Richard Dawkins & John Mackay

[O'nus]

I am not too familiar with John Mackay, but I can tell that he is a rather intelligent person. It is people like this that seem to scream to me, "I want to give up my faith, but I have so much of my life already invested into it to give it up!". Either way, I would like to focus on the key arguments. Present/past Mackay relies, almost entirely, on the idea that present is the only proof we have. We cannot know the past because we do not live in the past. He says that, only if we can replicate conditions in our actual tangible time can we know for certain those conclusions that we come up with (ie. measuring distance between cities). However, there are two major flaws here (significantly major). 1) When do we draw the line for measuring the present compared to the past? If we are going to be literal, then each moment is new and can never know the past. We cannot know for certain what we ate for breakfast if we took this argument literally. But we are not going to say that, are we? It is ridiculous to think such a thing. Thus, we must be able to replicate conditions that lead to postulated conclusions in our lifetime. However, these conditions must be precisely the same as those that are given to the conclusions of the other. This leads to 2 2) Mackay contradicts himself. He at first says that everything in our present moment that is proven is based on the faith position that we can prove the past via the present. However, we do not take the position that we cannot know for certain what we ate for breakfast or where we live. He also says that he can prove things as long as he can replicate the conditions (ie. measuring distances, geology, etc.). But, the most major problem with this is that that is science! All of science contradicts his religious ideals and does not provide a single shred in favour of his God. Furthermore, a better position would have been to say the uniformity argument; these truths are right if our natural conditions have always been the same (ie. laws of chemistry have always been the same). This is a very weak argument, but the better one. The reason it is weak is because we can apply it to everything. Imagine if we used this argument in a murder trial; you cannot know that X killed Y because the laws of your proof may have changed over time. In this case, all of the justice system and everything we know is in complete chaos and throw into disarray as we can never know anything for certain. Pyrrhic skepticism is a big bag of tautological failure. It is an unfalsifiable premise and anything that is unfalsifiable is just as reasonable as the flying spaghetti monster. It is when you mix in truths that make it seem appealing and factual. Atheism as religion Now this comes up a lot in general. The crux of the argument is that Atheism is based on a faith that God is not real. I believe I have already covered above how this is not the fact. Furthermore, people's ubiquitous ignorance to this is astonishing; Atheists are still open to the idea that God could be real. The majority of Atheists do not take the positions of arbitrarily deciding that "God is not real=true". It is contradictory to why we came to the conclusion in the first place; there yet to exists any justifiable reason to know that God is real. Dinosaurs and humans At the beginning he acknowledges that fossils are up to millions of years old. He acknowledges the dating techniques used. Then, later on, he says that he finds it reasonable to believe that humans could have existed with dinosaurs. I'm flabbergasted by this. This man first appealed to me as intelligent, especially when he accepted the dating of the fossils.. at first. Then he completely changes his mind when it comes to including God. It is as though, when God is involved, all science's truth is ignored; the truth that he initially accepted. Fact; humans and dinosaurs did not exist together. If anyone wants to dispute that, even I myself have resources (that I have already posted on this forum) to prove that. Teaching kids how to think This is what really pisses me off now. Firstly, he comes across as a reliable intelligent man. He even mislead me. I thought I could really learn something from him by watching this and I seriously did my best to suspend my affinity for Dawkins. Truth be told, I at first thought Dawkins was being pretentious. However, I noticed that Dawkins was actually being more insightful that I and saw through Mackay's contradictory and malicious intent. He asserts that we ought to teach children how to think and asks for the zounds of people to support his cause with money. Let that reside in your mind while I elaborate my next point; Ought we teach children how to think autonomously? Ought we teach children how to question, inquire, learn, and adapt to new forms of information? If we indoctrinate a child into a presumptuous belief (ie. God exists without reason) then that child will be very susceptible to becoming attached to a community. In that community, if she ever suspends his beliefs in God and exercises critical thinking, she risks being ostracized. In addition, the best way to reinforce these presumptuous beliefs is with effervescent encouragement; the more people that believe what you believe will make you more passionate about it. Thus, donate money and support cause to your already existing belief system without any justification. This interview really irritated me as I as deceived, by an obviously intelligent person, into thinking that I could learn something enlightening from Creationists. What do you think...? ~

[SomeDreamer]

Well you got the key arguments pretty much covered And I agree in those. It really do seem as if he's extremely desperate to hold on to his faith in god, because he SHOULD realise that as soon as he starts to take god into the picture, even his own scientific knowledge contradicts his belief in god, at which point he tries to mix the two and everything starts to sound extremely silly, Dawkins also clearly recognizes this I also tried to check out some of the info on evidenceweb.net which he mentioned, and he did cover his full creationist view extremely well, because that website spew all the classical BS out. He has absolutely no new take on the whole idea behind the creation theory, but he's very good at covering that. In the introduction they make a huge flaw: No human beings were there to watch the earth being formed. No man or woman observed the first plant grow out of the soil, Nobody saw the first creature crawling along the ground except for the Holy One who created! Our Earth was created by God. Needless to say I stopped reading after the last line. How did they magically came by this conclusion? .__. We know this because God the Creator has told us what has happened in the ancient book of Genesis, the first book in the Bible. Genesis also tells us , the sky, the sea, and dry land were made by Him. It's like they try to cover all the ordinary nonsense in some sort of new form.

[grasshoppa]

I am not too familiar with John Mackay, but I can tell that he is a rather intelligent person. It is people like this that seem to scream to me, "I want to give up my faith, but I have so much of my life already invested into it to give it up!". This is exactly what's going on. Reminds me of a few people around here too.

[Luanne]

I fully agree with the original post. Mackay as well as other creationists are placing their analytical and rational reasoning on a theater stage, allowing them to act under the direction of ego. And by ego, I mean a formed identity belief. Present/past The reason it is weak is because we can apply it to everything. Imagine if we used this argument in a murder trial; you cannot know that X killed Y because the laws of your proof may have changed over time. This is a great point! I wish Dawkins asked him that, instead of "why don't you believe the world is flat". But Mackay seems friendly and nice, and that is enough for me to be able to see from his point of view. I am grateful I can do that, cause it allows me to look at my self. It always brings me back to, what I mentioned in my second paragraph, a question of a formed identity belief, and reminds me instantly - we all have it! Then how can I tell I'm not led by it? From that point on, I reconsider my beliefs. Is it something someone said to me? Or do I honestly see the logic in it? It's a tricky tricky subject. We can prove something to be logical, but how can we prove logic to be logical? What opinion would one person form if they had no memory whatsoever, no experiences, no identity? Just an ability to learn from that moment on... Now those are the questions Mackay had asked that I found interesting. But the fact that he provides the most contradictory answers...that's where his ego kicks in. So, what's the difference then, between an atheist and a creationist? Why is atheism not a religion? An atheist keeps an open mind and leaves the cosmological questions open, while the creationist answers them and sticks to those answers, as if word means anything beyond our mind. I'll skip the part about dinosaurs. As for the children, Dawkins said it... there is no religious child, like there is no marxist child, or any of parents' accepted ideology. What they are doing is wrong. Life is a game, but every game has its rules. Creationists simply don't play by the logical rules. It's a good interview, but it could be better.

[Black_Eagle]

re⋅li⋅gion   /rɪˈlɪdʒən/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [ri-lij-uhn] Show IPA Use religion in a Sentence See web results for religion See images of religion –noun 1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs. 2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion. 3. the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices: a world council of religions. 4. the life or state of a monk, nun, etc.: to enter religion. 5. the practice of religious beliefs; ritual observance of faith. Atheism does not fit. Atheism is not a belief in anything, it is a lack of belief in all gods. You could turn atheism into a religion...but I say with confidence that this rarely happens, if ever.

[Caprisun]

It's obvious that John Mackay isn't listening to what Richard Dawkins is saying. He is just regurgitating all of his typical lines without even thinking about what he is saying (try counting how many times he says "its not the past, its the present.") Most of Mackay's answers don't match up with the questions he was asked. Creationism is like a virus of the mind that programs it hosts logical brain to shut down whenever their views are challenged. Dawkins even mentions it at one point, it's as if the person knows on a deep subconcious level that they are wrong but for some reason their concious mind resists even contemplating the possibility of being wrong. You can see it in any public debate on the subject. They kind of sit there smiling while the scientists systematically discredit every claim that was made, then when they open their mouths again it is obvious that it all went in one ear and out the other. This is why it is pointless to debate with creationists, it may not even be that they are not intelligent, it could be a legitimate psychological disorder. I think it is very similar to the mindset of a conspiracy theorist. I watched a documentary in a class of mine, I can't remember who made it but I think it was Nat. Geographic or Discovery channel. It was about the 9/11 conspiracies where they took every claim made by the conspiracy theorists and they paid experts a great deal of money to create experiments to test these claims. The conspiracy theorists claims fail beyond doubt in every instance. Then they showed the videos of these experiments to the leaders of the "9/11 Truth" movement or whatever they were called. It was very interesting to see their reactions when they were faced with the prospect of being wrong. They asked for proof and they got it. But still they refused to believe what was so clear in front of them. They made all sorts of excuses. They were desperate to find reasons that these experiments were not legitimate. There was also a good interview with an author who wrote a book about the psychology of conspiracy theories, and he seemed to support this idea of a mind virus. I wish I could remember the name of the documentary.

[acatalephobic]

Warning: regard or disregard this as you please. long-winded value judgements and general dead-ends ahead. i'm sorry. i'm late to this, but even so: i feel as though i was mislead in a way that parallels that of the original post. i felt i was on the same page with this analysis, until the 2nd to last sentence. this interview intrigued me, as many others, because it potentially offered a way for those on either side of the spectrum to find what lies in the middle. the root cause of the supposed dichotomy, and therefore [in my humble opinion] the grain of truth that could be taken away from it. even though i didn't walk away with the definative conclusion i'd hoped for, i felt it gave me some insight into the crux of the whole disagreement. ...i just can't escape the fact that both Dawkins and Mackay speak from a place of extreme personal bias. granted, each rely on their own set of [opposing] criteria...but each remain a direct result of those criteria, and refuse at all costs any points that deviate from said origins. an "atheist" choosing to negate any insight that any "creationist" may offer, lends a certain legitimacy to the idea that a "creationist" could rightfully negate any insight that any "atheist" might offer. does either scenario offer the possibility for progress? i would tend to think no, it only reinforces predetermined claims on either end. again, in my humble opinion, people as one-sided as Dawkins and Mackay will never gain any new insight from one another, and nothing will ever be gained from their interaction...simply because both sides refuse to acknowledge that their original assumptions are beyond critique. it's as if both men are desperately wishing for something new to enter into the debate, and simultaneously preventing such an concept to take shape. ...and if that's the case, i just hope others who saw this interview saw that such a scenario is utterly fruitless.

[Kromoh]

This interview really irritated me as I as deceived, by an obviously intelligent person, into thinking that I could learn something enlightening from Creationists. What do you think...? I think the same. No real point in repeating things you already said.