The Atheist News Podcast

In the second of what I suspect will be a scattered series of posts on Darwin–I’m TAing a class on him this semester–I bring you some facepalm-worthy news on this godless Sunday morning.  The UK’s Telegraph reports that a new drama about the life and times of Charles Darwin has recently made its premier at the Toronto Film Festival to much acclaim.  The film–which, judging by the trailer, looks quite good–is titled Creation, and is apparently centered around a portrayal of Darwin as a father, husband, naturalist, and human (rather than as an almost legendary scientific figure); it seeks to depict Darwin’s “struggle between faith and reason” as he wrote the Origin of Species, and throughout his life.  The producers have had no trouble finding distributors for the film in most of the world, but have been unable to find a single distribution company willing to take the film on in the United States.  The reason?  The film’s central topic–evolution–has been deemed too controversial in the United States.

As shocking as this might seem, I suppose the distribution companies are on firm statistical ground here: a Gallup poll conducted in February (to mark Darwin’s 200th birthday) found that fewer than 40% of Americans endorse the theory of evolution even in the broad strokes, and the number falls to just 24% if only those who regularly attend religious services are considered.  That makes for some reasonably fierce opposition to the topic of Creation, and perhaps some good reason to think that the film might struggle to find a wide audience in the United States.  Even still, though, I find it hard to believe that there’s no audience here at all: Bill Maher’s Religulous, after all, was able to find enough of an audience for a release, so it can’t just be that Creation offends America’s religious sensibilities.  Is there a deeper opposition at work?  Perhaps.  Much of US culture is profoundly anti-scientific and anti-intellectual, so perhaps the fact that Creation is about science (or, rather, about a scientist) is as off-putting as the fact that it covers evolution specifically.

Whatever the reason, I hope that the film’s producers are able to strike a deal soon: this looks like a really entertaining and well-done look at Darwin the man.  I was happy to see hints at the inner turmoil he must have experienced as he pushed his theory to its limits and yet still tried to maintain a close relationship with his highly religious wife Emma, for whom he cared a great deal.  It also seems to deal with the tragedy that was the death of Annie Darwin, the scientist’s favored daughter, at age 10–the event was to haunt Charles for the rest of his life, and may well have helped shape his waning religious sensibilities as well.  Non-American atheists can expect to see the film soon; my fellow Yankees and I may have to wait a bit longer.  Still, I suspect it will find its way here eventually.

Charles Darwin was 200 years old this February–or, rather, he would have been 200 years old if he hadn’t been ejected from the gene pool in 1882.  Moreover, the 150th anniversary of the publication of his magnum opus, On The Origin of Species, is right around the corner: it was first published on November 24, 1859.  I’m not sure if he’d be shocked or completely nonplussed about the fact that his ideas are still being publically debated today; he was never much for the public intellectual spotlight himself, though, and likely would have been happy to cede his role in the vigorous discourse to Richard Dawkins and the other modern-day Thomas Huxleys of the world.  In the spirit of this auspicious annum, I offer the following book recommendation: Living With Darwin: Evolution, Design, and the Future of Faith, by Professor Philip Kitcher, is absolutely fantastic.

Kitcher is a professor of philosophy at Columbia University (and, in the interest of full disclosure, is your not-so-humble blogger’s advisor, so this review might be biased); he works mostly in philosophy of science, philosophy of biology, and philosophy of literature.  He’s been a strong voice in favor of reason and evolution at least since the publication of his 1982 book Abusing Science: The Case Against Creationism, and Living With Darwin marks a triumphant return to that topic.  While he has received less attention than the Dawkins/Harris/Hitchens/Dennett crowd, Kitcher has, it seems to me, produced a work that is far more balanced, thoughtful, and scholastic than any of the work by the “Four Horsemen” (with the exception of Dennett).  Living With Darwin is far less shrill, condescending, and strident than (say) The God Delusion or God Is Not Great.  It is clearly a piece of careful scholarship, not a polemic designed to inflame as many opinions as possible; the whole work drips with the charmingly reserved English-gentleman wit that Kitcher exudes in person.  If you’ve tried some of the works by the “New Atheists” and have found the tone hard to swallow, I’d doubly recommend this book.

Kitcher’s approach is unique with respect to more than just tone, though.  As he points out in the first chapter, the common position to take with regard to the intelligent design/creationism/evolution debate is simply to deny that the first two are science at all–most opponents of intelligent design will argue that it ought to be kept out of the classroom because it fails some unnamed test on the basis of which science can be discriminated from pseudoscience.  Kitcher, with a philosopher’s typical sensitivity to tricky problems like this, disagrees.  He points out (quite rightly, in my opinion) that making this kind of move–the “ID isn’t science” move–requires us to solve a notoriously tricky problem in the philosophy of science: the so-called problem of demarcation. This is no small order.  The demarcation problem–the problem of how and where to draw the boundaries of science so that all cases of “legitimate” science are included within the boundary and all cases of mysticism or pseudoscience are excluded–is one that philosophers and scientists alike have wrestled with for centuries now.  Even some of the giants of the field–Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn for instance–have found themselves stymied by this problem.  Perhaps surprisingly, it turns out that this line is very difficult to draw in a consistent and not ad hoc way: it is difficult, that is, to articulate a general criterion (or even a general set of criteria) which invariably lines up with our intuitions about what should be science and what shouldn’t be.  Most people immediately go for testability as a criterion, for instance, but that would seem to exclude much of what theoretical physics does.  The problem is likely not insoluble (I’m inclined to think that very few puzzles are unsolvable), but it is difficult enough that I think Kitcher is wise for trying to find a way to make the evolutionist point without leaning on a tacit solution to the demarcation problem.

This, then, is Kitcher’s move in the game: let us admit (if only for the sake of discussion) that both intelligent design and young Earth creationism might count as valid scientific theories (whatever those might turn out to be); still, however, that is not enough to get them into the science classroom.  There are many theories that have been, in the course of human history, valid scientific theories (the theory of aether as the medium through which light waves propagated, for instance) but which are no longer taught in the science classroom.  Why are they no longer taught?  Precisely because (says Kitcher) they’ve been shown to be incorrect scientific theories; even if we admit that they pass the mysterious demarcation test, we can also admit that they’ve been shown to be false.  They’re science, that is, but they’re bad science.  Kitcher contends that ID and creationism both ought to be counted, along with aether, alchemy, flogiston, astrology, heliocentrism, and a whole host of other dead (but once respectable) theories about how the world might work, as scientific ideas that have, in light of new discoveries, lost their status as “good science.”  This is a clever move, I think, and one that turns out to be immensely profitable for him: it lets him argue that ID and “creation science” might belong in a history of science class (alongside alchemy), but that they have no place in a science classroom, which should communicate only our best–that is, our most explanatorily powerful–theories about the world.

There’s a further strength in that position too, though: it makes for much better public relations.  Rather than accusing the parents pushing for intelligent design in (say) Kansas of being stupid and unscientific, Kitcher takes the more even-handed approach of arguing that almost all of them are well-meaning people who have been taken in by a very few religious and cultural leaders who seek to exploit the debate for their own gain.  As a result of this stance, the book–including its somewhat more polemical final chapter–ends up feeling far less condescending than (say) the work of Dawkins or Hitchens.  Kitcher is happy to operate on the assumption that most people legitimately want the best for their children but, because they lack the education and experience to evaluate the status of one theory relative to another, are being manipulated by politicians and pastors who assure them that intelligent design is on just as firm scientific footing as it ever has been.  Most ID proponents, that is, are neither stupid nor evil, but rather just misguided.

This is not to say that the book is perfect.  Kitcher’s spiritual tolerance, I think, is not entirely misguided–still, I don’t agree with him on all points.  The last chapter is primarily dedicated to advocating a more “spiritual” interpretation of traditional religions; his point is that if we can encourage (say) Christians to hold onto the message of the Bible while throwing out literal interpretations, we can have our cake and eat it too–people can keep their religion, but will cease to try to use it to outcompete scientific explanations.  This spiritually tolerant position is one on which he and I have verbally clashed before, and I still think he’s wrong about it.  Kitcher’s position (both in the book and in person) is that we ought to encourage people to look at religion like they look at poetry–as just a beautiful way of expressing truth about the world, or as metaphor.  He seems to think that this shift can happen rapidly–within a single generation–and that it will largely eliminate the problems with religion.  I disagree.  While I think it might be possible to get to a point like this in the future–a point where we can encourage people to read the Bible and see it as literature with a good message–it seems to me that this shift will not happen unless and until the populace at large recognizes that religious and spiritual explanations for the world are fundamentally bad explanations.  To that end, we ought to strive for the complete elimination of spirituality, not a kind of nebulous middle ground of mutual tolerance and respect.  This is but one flaw in an otherwise very good work, though.

All in all, this book is, I think, incredibly successful.  Kitcher masterfully weaves science, philosophy, history, and social commentary together to create a compelling narrative.  He carefully considers the evidence both for and against intelligent design theory, and rehearses the discoveries in geology, physics, biology, and philosophy that have led all serious thinkers to abandon both ID and creationism as legitimate explanations for the diversity of life.  He shows a great sensitivity to the social and cultural issues surrounding the debate, and takes great care to write in a tone that is both accessible and respectful to all concerned.  The science is simply and clearly presented without being dumbed down, and the philosophy is so woven throughout it all that you’re scarcely aware that you’re reading a professional philosopher at all; technical vocabulary is almost entirely absent, and the tone is conversational.  This book is a must-read for anyone who is concerned about science education, evolution, or religion: it belongs on your shelf next to (or perhaps even in front of) the works of the more well-known atheist authors today.

Who am I?  Why am I here?  It seems only appropriate that a philosophy blog begins with these questions; Dan Dennett says that it’s an occupational hazard of the profession that we philosophers get asked to define the meaning of life over dinner (or over the Interwebs, as the case may be).  That’s not what I mean by posing these questions-though I won’t promise that I won’t, in the course of our discussions here, address that tricky subject.  My aim, at least initially, is much more modest: I want to tell you a little bit about who I am, what I believe, and how I ended up writing these words.  I want to set the stage for what will follow.  Those uninterested in inspirational words can stop reading now and pick up at the next post, which (I hope) will be a good deal more argumentative.  First, though, the mood must be established.

In an important sense, it matters less who I am, and more what I do (that’s a philosophical claim, for those keeping track)-let’s start there, then.  I’m a member of that rare and reviled group called “the Professional Academic.”  I get paid to do what I’m doing right now-that is, to think carefully, and then write about my thoughts.  Yes, it is a pretty sweet gig, if I do say so myself.  Still, there’s an old joke in academia that goes something like this: if you’re at a cocktail party with people of mixed professions, and someone asks you what you do and you say you’re an educator, eyes immediately glaze over.  If you’re at a cocktail party with educators and someone asks you what sort of education you’re in and you say you’re a college professor, eyes immediately glaze over.  If you’re at a cocktail party with a bunch of college professors and someone asks you what sort of professor you are and you say that you’re a philosopher, eyes immediately glaze over.  I’m a doctoral student rather than a full professor-a professorial pupae-but the point, I think, remains: something there is that doesn’t love a philosopher.

Why?  We’re an amicable enough bunch (at least when not arguing with one another), and we certainly shower more often than the engineers.  Here’s my guess: philosophers make people uncomfortable in a way that engineers (and poets and chemists and computer scientists and historians) don’t; in a very real sense, it is our job to make people uncomfortable-that’s what they pay us for.  The philosopher is much like the court jester of old in this regard: we get away with saying what no one else can get away with saying, and maybe that’s just because people can laugh off our words-oh, that’s just the philosopher, up to his old tricks.  The good student of history will note that wise rulers knew enough to listen to their jesters when they spoke, though: “The mind that’s afraid to toy with the ridiculous will never create the brilliantly original,” says David Brin.  Words that make us uncomfortable often do so because they strike at truths we’d rather not acknowledge-they “break the spell,” to borrow from Dennett once again.  This, I think, is at the heart of what good philosophy does (or ought to do): break the spell, and tell people what they might not want to hear.

It’s no secret that philosophy thrives when worldviews are in turmoil: the birthplace of philosophy as a coherent discipline was Ancient Greece, that archetypal cross-road of ideas and cultures.  Philosophy flourished in the Athens of 2500 years ago precisely because the comfortable bubble that the Greeks had constructed-the explanatory bubble of warring gods and mischievous spirits-found itself threatened by new cultures, religions, and explanations: by new ideas.  Philosophy developed as a way of trying to make sense of this turmoil:  as a way of trying to find a steady point in the intellectual maelstrom.  With Aristotle, it seemed that the Greeks had found this point, and the Aristotelian system kept the world comfortable for more than a thousand years.

Sometime in the middle of the 17^th century, though, that creeping edge of nervousness began to overtake humanity again, though this time the culprit was singular and clear: science.  Science’s attack on humanity’s comfort was well-organized and multi-pronged-the springing of a trap designed by a master general.  Copernican physics threatened our special place at the center of the solar system; biology threatened our special place as animate things in a fundamentally inanimate world; evolution threatened our special place as the chosen species, earnestly (and gravely) assuring us that we were just another “rational animal.”  I am taking some liberties with the timeline, I know, but be patient and allow the jester some poetic license.  Amid this cognitive vertigo, philosophy-more-or-less silent for centuries-found its voice again; it is no accident, after all, that Descartes’ primary project in his seminal Meditations on First Philosophy was to establish something “firm and lasting.”  In a world where the steady, soulless march of the natural sciences threatened to eradicate all that humanity had believed since we first arose, an Archimedean point was sought-a point on which humanity might stand, move the world, and be unmoved in turn.  The reader can judge the relative success or failure of this project for himself.

Science, for its part, has paid little attention to our collective discomfort.  It has rolled on, oblivious to the comforting fictions crushed beneath its treads, and we find ourselves at another crossroad today.  Computer science threatens our very notion of what it is to be a thinking thing (so much the worse for Descartes’ immovable point?); quantum mechanics tells us that reality might, in reality, be very different from the way that it seems to us.  Astrophysics tells us that we are even further from the center of the universe than Copernicus might have imagined-indeed, it tells us that the universe is a bounded shape that has no center.  The mind rebels at it all, and philosophy, as always, thrives-a brightly colored fungus feeding on the decay of our parochialism.  The philosopher might be the jester, but the philosopher is also the steady hand in the earthquake of ideas; the candle held up to the menacing shape of science; the voice that says “Now see!  There’s no reason to cower after all-what seemed to be the Specter of Insanity approaching is just so much shadow and nerves.  Stand tall and let’s make sense of this!”

“Together, we can make sense of this.”

Moreover, we can make sense of this without compromise-without backing away from the brilliant light that science has shed for us.  Plato’s prisoner, first emerging from the cave of his ignorance, found that the light of the sun-the light of knowledge-hurt and burned his eyes.  He wanted to flee back into the comfort and the dark, back into the easy, cool shadows of superstition and ancient wisdom.  As he resisted this fear, though, he found that he could, by degrees, see the world around him more and more clearly; he could see that the shadows in the cave, which had seemed full of life, power, and usefulness before, were now unmasked as nothing but pale reflections of the harsh, stunning, and beautiful reality above.  We too must resist the temptation to flee; we must resist the temptation to turn away from the light of reason and run back to the comfort of supernaturalism, because as soothing as it is, as real as it seems from this perspective within the cave, as much as we think we can’t live without it, the view from Inside is a lie.  It has been, historically speaking, a rather good and helpful lie-we wouldn’t be where we are as a species without it-but the time has come to cast it aside and step into the light of the natural world with eyes open and shoulders squared.  The time has come to face reality on its own terms.

And that, at last, is what brings me to you-what brings philosophy to you.  The journey is bound to be full of discomfort-we’ll have more than our share of mental blisters before the climb is done-but the vista at the top is, I think, worth it.  The view from above the clouds is beautiful, and it is beautiful in spite of (or perhaps because of?) the fact that we find no golden throne, no heavenly host, no trumpeted clarion calls to greet us as we break through into the light-above the clouds, there is only sky and sky and sky.  I do not claim to be your guide on this climb-even I, admittedly no paragon of self-deprecation, have enough humility to demure in the face of that title-but rather just hope to accompany you, pointing out some of the major landmarks along the way, and having some of the same pointed out to me.  I might help you avoid a few missteps and precarious drops, but only in virtue of my training as a mountaineer on smaller climbs-I suspect (and hope) you’ll pull me back from more than a few sheer drops as well.  Let’s make the climb together, and explore what it means to see the world from atop Natural Peak.  I look forward to the ascent, and I’ll see you on the trail.