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Again I'm forcibly reminded of prof. Stavrakopulou, who is speaking out against 'New' atheism, while at the same time complaining about the problems religion causes for a Bible -scholar who happens to be an atheist. She is fighting on the wrong side. I know why - she is fascinated by the bible; it's her life's work. I don't know what the angle is of this fellow.
1. I don't see why it's untenable to both speak out about New Atheism and also complain about religiously induced problems that she personally faces. Two distinct issues.
2. John Gray is/was a career political philosophy professor, as far as I know. 'Professor of European Thought' at the London School of Economics was his last gig before retirement from academia. His angle is basically nihilism; he attacks most everything without advocating much. His book 'Straw Dogs', which as I said is probably the best book I've ever read, concludes with the pleading sentence, 'Isn't it enough just to see?' He is sympathetic to ancient Epicureans and likely Stoics, though I can't think of any favorable mentions of Stoics offhand. He perhaps is guilty of unrealistically holding up such examples from millennia prior as attainable lifestyles in the modern age, or at least of overestimating the instructive value that their examples may hold...but I'm reaching here in an effort to criticize. He's not an enthusiastic advocate of anything, that I've yet seen anyway.
Yes and no...? I mean, do you deny the basic distinction between, say, weak and strong atheism--lack of belief versus active nonbelief? He actually took his title from a 1930s book called 'Seven Types Of Ambiguity', written by an atheist poet he seems to have admired. So it's somewhat of a device, but, yes, it's mostly about the many different kinds of atheists--there in reality being as many kinds of atheism as there are atheists, just as there are as many kinds of Christianity as there are Christians, etc.
I think so. Atheism is just not believing in any god -claim. I only evet came across one "strong" atheist (if that means a "gnostic" atheist, and he dropped that logically untenable position for agnostic -based atheism, within which atheists can give a number on the Dawkins -scale of disbelief. Until they slip over into credence and become an agnostic theist. Probably irreligious and ticking the 'none' box.
It's the same atheism for active or non -active atheists. This (I repeat) is not different kinds of atheism, but different kinds of people, but who happen no to believe in a god-claim. You can have ex -Islamic atheists, but that is not a different kind of atheism. They to can also be activist or (if they want to stay alive) silent.
There can be many kinds of religion, depending on the Dogma. But people believing in the same dogma can still be very different. That doesn't mean that they each have a different kind of Christianity.
Atheism has no Dogma - just that anyone not believing in any god-claim automatically becomes atheist - even if they don't know it and think they are 'agnostic'.
Transhumanism? I already said that he ought to be helping New atheism, not attacking it. De Sade? Good grief I suppose he was atheist but we still seem to be confusing people with the thing.
There can be many kinds of religion, depending on the Dogma. But people believing in the same dogma can still be very different. That doesn't mean that they each have a different kind of Christianity.
Disagree wholeheartedly. They may all agree to the same principles given a preliminary test of faith or what have you, but if you talk to 'Seeming Christian Clone X' and 'Seeming Christian Clone Y' for any length of time, you'll be able to tease out areas of (perhaps implicit) disagreement. It's not at all hard to do that. Every single human on this planet is in some sense a walking, talking metaphysical cult of one person, even if if entirely brainwashed and institutionally affiliated/enslaved to/by external forces/organizations. The same logic applies to atheists, except with secular philosophy replacing theology in terms of key components of a given belief system of one.
1. I don't see why it's untenable to both speak out about New Atheism and also complain about religiously induced problems that she personally faces. Two distinct issues.
It isn't wrong to say what she thinks, but I think she has confused a love of the Bible with an antipathy towards the people who she sees as attacking it - even though her iinterests and theirs are the same.
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2. John Gray is/was a career political philosophy professor, as far as I know. 'Professor of European Thought' at the London School of Economics was his last gig before retirement from academia. His angle is basically nihilism; he attacks most everything without advocating much. His book 'Straw Dogs', which as I said is probably the best book I've ever read, concludes with the pleading sentence, 'Isn't it enough just to see?' He is sympathetic to ancient Epicureans and likely Stoics, though I can't think of any favorable mentions of Stoics offhand. He perhaps is guilty of unrealistically holding up such examples from millennia prior as attainable lifestyles in the modern age, or at least of overestimating the instructive value that their examples may hold...but I'm reaching here in an effort to criticize. He's not an enthusiastic advocate of anything, that I've yet seen anyway.
Ah A chapter on transhumanism may not equate with an espousal of it, any more than an chapter on De Sade makes him a sadist. My error there. There are valid comments perhaps on the possible effects of atheism on people who find a way to live and think without religion. But the lack of god-belief is the same thing. Just that.
I'm not even going to demand that 'Nihilism' requires him to adhere to everything that comes under that definition, or see futility in attacking 'everything'. Everything is open to criticism. And he is entitled to criticise atheism as much as anything else. I'm just saying that he seems to have exhibited some thinking that itself seems open to criticism.
It isn't wrong to say what she thinks, but I think she has confused a love of the Bible with an antipathy towards the people who she sees as attacking it - even though her iinterests and theirs are the same.
Ah A chapter on transhumanism may not equate with an espousal of it, any more than an chapter on De Sade makes him a sadist. My error there. There are valid comments perhaps on the possible effects of atheism on people who find a way to live and think without religion. But the lack of god-belief is the same thing. Just that.
I'm not even going to demand that 'Nihilism' requires him to adhere to everything that comes under that definition, or see futility in attacking 'everything'. Everything is open to criticism. And he is entitled to criticise atheism as much as anything else. I'm just saying that he seems to have exhibited some thinking that itself seems open to criticism.
1. Alright, well, not being at all familiar with her, I obviously can't say anything further. I do wonder, though--she has a 'confused love of the Bible' despite being an atheist? Maybe she should've been an 8th type of atheist included in Gray's book, for that seems rather idiosyncratic. Gray, for what it's worth, would *easily* attack you here for assuming that her interests and the interests of the 'new atheists' are the same--that's kind of the entire premise of the book, to doubt the validity of such weak social alliances that don't even actually exist in reality except as, uh, mental constructs of say my imagined solidarity with you, all the way across the Atlantic and ultimately unknown to me. That is Gray's possibly primary point, to cast doubt on these 'weak ties' which supposedly bind the atheists of today, to use a sociological term.
2. His thinking is definitely open to criticism--he doesn't go sufficiently in-depth on any given person or topic to even try to immunize himself from such. But that I think is the essence of good philosophy. Be engaging, be insightful, don't pretend to have the last word, because no one does.
1. Alright, well, not being at all familiar with her, I obviously can't say anything further. I do wonder, though--she has a 'confused love of the Bible' despite being an atheist? Maybe she should've been an 8th type of atheist included in Gray's book, for that seems rather idiosyncratic. Gray, for what it's worth, would *easily* attack you here for assuming that her interests and the interests of the 'new atheists' are the same--that's kind of the entire premise of the book, to doubt the validity of such weak social alliances that don't even actually exist in reality except as, uh, mental constructs of say my imagined solidarity with you, all the way across the Atlantic and ultimately unknown to me. That is Gray's possibly primary point, to cast doubt on these 'weak ties' which supposedly bind the atheists of today, to use a sociological term.
2. His thinking is definitely open to criticism--he doesn't go sufficiently in-depth on any given person or topic to even try to immunize himself from such. But that I think is the essence of good philosophy. Be engaging, be insightful, don't pretend to have the last word, because no one does.
She is a professor of Bible -study, and doesn't believe it it true. It is her work as well as her passion. I also have a passion for Gospel study, even though I don't believe that, either. I just see it as incomprehensible that while i am writing a thesis on it ( pretending i am, these days, anyway) it should be criticising Dawkins and New atheism and the claim of 'science' to have the better explanation, just because it is a passion and study of mine.
Ok I get the 7 types of Gray, but to direct it at atheism is a failure in thinking. Or at least logic. In a practical way I get it entirely. Atheism looks like the people who are in it, just as the church doesn't look like the basic tenets of Christianity, but the people who are in it. And that's how we judge it.
Prof. Stavrakopoulou ... I keep on about her, as she is where she can tip the right way and be a great help to us -and to herself, or get engrained into an antipathy towards outspoken atheism. And that would be tragic.
I also hope that Mr Gray might consider talking to atheists and being willing to rethink, rather than rushing into print and denouncing us without even asking for our input, for all the world like an atheistic Lee Strobel.
The weak social alliances is of course well understood and part of talking about atheism is to understand ourselves better and think what we are doing, what we are doing wrong and what we should be doing. We KNOW that society is a human construct (and consider the inviolable rule of Democracy - You Must Respect a Vote and how desperately the UK wants another vote to overturn Brexit) and we didn't need Mr. Gray to tell us that.
Increasingly I think that he should have been talking to us, rather than slamming us. But that wouldn't have sold so many books, would it?
I'm a pretty big John Gray fan; I consider his book 'Straw Dogs' to be the greatest book I've ever read. I also enjoyed 'The Immortalization Commission' and the parts of 'Black Mass' and 'The Soul of the Marionette' which I've read (I have 'Black Mass' on PDF and intend to read it in full at some point). He's an erudite and honest writer who is best described as a nihilist, which is entirely in line with my sensibilities. So naturally, his new book caught my eye when I spotted it on Tuesday. This morning, I read the first two sevenths, and...I think it would be a great book for some members of this forum to read, if only because I think it would pretty much anger the lot of you. His first chapter is dedicated to eviscerating New Atheism, which he calls uninteresting and says that he will not mention for the rest of the book upon the conclusion of that chapter. I agree with his criticism of Sam Harris' 'The Moral Landscape' (he never mentioned the book by name, but he was clearly referencing it when he discussed Sam's claim that science alone could determine human ethics); Dennett and Hitchens are spared in this chapter, but he also goes after Dawkins for lack of understanding of 'what religion truly is'--historically more important for the cultural significance of its rituals rather than a set of beliefs to be examined/critiqued as if they were scientific hypotheses or outright claims. I have mixed feelings about this argument, which I've seen others also make; I've always thought 'new atheism' to be too unsympathetic and uncompromising in its religion-bashing, but I also think Gray goes too far here in his emphasis on practice/'faith' over the actual tenets of belief. Good stuff, though, regardless.
The second chapter is a takedown of secular humanism, wherein he goes after Kara Zetterberg's favorite Bertrand Russell (for a few pages, only--one of the things I like about Gray is that he never spends much time on a single topic, which works well with my attention span) and John Stuart Mill (about whom he'd already written an entire book--perhaps that's an exception to the 'never spending much time on a single topic' general rule), among others. His main thesis here is that atheists tend to have faith in the gradual improvement (if not perfectability) of the species and in 'moral progress', a stance he denigrates time and time again. I largely agree with his cynicism here; he'd probably have done well to reference atheist psychologist-rather-than-philosopher Steven Pinker in this section, as I couldn't help but think of Pinker's 'The Better Angels Of Our Nature' several times during this chapter. In the part about Russell, he mentions that Russell's stance on the value of religion (among other things) changed frequently throughout his life, which is perhaps unavoidable over a 98-year lifespan, but Gray's not about to let those changes of opinion go unnoticed.
Anyway, as I said, I'm a big John Gray fan, so I'm biased here, but I'd recommend this book to all here, if only to hear some angry feedback from the posters here whose favorite flavor of atheism is sure to have been critiqued by Gray herein. He states at the outset that he's sympathetic to two of the seven 'types' of atheism that he covers--the last two, and two which I already figure to be of the bleaker variety. I skipped ahead and read the two-page conclusion, and it is one of the finer pieces of writing I've encountered; if I ever actually buy the book as opposed to reading the entire thing over several separate trips to the bookstore, I'll post that essay in its entirety here.
There is only one type of atheist. The type that doesn't believe in the existence of any gods. Beyond that, there are millions of individuals who each have their individual worldviews and opinions. Anyone who suggests otherwise is unclear on the concept.
There is only one type of atheist. The type that doesn't believe in the existence of any gods. Beyond that, there are millions of individuals who each have their individual worldviews and opinions. Anyone who suggests otherwise is unclear on the concept.
Exactly. There is a lot of (understandable) confusion about atheists and atheism, which is why we are here. It is rather a pain that so many people (including, depressingly, many upper -profile atheists themselves) who prefer to shoot their mouths off before checking their facts with atheists who -like myself - have been equally confused and have learned from others.
Ok I get the 7 types of Gray, but to direct it at atheism is a failure in thinking. Or at least logic. In a practical way I get it entirely. Atheism looks like the people who are in it, just as the church doesn't look like the basic tenets of Christianity, but the people who are in it. And that's how we judge it.
I don't think it's a failure in thinking. The single most significant stance that one takes in life is whether or not one is a theist. From there, a lot of other beliefs follow, if not logically, then, yes, from a practical standpoint. If you believe in some specific god, then religion tends to dictate your thinking on a whole host of social issues. If you don't, then there are some other positions that one is likelier to take given that the burden of religiosity does not exist. Gray's overarching point is that many atheists substitute some sort of secular religion for 'traditional' religion--belief in humanity, progress, technology, etc. I think his arguments sometimes lack clarity, and he is at times possibly overly cynical (which, coming from me, says a lot), but he also says a lot of things worth considering. I knew there'd be dismissive posters on this board, but I also know that despite being atheists, many of the people who post here aren't exactly the most open-minded of sorts, so I maintain my position from the original post that any single person here would do well to read the book--especially someone such as yourself who'd be inclined to write 30 posts arguing against the book before having read a single sentence of it. John Gray uber alles, IMO.
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I suppose he was atheist but we still seem to be confusing people with the thing.
pretending i am, these days, anyway) it should be criticising Dawkins and New atheism and the claim of 'science' to have the better explanation, just because it is a passion and study of mine. 
