about 50% of Christians) ascribe to.”
Certainly you aren’t writing off one of the most powerful and influential churches in history, along with over a billion adherents, as not relevant to a discussion about religion?
I think it reasonable to assume that when he addresses those that hold such beliefs about condom use for example, that it’s understood that he is actually speaking to those that have that particular belief, no? He was after all, addressing the entire nation, of which a good quarter of are Catholic.
I must simply point out that once again a stance of the Catholic Church or other church on an individual issue is to argue about points that aren’t central to the teachings of Christianity. The church can mess up, the church can error. This is because we are human, and it does nothing to the claim that Jesus is savior.
“It seems dishonest of Harris to assert that atheists are completely different…”
I would ask that you give a single example of something that all atheists share other than the lack of a belief in god, if you found that dishonest. Or was it merely the comparison?
It was for comparison.
Day states, “By applying his metric to the state-wide voting instead of the more
precise and relevant county,…”
OK, brakes please. Though I dread the thought of this, if you would like to proceed with these mountains of data, I will be obliged to do so – but only after I check all of these numbers for myself, and from both angles mentioned. I am not prepared to take either of these men’s assessments on…faith, any further. I was willing to stick out my neck a tiny bit as to the veracity of Harris’ method, but to debate specific numbers from his and another source, neither of which I have verified myself, is a bit much – not my style. I couldn’t in good conscience do so. This would of course take a bit of time, so let me know if you wish to argue this to its end.
I can be rather obsessive with research, and will hand you the specifics on a platter with references sited, likely with better detail than both of them. But I ask you be certain this is something worthy of your debate, as it will take quite some time to compile, and it was not my original intent. That said, I am willing.
I will continue to assert I believe that either way this statistic is utterly unimportant. I would like to simplify any search you want to make by pointing to the CIA World Factbook on the U.S. (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/us.html ) and its stats on religion: “Protestant 51.3%, Roman Catholic 23.9%, Mormon 1.7%, other Christian 1.6%, Jewish 1.7%, Buddhist 0.7%, Muslim 0.6%, other or unspecified 2.5%, unaffiliated 12.1%, none 4% (2007 est.).” Atheists are decidedly a minority. It seems illogical to point to atheists as the reason for less violence in an area. It also is reading into statistics, a lot. Overall, I just think this entire argument is nothing but irrelevant. Unless you really want to argue that it is relevant somehow, I’d be happy to drop it.
“Day points to a 2001 ARIS study that shows that 14.1% of Americans are atheists.”
Again, the research would need to be done on my end to go much further with this.
“I’ll concede again that I should have been more clear here. Harris does admit that religious people do good things, but it seems to me that his argument centers around the idea that no religion = better people.”
I think that’s a fair assessment of what he says, or at the very least, that religion is not required to do that same good. But I believe what you’ve said here is valid, yes.
“He seems to argue that if religion were removed, more good would be done.”
I believe he does, if for no other reason than the impediments that religion erect – i.e. the issue of condoms mentioned (and the hordes that die because of it), the IUD (birth control) issue and the related cancer tat results, the stem cell research issue… – all of which that, if it were not for the church, would save innumerable lives.
So yes, if religion would stop attempting to legislate morality, much more good could be done. Removal of said religion would likely produce the same effect, though I am not advocating it’s ‘removal’. I’m unclear as to whether or not he is. I didn’t get that impression, but it would depend on how you mean removal, of course – and by what means would be of utmost importance.
This is utilitarianism to the max: What makes the greatest good for the greatest number of people? I don’t think this is a valid moral stance to take whatsoever. The biggest problem is one of the classic examples against utilitarianism: Let’s say that there are 1,000,000 people whose happiness would increase if a minority group of about 100 people were killed. Simply following utilitarianism, one would have to advocate killing these 100 people. A counter argument could then be made that being dead is a very big unhappiness, while the 1,000,000 people wouldn’t be super happy about it, just a little happy. But what if 1,000,000 people would be happier if 1 innocent person were tortured? What if they’d be happier if 1 innocent person were just beaten? Either of these cases seems wholly within the utilitarianist view of ethics. But we can see they are clearly wrong (unless one wants to argue that torture or beating an innocent person can be a good thing). To argue on the basis of a utilitarian view is to accept that ethical stance as a standard of judgment, which, as we’ve just seen, is awkward at best.
“I could stand to reword that part of my blog entry, but again I don’t think I’m attacking a straw man when Harris specifically tries to detract from the good that religious people do (i.e. his Mother Theresa example in which he says she was “…deranged by religious faith.”) If she were not so deranged, she would have been better. That seems to be a valid way to argue from what he is saying.”
When you stated “whether people like Harris want to admit it or not.” you in fact posited something that he did not say, and then refuted it. That is essentially what a straw man is, to set up and refute a position that your opponent did not take.
With regards to Mother Theresa, I have very little information as yet – though it is now apparently available. Hitchens also has some pretty scathing things to say about her in ‘God is Not Good’. Regardless, I would hesitate to argue her virtues, but would also caution you until you can digest information that surfaced (I believe from her personal letters?). It’s worth taking a look at from what I gather, as it is rather illuminating and casts her in a grim light after all. It was this information that he was basing things on, not the old, untarnished saintly image she’s enjoyed in the past. It’s something I need to look into as well.
Harris wants to discredit the good that religious people do by name calling. Attacking Mother Theresa is simply an ad hominem fallacy. Further, I’ve read some of these things from her diaries, etc. They point to her having the same struggles as all people of faith do—wondering if we’re doing what’s right, wondering if God exists, etc. That doesn’t seem damaging to me.
“…doesn’t do anything to hurt the message of Christ…”
This is one thing we may agree upon, for I have no particular malice towards the figure of Christ, nor much of his teachings. Not all mind you, but much of them. It is religion as a whole, and the behavior of its adherents that I find to be a problem, not the teachings of one philosopher. It is the interpretations of that philosopher, the justification – however ill advised – in his name, the imposition of this code of morality through legislation on to those who do not share the beliefs, etc. Not the man.
Christ claimed to be God. To call Him simply a philosopher does no credit to what He did and said while He was on earth. I’d agree that Christians do not always (or perhaps even often do not) follow the teachings of Christ. This is something I think the church does deserve criticism for—embracing a morality that wasn’t Christ’s. Dietrich Bonhoeffer does a good job in his book “The Cost of Discipleship.” But that is a whole other issue, seeing as how we agree truth claims are untouched.
“It is wholly possible that Christians do good things out of the kindness of their hearts.”
Agreed, it is possible.
“…it implies that the only reason a Christian does good is for reward,…”
I’ve certainly heard this argument, yes. There are many Christians that do just this – as wrong-headed as it may be. But I would tend to focus more on the ‘do good because they are commanded to’ aspect myself. I argue this from personal experience with a rather substantial number of Christians, both on line in and in real life. The quotes from many-a-video for example of Christians stating that;
1) If it weren’t for biblical morality spelling things out for them, they’d likely be completely immoral (I kid you not – perhaps you would be surprised by how many say such things?). -that what prevents them from committing these acts, is that it says so in the bible. ‘How else would one know right from wrong?’ they say.
coupled with;
2) Their complete inability to grasp that an atheist, because they do not have this book that they follow, can still be quite moral indeed. It seems utterly unfathomable to them. That to me says a great deal about their morality.
I am deeply saddened to hear #1 and 2 together. The Bible even says that “(Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.)”-Romans 2:14-15.
Thus, Scripture itself shows that those without belief can know and do the requirements of the Law. The core argument, however, is based on an assumption [that Christians only do good for reward] that is not a logical truth and is invalid.
“The point you make about the result being the same is interesting, given that you just argued above that it is somehow better to do good things without a responsibility to do so.”
It seems you are confusing the result, with the intent? Yes, I maintain that the intent of said act is important when attempting to assign a value judgment to that act – even if the outcome is identical.
For example, giving a large sum of money to charity when one has little to give would rightly be considered more altruistic, than giving money when you’ve plenty to give because you expect to get a tax write off.
Your correction from obligatory to objective is noted. Though if I were a student of Freud… 😉
Again this whole argument is based on the assumption that Christians have questionable intentions when they do good (i.e. they do it for wanting a reward). This may be true for some, but it is untrue to apply it to all. It also seems to assume that the only reason atheists or nonreligous people would do good is out of the kindness of their hearts. This also seems an invalid assumption, as [you noted] tax write offs and other rewards (a feeling of being a good person, having others see how charitable one is, etc.) could influence some.
“One could make the same argument for the history of irreligion.”
By irreligion, are you referring to essentially every cause not directly tied to religion (as it can mean absence of, indifference to, or hostility towards religion)? If that’s the case, then I would certainly agree. Religious reasons for violence vs. every other possible reason for violence…religion might stand a chance in that instance!
It seems like you had access to “The Irrational Atheist” by Day judging from your more recent e-mails, and so can see that from the Encyclopedia of War one can determine that religion is the cause of 6.98% of war. This seems to undermine the idea that it is a major cause of war in the world.
St. Augustine said “We are never to judge a philosophy by its abuse.” I believe that violence in Christianity is not just abuse of Scripture, but it goes against the core tenants of the teachings of Christ and the beliefs that the church was founded on. The same beliefs that exist in the core of Christianity today.
“I think simply looking at an overall # of death rate, it is possible that irreligion has lead to more violence than religion.”
I don’t know that that would be possible, but I would be interested as well in the results of such a tally. One reason of the cuff, is that the inherent inequalities in technology, transportation, etc. presented by the times would make comparable calculations impossible. Much like how we adjust today’s value of a dollar to day’s of old to see how much something was worth a hundred years ago.
By the time a man could openly admit being atheist without fear of being say, burned alive by the church, technology had progressed by leaps and bounds which always, always translates into more advanced warfare. So certainly these (atheist) leaders that you site had much more gruesomely efficient ways of disposing of their fellow man than did their theist predecessors. I shudder to think of the Catholic church (for example) having in their possession advanced WMDs during the dark ages.
I’d still be morbidly interested in the count if it were possible, but it would hardly be equatable.
Your use of “Dark Ages” exposes a presupposition against religion. Historians in general are completely abandoning the phrase because it paints a picture different than what is historically true.
Arguing that the church being in possession of different technology would mean they would have killed more people is an example of a non sequitur argument. It doesn’t follow logically that the church would have used those weapons. It also is arguing from common sense—yet another fallacy. We can’t know what would have happened in this case. You can only argue that it “makes sense” that the church would have killed more. This does nothing in the sphere of logic.
“It is also worthy of note that Harris specifically tries to get around these people by calling them irrational and makes some attempt to try to put them outside of atheism…His argument here seems to be that these people are irrational, so they can be dismissed. Yet I’d make the argument that Christians in particular who try to use that belief system for violence are irrational. Either both can be discounted, or neither can.”
I think we’ve touched on this already, but it bares repeating even if we have. He attempts to stress, as does any atheist thinker I have read, that one can not be said to do something ‘because’ they are atheist.
This is because there are no tenets, beliefs, dogma, rules, laws, scripture…nothing necessitated by atheism, excepting a lack of belief in a god. This leads to nothing necessarily. Humanism, for example, may indeed have some things to answer for. I’m not the one to ask.
But atheism in and of itself says nothing, asks nothing, certainly instructs or demands nothing. It is a lack of belief. Period.
Therefore, one can not attribute any particular act to an individual ‘because they are an atheist’. I hope this becomes clearer to you as we go.
But one can say that an atheist does an action, i.e. Stalin killing millions of his own people. Also, this argument seems to smack of a double standard, because again, Harris specifically points to rationality as being the judge by which people can disassociate with people of the same background (i.e. atheist). If this is the standard, then those who kill in the name of Christ can be discounted as well.
I, however, don’t want to argue that atheists are violent automatically, and I believe it is wholly false to do so for religious people, especially in light of the evidence (like that of wars).
“1. God is morally perfect and 2. God commands killing
are incompatible…alternative readily makes itself available: 3. There are some whose moral depravity is such that God will not suffer them to live”
Of course, this only works (assuming for the moment that it does in fact work) if you assume that number 1 is in fact true. I have no reason to suppose this. I would further suggest that this argument places the proverbial cart before the horse. To judge an entity as morally perfect in advance, and then proceed to insist that all of his actions are moral because of this and based on nothing else – certainly nothing objective – is completely backwards for a reasoning animal.
I expect this may come up in our future dialogue, so I’ll leave it at that.
I do indeed assume that God is morally perfect in that post because the argument is against Christian theism, which asserts that God is morally perfect. The argument says that those two points within Christian belief are incompatible. So it is a completely valid presupposition.
Further, Alvin Plantinga points out in “God, Freedom, and Evil” that the theistic definition of God is a maximally great being—maximally great would include maximally great in morality, hence God is morally perfect.
To argue with me on that point is to miss the entire argument. Theists are attacked on their own idea that God is morally perfect, so that premise is simply granted for anti-theists to argue against.
“…clearly not recording stories of massed killings in the name of the Lord for the sake of showing God’s moral imperfections (which, I would argue, points even more towards the innerrancy of Scripture, but that’s a whole other issue),”
Yes, the idea that the more outlandish the possibility, the more true is the statement. I’ve heard many versions of that very peculiar argument, but I wouldn’t mind hearing yours at some future point. This is why the tacking on of miracles to the old, rather dry bible, had such a profound effect. Sadly, it works.
Interesting use of adjectives there. What this paragraph has shown is simply an argument based on nothing. I could call atheists anti-theistic arguments dry and old and have similar logical effect—none. Please refrain from such terminology in the future of our debate. I’d like to keep it at a more intellectual level.
Further I’m not sure what you’re implying when you say the “tacking on of miracles.” Surely you are not implying that miracles were written into Scripture later. That would be an interesting argument to make, and the burden of proof would certainly be on the affirmative.
“Those who argue that the God of the Bible is evil are merely skimming scripture for verses they believe will back them up in out-of-context situations.”
That’s a rather rash and sweeping generalization. Along with many other theists, you rest on the position that if one does not come to the same conclusion as you have, that they must not have read it. I imagine you know full well this is not the case.
I would further submit, that there is simply no context that one can place some stories of the bible in, to somehow make them justifiable (sending bears to rip apart children for teasing a bald man comes to mind, and that’s one of the less extreme stories. There is no proper context for this that would elevate to some moral platitude, no moral justification whatsoever. It’s a disgusting little story used to frighten people, and nothing more).
Are you suggesting that you have the authority to interpret Scripture? Reading is not equivalent to understanding. There is a long line of people whose lives have been dedicated to hermeneutics, exegesis, and other methods of studying scripture who have not come to the conclusion that it endorses violence. The church fathers, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, countless studies in Systematic Theology, and modern voices in the church (Bonhoeffer, Van Til, Walthier [maybe not so modern]) and the like can all be found to assert a central teaching that Christ is Lord and savior. The teachings of Christianity are not of violence. To take the extremists as the norm is to be intellectually dishonest.
Not only that, but to claim that one outside the church (i.e. yourself) can find scriptural authority to back up violence the church has endorsed is to employ the argument from authority. You’re claiming yourself as the authority on scriptural intepretation and as the authority to judge the motivations of the church now, or hundreds or thousands of years ago. That alone is enough to reject such an argument. I’ll not deny that you can read the Bible, but to argue that you have better knowledge of it and its meaning than those within the religion, with accumulated knowledge of thousands of years, is false. And I can say all of this without appealing to God. There’s simply no way to justify you placing yourself in the position to interpret scripture over and above the actual authorities on the text.
Now this is also an argument from authority, but one that trumps yours. And an argument from authority, whilst weak and not formally valid in logic, is informally an argument that can be made within the structure of logic—in that we can show that people who are experts in the field (not us) have this position. The problem is that your authority (yourself) is not even close to the authority of thousands of years of accumulated students of Scripture backed up by entire fields of study that are governed by the rules of logic and have an intimate knowledge of the religion.
“by the assertion that God’s role as Judge could mean He cannot allow certain evils to pass unpunished.”
Again, the evil of teasing a man about his baldness required that children be mauled by bears? Is this god’s idea of the punishment fitting the crime?
“but it is also to argue without a knowledge of the culture that such a text originated from.”
Again, children – teasing – bears. In any age, that is simply sick. We can get more into other stories of course, that one is just so elegantly morbid, it served well.
I don’t really want to go through and discuss every violent story in Scripture. But if you’d like to, I’d willingly go over each one at length. Because the bear story is a hard one, it bears (pun unintentional) repeating:
“From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some youths’ came out of the town and jeered at him. ‘Go on up, you baldhead!’ they said. “Go on up, you baldhead!’ He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the LORD. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the youths.” -2 Kings 2:23-24.
An initial point I’d make would be to point out that we are not the judges of the world, God is (according to my worldview—which whoever brings this argument up is arguing against, so my presupposition is valid). Therefore we do not define what is “morbid” or “sick,” God does. Arguing that God is evil because of this act is to stand in judgment of God. This is unacceptable from a theistic view which presupposes His supremacy.
But I do believe a better explanation is needed in this case. I used a couple sources here, but my main one was Geisler’s “The Big Book of Bible Difficulties.”
1. These men were holding the prophet of God in contempt (see previous chapters and verses to see just how God selected this prophet). This was no innocent mocking, but a direct attack on God’s authority, as Elisha was acting as the voice of God to the people. Hence, these young men were mocking the voice of God.
2. These young men were not innocent. Their great number compared to Elisha shows the danger he was in, especially in light of their sin of mocking God. Not only that, but it says the young men came out of town to jeer at him. They didn’t want the confines and authority of the city to limit the actions they could take. Calling him a ‘baldhead’—a reference to the baldness of the lepers was another sign of the contempt with which they held Elisha. He was not safe.
3. Elisha’s curse served as a warning and a sign. He was God’s prophet, and God would not suffer threats or mocking.
4. The nature of their mocking becomes clearer looking at what they say. “Go on up…” When looking at what had happened just before (Elijah ascending into heaven), it can be seen that this was essentially a challenge to Elisha’s authority as God’s prophet. The Hebrew word here, alah refers to “ascend.” It is the same Hebrew word used in 2 Kings 2:11 to describe Elijah’s being taken into heaven. What cannot be seen in the English is revealed in the Hebrew.
God’s punishment can then be seen as protecting His prophet, a warning, an act of Divine Judgment, and a confirmation of Elijah as prophet.
“This is an issue of semantics and I’m willing to concede the point that Harris does not adhere to Jainism.”
Though I appreciate the concession, I have to make this clear.
‘Semantics’ is generally conjured when the difference between words is somewhat trivial, and not important to the point being made. When you pronounce a very well known atheist who’s made it his work to combat religion, an adherent to a religion, that is certainly not just semantics, but an egregious error that I felt needed correction.
“Though it is clear that he has some interesting views on spirituality”
I believe you are referring to the fact that he practices meditation perhaps? I’m not clear on the significance of this? To be clear, it is meditation utterly devoid of anything ‘supernatural’ if that helps.
I was hoping we wouldn’t have to get into this. http://skepdic.com/news/newsletter74.html#3 “Harris presents himself and atheism as rational, yet he doesn’t apply very rigorous standards of rationality when dealing with the subjects of reincarnation and the paranormal.”
“’These are people who have spent a fair amount of time looking at the data,’ Harris explains. The author … Dean Radin … proclaims: ‘Psi [mind power] has been shown to exist in thousands of experiments.’”
“That Harris would take seriously Stevenson’s beliefs about xenoglossy is disconcerting.”
I also find it hard to believe that this is coming from a man who claims to be a voice of reason. Harris indicates that Stevenson’s stories about xenoglossy are either true or they’re fraudulent, which is a false dichotomy. Stevenson could have gotten the translation wrong, he might be gullible, he may have made a mistake, he may be exaggerating, or he could be a pious fraud. Harris says that he can’t see how something could be a fraud if it makes so many people miserable. What about religion?”
“The fact that I have not spent any time on this should suggest how worthy of my time I think such a project would be. Still, I found these books interesting, and I cannot categorically dismiss their contents in the way that I can dismiss the claims of religious dogmatists.”- Harris
http://atheism.about.com/od/godlessatheistpolitics/tp/SamHarrisProfileBeliefs.htm
“Most criticism of Sam Harris comes from religious theists, but secular atheists have also found things to disagree with. The most prominent criticisms from atheists probably focus on his ideas about “rational” spirituality and mysticism which sound to many like little better than the sort of mysticism served up by traditional religions. Harris argues that “we cannot live by reason alone” and that it’s possible to tune one’s brain to perceive the world differently than usual and that this lies at the heart of spiritual traditions, including religious ones. He believes it’s important to cultivate skills in this area, not just to cultivate skills at skepticism, science, and critical thinking.”
Quotes from The End of Faith:
“There is clearly a sacred dimension to our existence, and coming to terms with it could well be the highest purpose of human life.”
“Spirituality can be—indeed, must be—deeply rational.”
“Clearly, it must be possible to bring reason, spirituality, and ethics together in our thinking about the world. This would be the beginning of a rational approach to our deepest personal concerns. It would also be the end of faith.”
“combined to his specific exclusion of Eastern religions from his general attack on religion show at least a predisposition”
Predisposition? No, I wouldn’t extrapolate that at all. If anything, I would guess (and that seems to be what we are doing now), that he prioritizing. That is, focusing his efforts on the religions he sees as the largest threat to our well being (i.e., the Abrahamic faiths).
“Fair enough, then I’ll say that these men were atheists. The people who did violence and were Christian can still be compared to as a legitimate analogy. Atheists who do violence. Christians who do violence. I’d argue both are bad.”
Yes, of course both are bad. No one in their right mind would argue other wise in my opinion. The point being, that a theist has a book chock full of violence that their god has committed or commanded others to commit, on which they base their morality. They have used this for centuries to justify some very nasty behavior indeed!
The key difference when one tried to attach some act to an atheist ‘because’ he is atheist, is that there are no such texts, tenets, dogma, etc. as mentioned. I’m repeating myself too much now, I’m sure you’ve understood.
I’m repeating myself too much too. As my friend pointed out, justifying claims doesn’t make something true or valid. Eisegesis is not the same as exegesis.
“Belief in a God can, however, give an objective standard by which all actions must be judged. Thus there is a better basis by which to reject certain actions than if there is no objective standard.”
I’ve more responses to this than would be manageable. I’d like to merge it with the above questions of objective vs. subjective morality above, and give them a separate debate. It deserves and requires it in my opinion, as I hear nothing more frequently from theists, than the morality questions.
Agreed.
“To argue that Christianity is violent is to go against the core teachings of Christianity from its founding”
Yet it stands in direct opposition to the reality of what the religion has produced in practice. In this case, the intent of the original if it is as you posit, and I’ve no particular reason to object, does nothing to rescue the reality of what it has been, in reality, in practice. The reality trumps the ideal.
Reform in the Church has been needed in the past and will be needed again.
“as we do have a strict definition of what it means to be Christian in the Bible.”
Again, those 30,000 sects scream loudly that the clarity you believe you have is either an illusion, or 29,999 sects have it wrong, and you got very, very lucky by picking precisely the right meaning. Additionally, that number is undoubtedly much larger concerning those that disagree on the meaning. Certainly even you, in your own congregation, disagree about the meaning of some text with another in your flock. I pick that number because it is easily understood.
You’re confusing doctrinal differences with theological ones. Christianity is built on Christ as savior and Lord. The “30,000 sects” have disagreements about things that are not the core of Christianity. I trust I will not have to repeat this again.
“Christians who use the Scripture to justify violence have missed what Christ himself says about violence.”
Ah, but we just got a little closer. I don’t deny this. I am not necessarily saying that all the evils done in the name of the bible, were done in the “true spirit” of what Christ taught.
But it is this vast majority, that are in your eyes ‘getting it wrong’, that comprise the religion, and dictate the policies of the religion on massive scales. It is they that are fighting the wars, killing the doctors, withholding the birth control, mutilating the genitals, retarding scientific progress, urging the end times by deliberately flaming the wars in the middle east, interjecting their pseudoscience into public classrooms, wedging their warped agendas into politics, into ours laws…it is they that OWN your religion and always have. If you are this type of Christian that I think you are claiming to be, you are indeed a minority, and you should be as horrified by their actions as I am. They are a death cult, pure and simple. And these are only the more overt damages caused by religion, speaking nothing yet of the psychological injuries it necessitates among other things.
Ad hominem attacks against Christian actions don’t dispute the truth claims of Christianity. They can dispute individual doctrinal stances, of which there are many differences.
Also, “retarding scientific progress?” That’s utterly false. Newton? Copernicus? Galileo? Pascal? Boyle? Leibnitz? Francis Collins? Bacon? Kepler? Descartes? Faraday? Mendel? Kelvin? Planck? Need I go on? Theists. All of them. I could make a longer list. I’m sure these names are easily recognized. Einstein was a deist, not an atheist. It seems clear that there have been a number of rather major scientific discoveries by theists. I challenge you to claim that someone like, oh, Gregor Mendel, was “retarded” by religion. These men were not “retarded” by their faith.
“Conceded. Though the atheism you are describing is a “soft atheism” that goes against the definition of atheism as seen in both the Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy”
I would actually refer you, rather than a definition in a book, to the real world community of atheists, where the type of atheism you seem to think is universal, is quite the minority.
http://richarddawkins.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=742
This is one sampling of the community at Richard Dawkins’ forums. Your version of atheism is trumped roughly 2.5 to 1. Incidentally, if you’re still searching for your ‘real’ atheist, they are there as well, and would love to speak with you I’m sure!
Argumentum ad populum. Here you’re arguing from consensus in order to redefine a word. “My version of atheism” is that which simply defines the term. Logically, your claim of a 2.5 to 1 ratio does absolutely nothing to the definition of atheism.
Also I’d at least like to think a book has a better chance of getting it right than a forum on the internet. The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy and the Encyclopedia of Philosophy seem to me better sources from which to define a term.
I never claimed my idea of atheism is universal. I claim that those who assert their atheism are actually just agnostics in disguise.
regarding this; “the definition of atheist was written by a soft atheist, afraid to embrace the totality of the stance.”
That’s just silly. I would say ‘offensive’, but I don’t offend easily. The majority of atheists I have met and spoken with (no small number), adopt the position they do because it is the intellectually honest position to take.
One can not know with complete certainty that ‘anything’ does not exist (or for that matter, does exist if you’re in the solipsist camp), and this is conceded by any thinking person. It is simply not possible. To claim such a thing involves FAITH, which most rational minds I’ve encountered, have little use for. It is not out of fear as you suggest, but out of integrity evolving from a carefully thinking, reasoning, logical mind.
“One can not know with complete certainty that ‘anything’ does not exist.” Hence the problem with atheism. Interestingly, “not knowing” is agnosticism.
“This seems ad hominem to me. Rather than attacking any specific argument, he is attacking, say, Catholics, for preaching abstinence”
The argument he puts forth throughout is essentially, that religion does harm. He lists in your example, many ways in which religion is doing harm. I see no ad hominem attack. Perhaps the personal nature of the address is what’s distressing you. It is, more than a formal argument here (which would take a very different form), as if he were standing before a room of people speaking to them. It certainly does contain emotional appeal, granted. But i would hesitate to call it ad hominem, as he is directly addressing the ills he claims are doing the harm.
But what is it that he is arguing then? If he’s arguing that religious people can be violent, I’d agree. If he’s arguing Christians have used scripture to justify violence through eisegesis—incorrect interpretation of the text—I agree. But it seems that he is trying to discredit Christianity with his argument, an argument that is arguing against the people within a religion, not against the beliefs of that religion. Hence it is ad hominem… unless he is simply arguing for reform within the church.
“Another thing I’d love to point out is that Harris is a wonderful example of the argument from atheism”
You’ll get no argument from me on that. I find the argument quite silly. I can appreciate what its inventor might have been trying to do, but I find the delivery completely sloppy, and as you say, never should have included the word ‘atheist’. I find it to be a play on words that just didn’t work well.
I’m glad.
**The following was moved to the end to act as a conclusion. I will break from form some for this reason, but I trust the ideas conveyed are still quite rational, and offer some insight…**
“As far as whether Christianity sanctions bad things, I think that is nothing but an unfair charge…It seems clear that the Christianity Christ preaches is not one that condones violence. ”
That is ‘seems clear’ to you is of little consequence to the reality that it is most certainly NOT clear to many, many millions who use it as their moral compass.
This would be one of the major points of contention. Allow me a bit of a diatribe in an attempt to explain…
But this is not now, nor apparently has it ever been, what the church (and ergo the majority its followers) has actually done in practice. This is indeed, the ultimate no true Scotsman fallacy here.
That the church itself, the institution that presumably has the clearest understanding of the meanings contained within the bible, has been the perpetrator of such unimaginable evil (just peruse the medieval torture devices crafted and implemented by the church for a tiny sampling of its horrific past) is precisely the point.
If the church itself, responsible for disseminating this sacred information to the masses, has acted thusly – what are the masses to take from this? The result is unavoidable – the hatred, bigotry, paranoia, intolerance, etc. that we see daily from the religious. They are only regurgitating what the church has fed them for centuries. This in no way exonerates them from responsibility of course, but certainly the vile men at the top of the heap have much to answer for. This is the ‘religion’ that those like myself are speaking of.
The cry I hear again and again, invariably, is that the other guy simply didn’t understand what the bible really said, or meant. But the one speaking of course, ‘has it’. They, of all the millions of believers present and past, understand the word of God like no other. They have unlocked the code at the end of the labyrinth which is the text of The Holy Bible. This would help explain the 30000+ sects of Christianity. There is simply no consensus as to what the book means or even what it says for that matter, and that, coupled with the unending amount of the physical and psychological brutality it contains…it is no wonder that such evil is committed in its name. It could hardly have resulted in anything else.
I suggest, that complete and unquestioning FAITH without reason or logic or evidence of any sort is the true violence. Blind faith in another man’s doctrine is a violence to the mind – a thinking, reasoning mind, which is truly the only thing that gives us our privileged status on this rock. Through faith, one seeks to extinguish this, and they succeed.
It was after all men that wrote these texts, codified them, rewrote them, translated them, added bits, subtracted bits, enforced them through the ages. And what evidence have we that these men had the authority to do so? These men told us so. They were instructed by God directly the theist proclaims. And we know this, as well, precisely because these men said they were.
At the end of the day though, honestly ask yourself, do you think that I or any other atheist cares in the least what thoughts you have in your mind? What faith you claim to have in some matter? It is precisely because of all of the things mentioned that we would even bat an eye towards a man of faith. I can’t imaging having given such things a second thought if it weren’t for the actions of the theist down through history, and more importantly to me – right now. I am perfectly content having someone believe whatever it is they choose…if they can refrain from attempting to force it on any one else.
So far, theists have been notoriously, almost constitutionally incapable of doing this. That, is the problem with religion.
The “no true Scotsman” argument applies if and only if there is no definition of what it means to be whatever it is that is being argued. Christianity has a clear definition within the Bible, complete with the command “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Any who does not follow that command and claims a Christian action is indeed not a true Christian, based on the central text of the religion.
I, too, shall now conclude.
Christianity has been the central belief of the Western world for well over a thousand years. During this time, there have been huge leaps in science, medicine, human freedom, and the like. The greatest discoveries in the history of science have all been made within a Christian era.
The Bible stands as a whole. Taking any single verse outside of the context and not allow it to be interpreted by the whole of Scripture is arguing from selective observation—a logical fallacy. One need only look at Systematic Theology and find that violence is not the result of the church, it is the aberration. I’m not claiming that I know Scripture well enough to interpret it perfectly. I’m claiming that thousands of scholars of the Bible over the past two thousand years do know it well enough to interpret it correctly. Those who have used it for violence suffer either the flaw of selective observation or they simply use emotional appeals—not scriptural ones—to make their point.
Christ Himself is the Light of the World. Christians are told in Ephesians 5:1-2: “Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” Scripture teaches clearly a life of love and peace for the Christian.
St. Augustine, in one of the greatest works in Christianity, “City of God” says of the Kingdom of God in Book II, Chapter 29, “The Heavenly City outshines Rome, beyond comparison. There, instead of victory, is truth; instead of high rank, holiness; instead of peace, felicity; instead of life, eternity.” This is what Christians look forward to: a city in which the standards of this world are no more. A city where holiness, truth, and felicity are enjoyed for eternity.
He says of a Christian life in Book XIV, Chapter 7: “When a man’s resolve is to love God, and to love his neighbor as himself, not according to man’s standards but according to God’s, he is undoubtedly said to be a man of good will, because of this love.”
The core of Christian faith is not doctrinal concerns over baptism, communion, or the like. Christians believe in the Triune God and Jesus as Lord and Savior. And the commands that are given are to love God and neighbor.
I close, with the words of Peter in 1 Peter 4:11, “If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God. If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.”
Outside response to the Debate
A friend who read through the debate responded:
“I would suggest a simpler test; read the text of their holy scripture, and see if it advocates and/or sanctions said violence. If it does, the religion is violent. If its holy scriptures are replete with violent act after violent act, the religion is violent.”
–This is an Appeal to Authority Fallacy where he claims himself as the authority, how pretentious. A non-Christian, even one who once was a Christian, is not an authority on reading the Scriptures on behalf of the Church. A non-Christian CANNOT tell the Church what its Scriptures say and mean. If one would cite a systematics text then perhaps he would be claiming a good authority. Good luck finding one church body whose catechisms endorse or encourage such violence.
–The mere fact that both Christians and Jews claim the Hebrew Testament is proof that one outside of the religion cannot claim authority on the document. Christians look at the Hebrew Testament and see Jesus of Nazareth as the fulfillment. Jews do not. Someone from outside the Church or outside Judaism is incapable of looking at the book and telling us what it says when there are two paramount religions that fastidiously disagree on what it says. This may be accused of the Inflation of Conflict Fallacy, but let it be seen that I am not arguing that because Christians and Jews differ on the Hebrew Testament that the truth of it cannot be known (that would be Inflation of Conflict), I am merely illustrating that someone from outside the religion is an inadequate authority in claiming what the Scriptural doctrine is.
“…which is more moral: helping people purely out of concern for their suffering, or helping them because you think the creator of the universe will reward you for it?”
– or in my own words, ‘because he commands you to do so?’
–The two are not mutually exclusive, plain and simple. Not to mention he forgot the option: helping people in their sufferings and trials because Jesus Christ has helped you in your sufferings and trials… that’s not because God commands us to, it’s showing the same love to others that we have been shown.
“Again, I refer you to the above statements. Christians can use the very scripture their religion is based on to justify the evils they do.”
–I can justify that the Sun revolves around the Earth by standing outside & saying “See! The Sun is moving & I am not.” That doesn’t make it true or valid. This is the case with the Crusades, the Inquisition, the KKK & others who may claim Scriptural support for their prejudice, violence, & hatred. Justifying claims does not necessitate their truth or validity.
–Eisegesis is not Exegesis. & interestingly enough if one would actually read through some of the historical mandates for these violent acts, he would find a surprising LACK of Scriptural references at all!
–Crusades- Perhaps your adversary has not read the five versions of Pope Urban II’s sermon calling for the 1095 Crusade. http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/urban2-5vers.html Let him who is open to truth and capable of thinking and discerning read for himself the words that initiated the Crusades. Fulcher of Charters and Robert the Monk record only Scripture references superfluous to the actual command to march on Jerusalem (in defense of sacred sites). The Gesta Version indicates that there may have been a severe misunderstanding of what it means to take up one’s cross and follow Christ. NONE, Not ONE of the violent sections of Scripture is used to support the 1095 Crusade. Nor are any of the Scriptural references cited used in their proper context and meaning.
–Inquisition- Likewise, perhaps your adversary should read the Ad extirpanda from Pope Innocent IV which instituted the Medieval Inquistion (http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~draker/history/Ad_Extirpanda.html). The Spanish Inquisition was driven by the king and queen with the approval of Pope Sixtus IV, but let there be no mistaking it, it operated under royal authority! Similarly the Portuguese Inquisition came at the request of the King.
KKK- Clearly they did not understand the grace of God was first for the Jew then for the Gentile (and all the World) as it says in the Gospels, Acts, and Paul’s epistles.
I hesitate to call your opponent’s claims Straw Man since they are quite clearly spoken from nothing other than ignorance. How disappointing and frustrating.
Debate on Sam Harris’ “Letter to a Christian Nation”
I have received permission to repost this. Some things are quotes from my blog, specifically “But Christians are Bad People” and others are quotes from Sam Harris’ “Letter…” (abbreviated due to laziness, not lack of respect). Some editing was done (i.e. removing names and extra info at the beginning, also added “if you’d like” to my bracketed side note on Matthew 22, and a few spelling errors were corrected).
This is a debate between an atheist and myself on Christianity in general. We decided to use my most recent blog and Sam Harris’ “Letter…” as the starting point. This will likely be only the first of many such posts.
His text is in normal print. My responses are in bold.
“Christians do bad things, so Christianity must be bad.” I would argue that opponents of Christianity such as Sam Harris, would likely say that “Christians do bad things – and as the Bible specifically instructs in and sanctions such things – Christianity must be bad.” I realize Sam Harris attempts to outline a case that the Bible commands evil in the beginnings of his book–citing Deuteronomy 13:6, 8-15. He then argues that Jesus does not remove responsibility from the law by quoting Matthew 5:18ff (page 5-6 in PDF form, 8-10 in the book). The problem is that Harris takes the Matthew verse out of context by either unintentionally or otherwise leaving out 5:18 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.” One of the core teachings of Christianity is justification. Jesus paid the price. The Law that is written in the Hebrew Scriptures (aka Old Testament) is indeed not abolished, but fulfilled in the person of Christ. Jesus’ statement that He came to earth to fulfill them (the Law He states will not be overthrown) outlines this idea. Paul makes this point clearer throughout his letters to the churches. Galatians 5:4-6, 14 (the rest of the passage can certainly be read, but I don’t think its wholly necessary to get the meaning)- “You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace. But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision [a requirement of the Law] nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love… The entire law is summed up in a single command: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.'” This is ultimately a doctrinal and theological issue. It seems it is one that Harris does not understand. His argument stems from taking Bible passages out of context and arguing against one of the core teachings of not only the church fathers, but also of Paul and Jesus himself–that Christ came as the sacrificial lamb to fulfill the Law, which no man can ever do. As far as whether Christianity sanctions bad things, I think that is nothing but an unfair charge. Christianity’s command can be summed up by what Paul stated before and by what Jesus Himself said of the law (Matthew 22:37ff [read before it for context if you like]): ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” It seems clear that the Christianity Christ preaches is not one that condones violence. Whether one wants to twist it to do so is another matter entirely. “Christians are bad, so Christianity is false.” In the second paragraph, you have changed the premise of your argument from “This is blantantly false, and I’m honestly shocked that someone like Sam Harris…” Again, your first premise is closer to what Harris has stated – the second I find questionable. The second is what you refer to here, and attribute it to Harris. I find no reference in his book that suggests he takes this position – correct me if I’m mistaken. That is, have you a reference that indicates that Harris thinks that because Christians do bad things, Christianity is false? I should have stated that more clearly. It’s a problem I’ll hope to rectify a bit by taking —‘s advice to lessen my amount of posts and increase the editing and thought on each. Harris doesn’t specifically argue that Christianity is false. He does seemingly believe it should be rejected because of the initial premise, however. Though, to be fair, if Christianity is true (i.e. exclusive claim to eternal life in heaven), then it should be embraced by all means. The only logical reason to abandon it would be if Christianity were false. Arguing against Christianity by saying it’s bad does nothing to its claims of truth, making the argument an ad hominem attack on the character of Christians rather than an attack on Christianity. Harris, it could be said, argues that Christianity specifically teaches bad things, but I’ve already demonstrated his lack of theological knowledge on the first point, and his other points (i.e. condom use, etc.) could be valid against Catholicism, which is not the Christianity I (and about 50% of Christians) ascribe to. It seems dishonest of Harris to assert that atheists are completely different while shoehorning the Christian right into a Catholic view. There were several times, whilst reading his book, that I found myself saying to his “You believe…” statements “No I don’t.” Those times are straw men arguments to me, though I would say that Christians who believe, say, in not having birth control, should try to defend their position (one I disagree with). I would suggest a simpler test; read the text of their holy scripture, and see if it advocates and/or sanctions said violence. If it does, the religion is violent. If it’s holy scriptures are replete with violent act after violent act, the religion is violent. Admittedly, I do find (at least) the international data concerning religious vs. non religious nations rather interesting. Though, Harris himself states; “Of course, correlational data of this sort do not resolve questions of causality…these statistics prove that atheism is compatible with the basic aspirations of a civil society; (and) …that widespread belief in God does not ensure a society’s health.” “A very good breaking down of Harris can be found in The Irrational Atheist by Vox Day…” Day states, “By applying his metric to the state-wide voting instead of the more Let’s do justice to what Day is pointing out, however. He’s taking the same sample size (i.e. the U.S.) and simply giving a more in depth analysis of what the statistics show. He’s being more specific with the data. Rather than showing that red areas have higher violence than blue areas, they show that blue counties have higher violence on average than red ones. Examples Day gives: Florida–11 blue counties account for 44% of the state’s population, but more than 50% of its murders and 60% of the robberies. Maryland–5 blue counties with a murder rate of 13.22/100,000 verses 0.89/100,000 in the red counties. Washington, D.C.–voted 91% blue but has the highest murder rate in the nation, almost 7 times the average national rate. Harris’ examples of cities are also taken by state, but not by county. When one goes by county, 13/25 of the safest cities are in red counties (verses the by state of 8/25), while 21/25 of the most dangerous cities are in blue counties (verses by state 12/25). In other words, when one gets specific with the data, it can be shown that red areas are potentially safer than blue areas. To say that it is a “smaller” sampling is inaccurate. Rather, it is looking more specifically at the same sampling. An analogy could be the body. Sam Harris points to one’s midsection and says there is something wrong with it. We can use that same data and zero in on, say, the kidney and point to that as the problem area. The same amount of data is there (we have examined the midsection), but the more specific information leads to a more correct conclusion. “…how is it that showing violence by political beliefs automatically shows a correlation to religious beliefs?” Because it can be shown that there is a strong correlation between the population’s political and religious beliefs. Therefore, show a correlation between violence and one’s political affiliation, and one can extrapolate from this. It is fair to say that certain geographical locations in the U.S. are in fact predominately one party or another (thus the whole red state – blue state dichotomy), and that those parties do in fact represent certain religious affiliations more than others – the stats bare this out quite well, and candidates stake their chances of winning an election on it. e.g. – The ‘deep south’ is predominately quite religious – compared to say, the much more liberal coastal areas, and to some extent, the mid west. The break down is shown here; http://www.valpo.edu/geomet/pics/geo200/religion/adherents.gif The blue and red correlates very closely to this reality; http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/statemapredbluer1024.png Certainly it isn’t perfect, but it is quite illuminating, and certainly enough to gain some reasonable insight as to the connections present between political and religious beliefs in the U.S.. Okay, let’s examine this in detail as well. Day points to a 2001 ARIS study that shows that 14.1% of Americans are atheists. About 1/2 of eligible Americans vote. So assuming that every eligible atheist voted, that means that 28.2% of the vote was potentially atheist. The problem is that exit polls show that atheists were less likely to vote than religious people, accounting for about 10% of voters in CNN exit polls. They went about 2/3 blue. But the problem is that Harris seems to want to use this to show that non-religious people are less violent. This discounts all those who didn’t vote, and it also means that only 16% of blue voters were actually non-religious. It seems kind of ridiculous to attribute all that nonviolent behavior to a lack of religion when it is only 16% of the voting total. So I stand by my idea that using votes to determine religious belief seems pretty silly. Not only that, but if we do use it as a determining factor, it would show the opposite of what Harris wants to argue. “…religion does do a lot of good, whether people like Harris want to admit it or not.” “It is undeniable that many people of faith make heroic sacrifices to relieve the suffering of other human beings.” – Sam Harris He has no trouble admitting that at all. (straw man) I’ll concede again that I should have been more clear here. Harris does admit that religious people do good things, but it seems to me that his argument centers around the idea that no religion = better people. Note especially pages 12-13 in the PDF version of “Letter…” He seems to argue that if religion were removed, more good would be done. I could stand to reword that part of my blog entry, but again I don’t think I’m attacking a straw man when Harris specifically tries to detract from the good that religious people do (i.e. his Mother Theresa example in which he says she was “…deranged by religious faith.”) If she were not so deranged, she would have been better. That seems to be a valid way to argue from what he is saying. But one major thing could be said here theologically as well. Christianity isn’t about achieving goodness. It isn’t about being good. It’s the fact that we are not good that means we need Christ. Whether or not one wants to say Christians are worse than non-Christians doesn’t do anything to hurt the message of Christ–because it’s not based on being good people, it’s based on being saved people. “But those who are, say, Christian, are commanded to be good,…” This is in fact a strike against Christianity in many an atheist’s mind; that the idea of Christian morality is ‘commanded’ of its adherents. Here Harris completely misunderstands large amounts of Christian belief. Again the assumption is that being Christian = better morals. But that’s not what Christianity is about. Also, this explanation of goodness begs the question entirely against the Christian. It assumes that a religious person only does good things out of belief of reward (or perhaps fear of punishment). The conclusion has snuck [edit: sic, blast!] into the premise. It is wholly possible that Christians do good things out of the kindness of their hearts. The Christianity I believe means that I am saved. Any good that I do is for other reasons, not for the hope of reward. The premise in the argument begs the question because it implies that the only reason a Christian does good is for reward, so the good acts they do aren’t as good as one who doesn’t do it for a reward. “…whilst atheism can at best offer an evolutionary view of morality that is not obligatory” Perhaps you can explain to me what the negative is here, assuming that the result – a person acting with moral responsibility – is the same? I meant to say “objective” not “obligatory.” This was wholly a mistake I can ascribe to lack of sleep. The point you make about the result being the same is interesting, given that you just argued above that it is somehow better to do good things without a responsibility to do so. But again, the use of obligatory was a complete mistake. Read it as “objective” and that is my meaning. I had a ridiculously long list here, and have decided it would be of no avail, at least not in this discussion. The violent history of religion would require its own debate. It does after all entail a couple thousand years of history. One could make the same argument for the history of irreligion. Harris concedes as much when he points out that Christians bring up people like Pol Pot, Stalin, and the like. Interestingly, I think simply looking at an overall # of death rate, it is possible that irreligion has lead to more violence than religion. It is also worthy of note that Harris specifically tries to get around these people by calling them irrational and makes some attempt to try to put them outside of atheism. Page 14 on the PDF version of his book (40ff in the book) demonstrates Harris in a very uncomfortable position. “The problem with such tyrants is not that they reject the dogma of religion, but that they embrace other life-destroying myths. Most become the center of a quasi-religious personality cult, requiring the continual use of propaganda for its maintenance. There is a difference between propaganda and the honest dissemination of information that we (generally) expect from a liberal democracy. Tyrants who orchestrate genocides, or who happily preside over the starvation of their own people, also tend to be profoundly idiosyncratic men, not champions of reason. Kim Il Sung, for instance, demanded that his beds at his various dwellings be situated precisely five hundred meters above sea level. His duvets had to be filled with the softest down imaginable. What is the softest down imaginable? It apparently comes from the chin of a sparrow. Seven hundred thousand sparrows were required to fill a single duvet. Given the profundity of his esoteric concerns, we might wonder how reasonable a man Kim Il Sung actually was.” His argument here seems to be that these people are irrational, so they can be dismissed. Yet I’d make the argument that Christians in particular who try to use that belief system for violence are irrational. Either both can be discounted, or neither can. “Further, is it not obvious that much religion embraces peace?” No, it isn’t. (begging the question) The Christian Bible is simply one of the most violence-ridden pieces of literature I’ve encountered. Page after blood soaked page espouses more brutal rape, slavery, torture, genocide, sacrifice – and often to the elation of, or under the direct command of, the Creator – than you can shake a stick at. The Bible does indeed have much violence in it. I’ve argued that things such as killing that is endorsed by God can be logically defensible here. I can sum up: “In this case, the one presenting the argument is suggesting that:
1. God is morally perfect
and
2. God commands killing
are incompatible. Thus, in order to counter this argument, all that needs to be done philosophically is show there is no inconsistancy. In other words, all that needs to be done is show another alternative. That alternative readily makes itself available:
3. There are some whose moral depravity is such that God will not suffer them to live
This third explanation gives a logical “way out” of the supposed dilemma presented by the first two statements. While this explanation may not seem satisfactory to some who would wish to debate the finer points of individual verses, cherry-picking out-of-context Scripture does nothing in light of the fact that option 3. is logically valid. The defender of the faith need not even demonstrate that this statement is true, only that it is possible.
Thus, I conclude that to have 1. God is morally perfect and 2. God commands killing is not a contradiction in light of 3. There are some whose moral depravitiy is such that God will not suffer them to live.
The case for God’s love could fill numerous volumes, but it is clear from Scripture that God is intentionally portrayed as the definition of Judge, morally perfect, and righteous. The writers of the inspired Word are clearly not recording stories of massed killings in the name of the Lord for the sake of showing God’s moral imperfections (which, I would argue, points even more towards the innerrancy of Scripture, but that’s a whole other issue), but they are rather recording these stories to show that God is indeed God and He is in control. In His moral perfection, there are things He cannot tolerate. Those things are punished in righteousness. Those who argue that the God of the Bible is evil are merely skimming scripture for verses they believe will back them up in out-of-context situations. Further, they are rejecting the Holy Spirit’s role in directing true and upright teaching of the word. Finally, even if one does not accept Scripture as innerrant, the Word of God, or as being passed on by the Holy Spirit, the philosophical problem of evil in the Bible is solved quite simply, contrary to general belief, by the assertion that God’s role as Judge could mean He cannot allow certain evils to pass unpunished.” Arguing that God portrayed in the Bible is evil is to not only do so by specifically searching for verses to support the case in light of much evidence to suggest otherwise (just see God’s interactions with the nation of Israel in light of their constant apostasy, the example of Jesus, the Psalms, and all kinds of other verses that deal with the mercy and goodness of God), but it is also to argue without a knowledge of the culture that such a text originated from. In other words, to argue that God is evil in light of the Bible is to look on such acts with modern eyes and completely discount the fact that the Biblical world was a completely different place than the world we have. There’s a couple of things wrong with this statement – almost to the point that I would respectfully ask that you amend your blog, and make the correction. But that feels beyond the scope of what we’re doing here. I’ll abstain from that request – but do consider what it is you’ve actually said; First, he does not endorse this religion. He highlights it as an exception to the rule. That is, he notes that it “preaches a doctrine of utter non-violence”, and he does so in order to contrast it with Christianity, which is replete with violence. Second, you then choose to use the unfortunate phrase ‘adhere to’ when describing Harris’ statements about Jainism – stating he in fact adheres to Jainism. Certainly you know he does not adhere to this or any religion? This is an issue of semantics and I’m willing to concede the point that Harris does not adhere to Jainism. Though it is clear that he has some interesting views on spirituality (I grant that Wikipedia is not the best source for this type of thing, but the quote from End of Faith, combined to his specific exclusion of Eastern religions from his general attack on religion show at least a predisposition). “…it is telling that Harris feels the need to include a chapter about Are atheists evil?” Do tell? I’m not at all clear what you think this exposes about Harris? I can explain for you why this inclusion was quite necessary in a book of this sort. Day in and day out, the American atheist is absolutely inundated with accusations from his Christian neighbor, that he is without morals, “spiritually” bankrupt, brimming with sin, in a word, evil. The need for a look into the morality of the atheist was an important component of the discussion – esp. in a book addressing a ‘Christian Nation’. Or more accurately, to show that no such connection can be made. A simple question; Do you honestly think that any of the evil that Stalin, Pol Pot or Mao perpetrated, could be said to have been done in the name of ‘rationality’? I’d be quite curious to hear you justify that if it is your belief. I consider what these men did to be the very height of irrationality. Yet Harris, and it seems you, continue to argue using points from people who are Christian and irrational. This doesn’t really seem fair. Also, I doubt that someone like, say, Stalin, would say they were being irrational. My main point is that either both types of irrational extremities (violent Christians and violent atheists) don’t need to be addressed, or they both do. Regarding the inclusion of atheism in that quote, simply, nothing can be done in the name of atheism. It’s a statement without meaning. As I’m sure you’ve heard many times, atheism is simply the lack of a belief in a god. Nothing more. How you one do something ‘in the name of’ a lack of a belief? Fair enough, then I’ll say that these men were atheists. The people who did violence and were Christian can still be compared to as a legitimate analogy. Atheists who do violence. Christians who do violence. I’d argue both are bad. If you wish to tack on some other world view or belief system (secularism, humanism, etc.), they actually begin to carry some baggage, and one might say they did something in the name of some ideal that that particular world view or ideology holds. But then you are no longer talking exclusively about atheism. Belief in a God can, however, give an objective standard by which all actions must be judged. Thus there is a better basis by which to reject certain actions than if there is no objective standard. “Sam Harris accuses Christianity in particular…He goes on to attempt to disassociate atheism with these obvious atheists” by saying “While it is true that such men are sometimes enemies of organized religion…” [Here I’d like to note that this is completely deceptive.” I will agree, within this section anyway, that he did seem to directly avoid saying that the men were atheists. It felt disingenuos to me. He does elsewhere, but that isn’t relevant. I have to concede that he might have been more direct here. I don’t appreciate the dodge either. That said… “These men absolutely were enemies of organized religion and wholly atheist. Harris is attempting to downplay the evil of these men.] “ It’s entirely honest on his part to say ‘sometimes’ in this case, as Hitler was in the list. Hitler’s atheism, as you know, is quite debatable, and he was a staunch bedfellow with the Church as well (however opportunist that relationship may have been). It would have been inaccurate to claim that ‘all’ of his list were enemies of religion and that they were all atheists. I can’t say for sure that this is why he stated it this way, but it would have been inaccurate to do other wise. “Isn’t it obvious that those who champion murder in the name of God are just as irrational as these atheists that Harris, Dawkins, and the like are quick to condemn as irrational?” Arguing this is false in light of the points I’ve already made, but it seems to be the central issue, so I’ll address it again. To argue that Christianity is violent is to go against the core teachings of Christianity from its founding (and indeed the person of Christ) to the present day. Not only are the two core law statements to love God and neighbor, but Christ specifically condemns violence in all forms. To argue otherwise is to beg the question. Again, it would be easy to pick out violent examples from Scripture and debate them on a verse-by-verse basis, but that is not the core issue. Christianity teaches the entire Bible points to Christ at the center. What does Christ teach? Nonviolence. This may sound like a variation of the “No True Scotsman” argument, but it isn’t, as we do have a strict definition of what it means to be Christian in the Bible. One need only look at what Christ Himself says and one can find what is indeed a “true Christian.” Not only that, but Paul, Peter, etc. are further examples of what Christianity means. Again, I refer you to the above statements. Christians can use the very scripture their religion is based on to justify the evils they do. Atheists have no such justification. An atheist committing an act of violence must assume the responsibility solely on their own. There is no dogma to point to and say “See, that’s what happens when you are an atheist.”. No ancient scripture or holy text, no authorities from whom rules and such are handed down, only an individual making a choice. Christians who use the Scripture to justify violence have missed what Christ himself says about violence. There can be nothing more clear than this when one simply reads what Jesus says. “I’d argue that atheists like Stalin could defend their killing from an atheologically defensible position as well: personhood doesn’t matter, so we can kill as we please.” There is no such position in existence. Not having a belief in a god says nothing of one’s beliefs about the worth of a human life. It does not put special value on it, nor does it devalue it – it says nothing at all about it – or anything else for that matter. It only denotes that one has no belief in a god. Conceded. Though the atheism you are describing is a “soft atheism” that goes against the definition of atheism as seen in both the Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. See further points about that here. “I do, however agree that either side can use those beliefs (or lack thereof) to condone violent actions.” How is it you arrive at some belief system (that would ‘condone’ an action), from the statement that one dose not have a belief in a god? “His examples include preaching abstinence over use of condoms,…All of these are ad hominem attacks (or ad Deum)” How is mentioning that the church preaches abstinence an ad hominem attack? I submit that it most certainly is not. This seems ad hominem to me. Rather than attacking any specific argument, he is attacking, say, Catholics, for preaching abstinence. I’m almost willing to concede your point here except for the virulent nature of his attack in this section. I may be reading too much into it, but this passage seems full of emotional appeal and very much like an attack on people who would dare believe such things and less like a legitimate complaint. I won’t comment on your subsequent three fold explanation – mostly in the interest of length (this is already ridiculously long!). I’m quite interested in discussing morality as it pertains to religion and atheism in the future though. Let’s hope we can return to this. Well. That’s quite a lot. More than enough for now, I’m sure. Hopefully it wasn’t too terribly dull, and I’ve left you with something worthy of response. Hope to hear from you soon, |
Another thing I’d love to point out is that Harris is a wonderful example of the argument from atheism (page 5 in PDF) which I address https://jwwartick.com/2009/07/24/the-argument-from-atheism/.This argument is demonstrably false because by definition a theist is not an atheist, check out the blog for a longer rebuttal.
Physicalism: Does it really have explanatory power?
Physicalism–the view that the human body is wholly physical–claims to have better explanatory power (and indeed, the only explanatory power) than other world views. Is this really true?
One way to defeat such a claim is to show that physcalism does not actually have such a monopoly on explanatory power. I believe that dualism offers just such a defeater:
The main argument I have against physicalism (and hence, for dualism) is that there are things in existence that physicalism cannot account for. These things include, but are not limited to:
1) There is causation. Physicalism essentially seems to claim that a thought or an idea, an emotion, is identical to the cause. In other words, touching part of the brain with an electrode, which triggers a sensation, IS the sensation. What physicalism then states is that things are not responses to emotions, they just are the emotion. But that is seemingly false, for all that is proven is that the mind is causally connected to the brain, not that they are identical. There is no part of the brain, for example, that is a memory. It may be shown that one can cause a memory to occur with stimulation, but that only proves that some memory (B) is caused by some firing of a neuron (A). But A is not B.
Take, for example, the idea within physicalism that love is the chemical reactions and neurological firings in the brain: love (B) is caused by chemicals (A). To say that the chemical is love is not true, for a chemical is ontologically different from an emotion—consider this example: if I conceive of a pink elephant, does that mean that whatever neurons need to fire in order to bring that thought into my brain are indeed a pink elephant (Moreland, 234)? Or do they merely cause the image of a pink elephant to appear? Likewise with any real object or imagining. These things are not physically contained in our brain, nor are they actually the chemicals or neurons themselves, they can simply be caused by such mechanical things. That does not make them identical. A may cause B, but A is not B.
2) Self-presenting properties. There are things that present themselves directly to the subject, and are considered wholly mental in nature. Things like love, the experience of red, thinking that three is an odd number—these things are directly present to a subject because that subject has them immediately in his/her field of consciousness. Two evidences exist for these properties: the first is that one can have private access to mental properties, but not physical properties… and the second is that one can know at least some of one’s own mental properties incorrigibly. People can know things themselves that they cannot be wrong about. In other words, I can know without question what the color green appears to be to me. No one else can know that.
3) The subjective nature of experience. This is called the “knowledge argument.” This one is something that is hard to explain without using an example (ty to J.P. Moreland for this). Suppose there is a deaf scientist who is the single leading expert on the neurology of hearing. It would be possible for him to know and describe everything involved in the physical aspects of hearing… yet not actually have knowledge of hearing itself. This experience is essential and subjective. It is also outside of the realm of physicalism to explain.
4) Intentionality. We can have an ‘ofness’ or ‘aboutness’ with our action that is inexplicable through physical needs. “Mental states have a directness that is intrinsic to them (Moreland 237).” In other words, many mental states are of or about something: fear of something, thoughts about something, etc. Now, there doesn’t seem to be any way to reduce something such as a thought about something to a physical explanation. In other words, the ‘aboutness’ of a thought defies physical explanation.
These are just a few arguments against physicalism. There are a couple more that could be made, but that would make this longer than I think it needs to be. Further, each individual kind of physicalism is subject to a wide array of critiques.
Moreland, J.P. & William Lane Craig. “Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview.”
J.W. Wartick - Reconstructing Faith 
