Tue 20 Oct, 2009
Bill Maher has just been granted the Richard Dawkins award:
The Richard Dawkins Award will be given every year to honor an outstanding atheist whose contributions raise public awareness of the nontheist life stance; who through writings, media, the arts, film, and/or the stage advocates increased scientific knowledge; who through work or by example teaches acceptance of the nontheist philosophy; and whose public posture mirrors the uncompromising nontheist life stance of Dr. Richard Dawkins.
Readers probably know about Maher’s anti-religious opinions. Not all may know about his views on medical science. You can find out about it over at Orac’s blog. Orac is no great friend of religion, but he doesn’t think too highly of Maher’s advocacy for increased scientific knowledge:
True, it’s only one criteria out of three, but Maher violates it by not just a little. In fact, he flagrantly, joyously violates it–nay, shreds it!–with science-free conspiracy mongering rants against the flu vaccine, big pharma, and a Tweet a few days ago (screenshot above) saying, “If u get a swine flu shot ur an idiot.”
Which is all accurate. It’s a strange choice, to say the least. Is Dawkins really pro-science? Is this good evidence thereof?
There’s some strange stuff going on among skeptics and atheism, strange enough to labeled even by NPR as a “bitter rift.” Things are not all friendly in the no-God camp.
Hat Tips: Catholic and Enjoying It, The Point, and Discovery.org.
Before someone jumps in and says, “You Christians have divisions, too!” let me gently remind you that I know that. This blog post was not intended as proof that atheists are worse than Christians. (Although if you think I meant to say that Maher was a strange, even bizarre choice for a Dawkins award, you would certainly be right about that.)
WHY do you think there is anything wrong with a group having divisions? Why on earth would you expect all atheists to be in agreement on topics aside from atheism? Why would you expect Christians to all agree on anything? They probably never did.
When a group includes 2 or more individuals, as it always does, there will be more than one opinion on almost everything.
So Maher is an atheist, and he also criticizes mainstream medicine — so what? Mainstream medicines deserves some criticism. It is not anti-science to be skeptical about the irresponsible over-use of vaccines and drugs.
I don’t know Maher’s opinions, but I did read some of the atheist blogs complaining about his getting the award.
I heard Obama is not getting the flu shot, despite being in an “at risk” demographic. Maybe he, along with Maher, knows something about the shots that the rest of us don’t.
LG
It’s worth noting that the NPR reporter who put together the “bitter rift” story had set out to do exactly that: play up a minor disagreement on an obscure matter among a few people into a Bitter Rift And A Major Fissure Among Atheists. Utter BS.
I hope that, like the atheists you cite, Christians here are willing to take on their fellow believers openly when they disagree with them. “Closing ranks” is rarely an edifying spectacle. I don’t often see Tom criticizing fellow Christians who go over the top in the comments here, even though they do so more than non-believers. (Yeah, Houlo, I’m looking at you.)
And where did this amazing “Is Dawkins really pro-science?” notion come from? That’s just weird, Tom.
The response to Dawkins that many atheists are cheering is this open letter by Shermer. And guess what – it’s published on the Richard Dawkins web site….
realpc:
If you knew Maher’s opinions you would know that his criticism of mainstream medicine really is anti-science.
“If you knew Maher’s opinions you would know that his criticism of mainstream medicine really is anti-science.”
It might be, I don’t know. But anyone who criticizes mainstream medicine in any way is usually called “anti-science” these days. Mainstream medicine deserves some criticism. Not that it ’s all bad, just that some of it is bad. We should not be called anti-science every time we disagree with the mainstream consensus.
Geoff, Dawkins often posts articles on his website he does not agree with. It’s kind of like infidels.org in that sense.
This is not the first time I’ve had reason to wonder whether he is really pro-science. His anti-God agenda seems often to outweigh his pro-science principles.
And why are atheism and science associated in the first place? Atheists are claiming that atheism has somehow been verified by science, when it has not. Atheists have been calling non-atheists unscientific for decades, even centuries, but their accusations are illogical.
Just because science discovered an explanation for thunder, for example, and decided thunder is not caused by angry gods, they leaped to the further conclusions that science has solved, or can solve, or will solve someday, all mysteries.
And furthermore,llateran that all mysteries will be solved within a mechanistic, reductionist framework
“Well you see, Norm, it’s like this… A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the herd is hunted, it is the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first. This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members. In much the same way, the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells. Now, as we know, excessive intake of alcohol kills brain cells. But naturally, it attacks the slowest and weakest brain cells first. In this way, regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells, making the brain a faster and more efficient machine. And that, Norm, is why you always feel smarter after a few beers.”
http://www.uncommondescent.com/humor/neural-darwinism-made-simple/
One wonders why new atheists almost always espouse that they are a more rational bunch; its like “reason” (notice the quotes please) becomes a symbolic token to find who’s in and who’s out, kinda like that ol’ wafer & wine thing.
I’m confused: isn’t the criteria paragraph one criteria and not many separate ones, given that they used “;” and not “or”. My reading is that the winner must have contributed to all of those areas with their book, movie, OR whatever.
“One wonders why new atheists almost always espouse that they are a more rational bunch”
There whole point is that religion is irrational and unscientific, and that’s why they prefer atheism, because they see it as rational. But it all hinges on the Darwinian hypothesis about the cause of evolution, which is a hypothesis without evidence. Atheism is NOT more rational than theism. In fact, the basis of atheism is irrational and unscientific.
The evolution debate is essentially confused. People are equating evolution theory with Darwinian evolution theory, and they are equating ID with creationism. The ID researchers are correct — Darwin’s theory fails to explain the origin of species (not to mention the origin of life).
As long as this confusion continues, the New Atheists will continue their raving.
One clarification: the Richard Dawkins Award is not given by Richard Dawkins or the Richard Dawkins Foundation: it is an award by Atheist Alliance International, named after Richard Dawkins.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/07/put_maher_in_the_hot_seat.php
Thanks for the clarification, woodchuck64. I have some questions, though.
Maher is anti-science in many significant ways. Dawkins says he’s pro-science, and the award is for advancing the purposes of science. Maher is manifestly unqualified with respect to one major aspect of Dawkins’s life message and of the purpose of the award.
What if the award had been given to someone who fit every aspect of Dawkins’s life message, and every qualification of the award, except for being a religious believer? I think Dawkins would have objected to his name being attached to that, don’t you?
But has he objected to Maher being given this award? Has he objected to his own very prominent name being used in this way? If not, then his silence is almost as eloquent as if he had given the award himself.
If not, then his silence is almost as eloquent as if he had given the award himself.
Does the expression “straining at a gnat” mean anything to you? Your attempts to read some significance into this trivial issue are vaguely amusing, but they say more about you than about Dawkins.
If you seriously doubt Dawkins’ commitment to science, I recommend that you read The Extended Phenotype, which is the highly technical, closely argued followup to The Selfish Gene. Or perhaps <a href="The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing, which he edited. I think you’ll find his actual words more eloquent than your bizarre interpretations of his silence.
(By the way, the comment preview feature is behaving strangely.)
I don’t doubt Dawkins’s general commitment to science for a moment. I question his consistency in applying it. I have pointed to two instances (in the OP and in comment 8 ) where he has let his atheism lead him to very unscientific positions. I think this says a lot about Mr. Dawkins.
The preview feature is working fine for me, using Safari or Firefox on Macintosh. Can you give me more details on what’s not working right for you, please?
On the preview feature: in my previous comment, I entered three book titles, each with its URL. Comment preview failed to display the text “The Extended Phenotype, which is the highly technical, closely argued followup to”. However it appeared OK in the final comment. Also, one of the angle-brackets in the final book reference got transformed into its meta-form, which results in the ugly unvarnished HTML fragment.
Your attempts to read some significance into this trivial issue are vaguely amusing, but they say more about you than about Dawkins.
It wouldn’t be particularly difficult to argue that your (somewhat desperate, in my view) attempts to downplay the significance of this particular issue and the differences within your particular in-group say a good deal more about you than they do about our host.
If you seriously doubt Dawkins’ commitment to science, I recommend that you read The Extended Phenotype, which is the highly technical, closely argued followup to The Selfish Gene. Or perhaps “The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing”, which he edited. I think you’ll find his actual words more eloquent than your bizarre interpretations of his silence.
The latest revised edition, at least according to what I’ve been able to find, was published in 1999. I hope this doesn’t come as a surprise to you, but people can change quite a bit in the span of 10 years. The much more recent collection you mention is something he edited, unless I am mistaken, not something he wrote entirely himself. One could make the argument, if one were so inclined, that the contributors to Dawkins’ collection were probably more devoted to science than he himself is, at least at this point (I wouldn’t know, I’ve read some of The Selfish Gene and liked it, but not the Oxford book).
I, personally, am not really certain how deep Dawkins’ “commitment to science” runs, I simply think you’ve made a fairly sub-par defense of it.
And in my own defense, looking over the comments here I believe I’m the only one aside from Mr. Gilson to have responded directly to Mr. Arnold’s comments (I am new here, so I apologize if either of you should be ‘Dr.’ rather than ‘Mr.’), so I do hope I won’t be accused of “piling on” the latter. If you wish to do so, however, feel free–I’m merely a humble Internet Commentator and in no position of authority, over you or anyone else. Our host is the one who will determine whether or not I’m being unduly rude or if folks ’round here are being unfair to you or whatever.
See here:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/10/aai_evening_award_ceremony.php
Quoting PZ Myers:
The good news for all the critics of this choice is that Dawkins pulled no punches. In his introduction, he praised Religulous and thanked Maher for his contributions to freethought, but he also very clearly and unambiguously stated that some of his beliefs about medicine were simply crazy. He did a good job of walking a difficult tightrope; he made it clear that the award was granted for some specific worthy matters, his humorous approach to religion, while carefully dissociating the AAI from any endorsement of crackpot medicine. It won’t be enough, I know, but the effort was made, and talking to Dawkins afterwards there was no question but that Maher’s quackery was highly objectionable. I also got the impression that he felt the critics of the award were making good and reasonable points, and that he felt the awkwardness of the decision.
Thanks for that update, woodchuck64. I’ll certainly credit Richard Dawkins for his ” clearly and unambiguously stat[ing] that some of [Maher's] beliefs about medicine were simply crazy,” and take back what I said earlier about his not repudiating the award being given to Maher in his name. It probably wasn’t Dawkins’s fault, and I’m sure it was awkward for him.
But I still think this was and is unscientific, and it still leaves me unsure Dawkins’s commitment to science outweighs his commitment to opposing God.
Great link, Tom. And I’m enjoying this conversation all around: the contributions are civil and substantial.
Just one little point I’d like to add: a more insidious way of detracting or harming something is exaggerating it or making it out to be more than it is. Dawkins may not realize it, but by pushing science beyond its legitimate bounds, he’s actually ANTI-science.
LG
Thank you for the link as well, woodchuck64. As I implied above, I’m not a great fan of Dawkins, but I don’t really have that much of an axe to grind against him in particular either. At least in this case it seems like he can’t be faulted for much.
I even feel somewhat bad for him. Being a public personality, I’d wager that as much as his foes try to humiliate him, his well-meaning fans who keep trying to attach his name to everything, like with this award to Mr. Maher, can be even more embarassing. With friends like those, who needs enemies, eh? :/
i prefer not judge anybody, everything about religious is come back to us. not even maher, dawkin, obama or maybe Bin Laden.
Best thing to do is save our earth and human race from anybody who not responsible about what they do.