Has anybody read The God Delusion by Dawkins?

I'm familiar with the problem of evil and the ontological argument for the existence of god, which is ridiculous.

If you claim that god exists but cannot be proven scientifically then you don't belong in a discussion about it. Using science we can pretty much determine that nothing in the universe requires a god and it all appears to have come about quite naturally and if there's no other evidence for a god, why believe in one? Philosophy doesn't enter into the equation.

 

First thing you need to as yourself then is 'what is existence?' And you are aware that the idea that nothing can exist that does not have direct effect on the natural world is a philosophy?

Our scientific reach is extremely limited and we were not even in space 100 years ago. To put total stock in science about the existence of god, when science is literally about analyzing what can be tested and studied is (to be frank) silly. For the record: I'm an Atheist, and I enjoy cosmology very much. I find the universe to be a place of pure wonder in it's cold mechanics, but to say philosophy has no place in a discussion about god, when philosophy is all about asking questions and pondering over subjects like god, and morality, and the way we live our lives is to not understand philosophy.

You can be a Humanist, which is where man is the only known measure for morality in the universe, and a skeptic, but these are both philosophical and not scientific positions.

 

Why bring up morality? Only a fool would use the existence of morality as an argument for the existence of god, because that is an argument that is easily shut down using SCIENCE (the evolution of empathy and what not).

Obviously science doesn't have all the answers and never will. But surely you're familiar with the term "god of the gaps?" Science hasn't answered this question YET, therefore god did it? Then what happens when science does answer the question?

"God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that's getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time goes on." -Neil deGrasse Tyson. People used to believe the sun was god. We know what the sun is now. Eventually, all the things that people still think are god will be as well explained as the sun is.

 

This is also a philosophy.

 

It's science I tell ya

 

Ok never read any of these books, I can expecting a mud fight that the mods had not policed yet. Instead I get a bunch of annoying questions put in my head


A discussion of a controversial atheist writer turns into a science vs philosophy debate. Only on this forum.

Seriously Dawkins is a scientist, why is he being criticized for not being philosophical enough? Do you criticize philosophers for not being scientific enough Lightman?


Also morality in philosophy used to support the existence of god. Yeah that works real great considering most moral/ ethical theories in philosophy do not involve religion.


Why either philosophy or science. They seem to work great together, and there is more then one way to bake a cake.

 

No. It's a philosophy. Again, I don't think you understand what philosophy even is: it's not theology, and it's not 'at war' with science which is the vibe I am getting from your posts, no. Philosophy is about reasoning, and logical arguments. In fact, you wouldn't even have logic without philosophy because a guy named Aristotle came up with the idea of logical deduction which is what the scientific method is based on. To claim that philosophy has no place in a discussion about what is 'real' is a philosophy, but it's a silly, illogical philosophy that ultimately destroys itself because you can't ultimately know what is real without logic.

Essentially what you are saying is 'science > philosophy'. Which doesn't even make sense because they support each other. And you can't have one without the other anyway.

This is very true. Many of the great philosophers of the past 300 years (Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Russel, Hume, Locke) where actively against religious ideals and values, and their work on morality stems from the idea that we live in a godless universe.

 

What "formal, academic philosophy" did I use in my reasons against the existence of god? Did you even read the post I was replying to? I just assumed we were talking about the same thing but apparently we aren't. Yeah yeah yeah, all that stuff you mentioned is philosophy, and it's also not what we were discussing. I was replying to a guy that thinks because Dawkins can't quote Hume he doesn't know what he's talking about. You don't have to have read Hume or any other philosopher or theologian's writings to make the arguments that Dawkins makes. They're irrelevant.

Now do you understand what I mean?

 

Well. No, because you wrote:

Now you are right, anyone can make the arguments Dawkins made in his book. This doesn't make Dawkins a philosopher, and nor does it make any philosophical argument any less valid just because the arguments were made by a biologist. When you write a book discussing the existence of god you are making a philosophical argument. The thing Lightman was clearly addressing, and quite rightly, is that Dawkins is not good at philosophy.

 

Sorry, isn’t Dawkins a scientist writing a book about addressing god as a scientific problem?

So why do we care about this moot point. We can lesson to any college grad that sat/ slept trough their required gen ed philosophy class make tones of philosophical arguments against god. From what I can gather this was outside of the interest and specialties of Dawkins, and is a red hearing a member trough out who had nothing else to add to the conversation.

 

Apparently, making scientific arguments is actually philosophy. In which case, why didn't the guy just say "Richard Dawkins is inept at making scientific arguments?"

Because that's not what he meant. He meant stuff like the ontological argument, which really stretches credibility and is irrelevant to the arguments Dawkins brings up which are based on the facts of the observable universe.

 

I'm shutting this down. This isn't a book discussion, it's a theology/philosophy debate