Humanism, atheism and other freedoms

I’m currently reading, and enjoying, Richard Dawkin’s new book, The Greatest Show on Earth: the evidence for evolution. Apparently, he was inspired to write it when he realised that, in spite of the fact that the evidence for evolution is overwhelming, many people don’t know that.

The book lays out the evidence in an easy-to assimilate way. Dawkins has had to be careful: he has been maliciously misquoted in the past by having short statements repeated out of context by creationists. (Apparently their ‘Christian’ morals don’t extend to honesty. And intellectual rigour is antithetical to creationism.)

As well as elucidating the scientific evidence, Dawkins tackles some of the muddle-headed ideas often thrown up by those who can’t cope with, or are scared of, evolution. For example, he carefully repeats that mankind is not descended from chimps, or any other kind of ape in existence today. We simply have a common ancestor – as we do with every other living thing.

Some of the other accusations thrown at evolutionists are more bizarre – almost to the point of cretinism, in my opinion. “I’ll believe we’re descended from monkeys when a chimp gives birth to a human” is one. This is so phenomenally stupid it’s hard to know where to begin. Dawkins makes a good stab at it, though. He also deals with the alleged ‘missing link’ (it isn’t missing), the lack of weird hybrids like the crocoduck in the fossil record (evolution doesn’t work that way so they should be missing) and the accusation that fossils show no intermediate stages (flat wrong on two counts: 1. There are plenty of fossil sequences that show steps along the evolutionary path; 2. Virtually all fossils are intermediate stages).

Then there’s the rallying cry of anti-evolutionists everywhere (or ‘history deniers’ as Dawkins rightly calls them): “what about the gaps in the fossil record?”.

Why wouldn’t there be gaps? What else could you expect? Fossilisation is a random happenstance relying on special conditions. Only a portion of the world’s rocks are capable of fossilising animals and plants during the rock’s formation. Special conditions must apply – conditions that don’t occur everywhere (a forest, for example, is not a good environment for creating fossils). Then the plant or animal has to be in the right place at exactly the right moment. Then we have to find the fossil. Untold millions must have been destroyed in the intervening period, by natural and human activity. Many more will be in strata where they will never be found. The fossil collections we have represent just a small fraction of the fossils that have been formed over the millennia.

Let’s consider an analogy. How many humans have lived and died? How many millions have been carefully buried, with clothes and grave goods in specially prepared ground? And yet how few do archaeologists find?

We’re lucky to have any fossils. And yet, the tens of thousands – or it is millions? – that we’ve been fortunate to find still paint a detailed and consistent picture. And they all fit beautifully with the theory of evolution. Indeed, ever since Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species, with his brilliant insight into the most important evolutionary mechanism – natural selection – every important discovery and advance, such as DNA, has fitted perfectly into the overall evolutionary picture.

(I’ll be dealing in more detail with some of the anti-evolutionary ‘arguments’ in my occasional series, Lies Believers Tell.)

All the arguments against evolution stem from one source. Ignorance. The very basis of these arguments is false because they rely on assumptions that simply are not true.

Creationists are the worst offenders. (Let’s remember that many religious people have no problem with evolution.) They listen only to each other. They repeat the same baseless lies and distortions because they don’t want evolution to be true. They prefer their ignorance because, however disconnected it might be from reality, it allows them to indulge in their bronze-age fantasies.

And this, sadly, is why I think Dawkins’ book won’t reach the people who need it most. Where truth and faith collide, the faithful will stick their fingers in their ears, incant loudly and give themselves up to ignorance.

The Greatest Show on Earth is available from:
 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

The creationists are at it again. Schools in the UK are receiving copies of a glossy new book, Explore Evolution, published by the hilariously mis-named Truth in Science.

What could be better? Surely a book on evolution is a good thing? Except that this book is one gigantic lie.

The book is subtitled The Arguments for and against Neo-Darwinism, but the contents are not nearly so balanced as that phrase suggests. Indeed, the material is carefully and deliberately twisted, distorted and unbalanced in order that readers – and these are schoolchildren, remember – will come to the conclusion that the Theory of Evolution is flawed and that other ideas are just as valid.

The book is, in short, a piece of creationist propaganda, heavily and dishonestly disguised as science.

Truth in Science is not a scientific organisation, it is an evangelical religious organisation. It just doesn’t have the guts to say so. (The British Humanist Association, at its Humanist Life blog, has an interesting breakdown of Truth in Science’s board members.) Instead, it flatters itself that it has a mission to educate, when in fact its mission is to lie to children.

Here’s how the organisation’s website describes what it’s up to:

At Truth in Science, we wish to highlight the scientific weaknesses of Neo-Darwinism and to encourage a more critical approach to the teaching of evolution in schools and universities.

We consider it is time for students to be exposed to the fact that there is a modern controversy over Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and that this has considerable social, spiritual, moral and ethical implications.

Creationists are always moaning, ‘Teach the controversy’ – but it’s actually the last thing they need.

First, there is no controversy. Even that much is a lie. Evolution is an established fact, and natural selection its most significant mechanism. Yes, there are debates and controversies within evolutionary science: that is the nature of science. Unlike religious faith, scientific knowledge continuously grows and adapts. It is a living thing, imperfect, incomplete but always getting better. Science is fundamentally honest in its willingness to admit its shortcomings and admit errors. Creationists and other religious extremists often take advantage of this openness, deliberately misrepresenting it as a weakness when it fact it’s a strength.

There is no controversy between evolution and … well, anything else, least of all religious fantasy. ‘Creation science’ is no such thing – it’s fundamentalist religious dogma and does not belong anywhere near a science class. ‘Intelligent design’ is just creation science re-badged when the latter was seen by sane, intelligent people to be fraudulent and intellectually bankrupt. If it is dealt with at all in schools (and I’ve yet to see a convincing reason why it should be) it belongs alongside other outdated mythologies, like the Flat Earth, dragons and witches – perhaps a footnote in a comparative religion class.

We know that the ‘teach the controversy’ ruse is an attempt to get creationism on the same platform as evolution – to pretend that they are somehow equivalent and equally respectable. Yet, the more that creationists (whether or not they admit to being such) make this call, the more they highlight the fact that creationism is not the equal of evolution. All they really succeed in doing is advertising the dreadful inadequacy of their ideas.

Perhaps this is why they are now resorting to such underhand tactics.

You’ll note that the mission statement quoted above does not mention religion directly, let alone creationism. Truth in Science [sic], like so other creationist organisations, has to resort to dishonesty in trying to sneak through its message – by inventing ’scientific weaknesses’ and pretending there is a ‘controversy’.

One assumes they know, at some level, that creationist ideas cannot stand by their own merits. They have none. They must disguise them as pseudo-science. They can’t ‘teach the controversy’ because that would mean presenting their case fully and honestly, which is doomed to failure. So they don’t want to teach the controversy – what they want to teach the UK’s children are lies and distortions.

And so a religious organisation attempts to push its ideas on children by not mentioning their religious origin. It’s rather like a drug dealer hanging around the school gates handing out bags of crack pretending they’re sweets.

Clearly, creationist organisations, such as Truth in Science [sic] do not have the courage of their convictions, nor do they have the decency to put their case honestly. Remind me again about ‘Christian’ morals…?

A round-up of some of the best books published in 2009 that humanists, atheists and freethinkers will want to have in their libraries.

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The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution by Richard Dawkins

In his previous books, Richard Dawkins, one of the world’s leading evolutionary scientists, assumed that most people knew about the evidence for Darwinian evolution. But it seems that many don’t. It’s not just creationists who labour under the delusion that the evidence is somehow weak – or even missing. Even ordinary people persist in believing that evolution is ‘just’ a theory (by misunderstanding what scientists mean by ‘theory’), that it shows no intermediate stages, that evolution can’t deal with the complexity of the eye or the emergence of flight. And, of course, the evidence accumulates and gets stronger every day. In this timely work, Dawkins lays out what that evidence is, and shows us – beyond doubt – that evolution by natural selection is a fact.

 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

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Ideas That Matter: Key Concepts for the 21st Century by A C Grayling

One of our leading philosophers guides you through some of the most important concepts that have shaped our time. The alphabetically ordered entries range across religion, philosophy, scientific theory and political movements. But it’s not just a dry reference work: as usual, Grayling leavens the important subject matter and profound implications with his accessible style, occasional seasonings of wit and customary passion. An invaluable lesson in how we got to where we are today.

 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

* See note below about AC Grayling’s latest book, To Set Prometheus Free.

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The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas edited by Ariane Sherine

A collection of writings – some thoughtful, some iluminating some hilarious – from 42 committed non-believers. The collection was compiled by Guardian journalist Ariane Sherine, who was behind the ‘There’s Probably No God’ poster campaign in the UK. The book contains contributions from the likes of Richard Dawkins, Charlie Brooker, Derren Brown, Ben Goldacre, Jenny Colgan, David Baddiel, Simon Singh, AC Grayling, Brian Cox and Richard Herring. In addition, the full book advance and all royalties go to the UK HIV charity Terrence Higgins Trust.

 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

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Bad Science by Ben Goldacre

Although not specifically about humanism or atheism, Goldacre’s passionate and often hilarious book provides a valuable lesson in how we need to uphold rigid standards in science. He first takes aim at the lunatic fringe – homeopathy, miracle vitamins and the like – showing how they exploit dubious, ’sciency’ language to give spurious credibility to their claims while hypocritically condemning science whenever it shows them to be fraudulent, which is often. Then he goes on to attack two more mainstream menaces – Big Pharma and bad journalists. Basically, it’s all about truth and honesty, and how there’s very little room for either in medicine once money enters the picture. Essential reading.

 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

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The Rough Guide to Evolution by Mark Pallen

A very accessible overview of what is rightly claimed as the biggest idea mankind has ever had. The importance of the theory of evolution by natural selection – both to science and to our understanding of ourselves – is such that you simply can’t have too many books about it. This heavily illustrated summary covers: the origins of the idea and the theory’s own evolution; a brief romp through the entire history of life on this planet; and an examination of the impact that the theory has had on science, society, art, history and even religion. And excellent companion to the Dawkins book above (though I would buy the Dawkins first).

 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

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God’s Problem by Bart D Ehrman

Well, okay, maybe a book about suffering isn’t all that Christmas-y. And this originally came out last year (the paperback was published in 2009, though). The thing is, Ehrman is such a good writer, and what he has to say is so important, that I wanted one of his books in this list. And I’ve just finished reading this one. It’s quite a personal book because Christianity’s inability to deal adequately with the question, ‘if god is good, why is there suffering?’ was among the chief reasons Ehrman, a former fundamentalist, lost his faith. He goes through the list of answers that believers lean on in an attempt to answer this question – such as: good comes out of evil; suffering is the result of free will (the most popular and the most easily demolished excuse); god likes testing us; and so on. And he shows just how feeble these responses truly are. In the end, though, I found reading the book a positive experience. The message I took away is a humanist one: there will always be suffering – it’s up to us, as compassionate human beings, to do what we can about it.

 Amazon.co.uk |  Amazon.com

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* Update (17/11/2009): I’ve just been contacted by AC Grayling’s publishers who point out that his latest book is about to hit the bookshelves. To Set Prometheus Free, published by Oberon Books (ISBN:978184002962) is subtitled ‘Religion, reason and humanity’. It is a collection of essays dealing with the need for more secularism in society. In effect, it builds on Against All Gods: Six Polemics Against Religion and an Essay on Kindness, published by Oberon in 2007. You can probably infer the gist of the book from the chapters: Where are we in history?; Why I do not subscribe to religious beliefs; Why Bertrand Russell was not religious; Scientists confront Intelligent Design and Creationism; The War of the Books; The Good Life. Meanwhile, the book is available for pre-order from Amazon.

 Amazon.co.uk

The ‘intelligent design’ trial in Dover, Pennsylvania was a landmark case. It established that ID is just a dishonest re-badging of creationism and has no place in a science class. It was an important victory for rationalism, commonsense and science.The video above is the 2006 BBC Horizon programme on the case and the underlying issues.I would also strongly recommend ‘40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, God, Oxycontin, and Other Oddities on Trial in Pennsylvania’ by Matthew Chapman – a personal, often funny, scrupulously fair and sensitive account of the trial and the people involved.