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How We Believe

W. H. Freeman & Co., New York, 2000

A review of Michael Shermer's How We Believe, The Search for God in an Age of Science.

2003-01-04



High Expectations


One can be forgiven for having high expectations of Michael Shermer, publisher of the excellent Skeptic magazine and author of Why People Believe Weird Things [1]. But instead of How We Believe, this more recent offering should more properly be entitled How Michael Shermer Believes Its Cool for You to Believe Wierd Things.

How We Believe is a disjointed compendium of various topics, many taken from previous articles in Skeptic. Much of the material is useful and interesting for the reader who has not already seen it in the magazine. The number of editing errors suggests that the book was perhaps rushed into print. It is debatable whether Shermer succeeds in delivering the explanation promised in the title.



Shermer, Closet Atheist


Shermer gives us a brief summary of the most popular arguments for the existence of god, and shows how each is flawed. He himself would appear to be a closet atheist. He calls his position "nontheism" which on close examination is essentially identical to negative atheism, i.e. absence of belief in god.

Yet Shermer bends over backwards to be very, very, nice to religious believers and practitioners. He lauds, for example, the "moral courage and nobility of spirit" of believers, in a paternalistic nod to black American churches. But he is not too shy about misrepresenting science (just what does he mean by statements such as "science is a type of myth" or "deep and sacred science"?) and belittling atheists and humanists (dimissing them as fanatical, or unrealistic, or overly obsessed by clarity and logic). He tells us over and over and over that "God" is certainly not dead, as if equating widespread belief in god with confirmation of his/her/its reality. He implies that that widespread belief will always be with us, and that's cool.

Are we living in an "Age of Science" as the title of this book tells us? Or are we living in an age of ignorance? Future generations looking back at us may conclude the latter. It is still socially unacceptable to show disrespect for belief systems -- religions -- which every reasonably well informed person recognizes as patently absurd unless interpreted and stretched in the most metaphorical and symbolic ways possible. Traditional irrational beliefs still burden human societies like huge dead weights, and we are a long way from the day when we will be rid of these vestiges of the past. It will take us even longer if people like Shermer, who should know better, keep telling us that the task is impossible.

Predisposition is not destiny. The fact that testosterone enhances aggressiveness does not imply that men in general are predestined to be killers and rapists. Similarly, the observation that we humans have a propensity for inventing various demons and angels in our struggle to explain the mysterious world around us does not mean that we are condemned to do so inevitably. Yet when Shermer explains how our pattern-matching habits lead us to beliefs about gods and goddesses and spirits and the like ("Type 1 Errors, Believing a falsehood" as he calls them), he fails to take the obvious next step: to suggest that maybe, just maybe, we could get over it. That perhaps we could learn to refine our pattern-matching abilities so as to make fewer such errors, to accept fewer irrational belief systems, to stop inventing gods and ghosts and goblins.



Separate Domains?


The great flaw in Shermer's worldview is the specious way in which he separates science and religion in order to let the latter off the hook. He considers three possible approaches to the science-religion debate:

  1. the conflicting-worlds model, according to which science and religion are seen as belonging to the same domain, but in conflict;
  2. the same-worlds model, which says they are "two ways of examining the same reality," that is, sharing the same domain but not in conflict; and
  3. the separate-worlds model, according to which science and religion are relegated to distinct separate domains, thus avoiding conflict.

Shermer vigorously argues for the third model, which is simply S. J. Gould's NOMA (non-overlapping magisteria) [2] (although Shermer never uses the expression in this book). Thus Shermer and Gould ignore the centuries-long conflict during which religious obscurantism has attempted to stop the progress of reason. When religious institutions sensed that they might be losing the battle, the more cunning among them strategically opted for increasingly metaphorical interpretations of religious beliefs in order to obscure the irrationality of those beliefs. Less intelligent (and more forthright) religionists -- creationists being a conspicuous example -- did not make that step.

Science and religion are indeed part of the same domain because there is only one "domain." Religion is a form of "science" in the general sense of the word. To be more precise, each religion is a cosmology, a theory of the universe. Such religious theories are invariably false; thus we are dealing with pseudo-sciences.

Just as the Shermer/Gould/NOMA worldview errs in placing religion in a distinct realm, it also errs in reifying science, circumscribing it and placing it off to the side in its own special sphere. Even to use the word "science" is dangerous because it opens the door to the erroneous assumption that there could be something "outside" or "beyond" it. To acquire knowledge of the world in which we live, we have no alternative. "Science" is the study of anything and everything. If a religion has any validity, then it is (at least partially) valid science. If not, then it is bad science, that is, a pseudo-science. By the same token, there is no such thing as "supernatural." If there exist "supernatural" phenomena, then they are by definition part of nature, part of reality, to be studied "scientifically." If ghosts or gods or spirits exist, then they are "natural."



The New Creationism


Shermer uses the term "new creationism" to refer to current creationism, that movement which recently made the state of Kansas [3] the laughing stock of the planet. But what is "new" about it? Isn't it just the same old creationism, like that which prosecuted Scopes in the famous trial in the 1920's? The expression "new creationism" would be much more appropriately applied to one or both of the following hypotheses:

Both of these hypotheses, like classic creationism, are based on the conceit that human beings are specially ordained by god, that we humans remain the centre of the universe. These hypotheses are the new anti-galileism as well as the new creationism.

Shermer's attitude is reminiscent of that of Confucius in Gore Vidal's historical novel Creation [4]. The novel's main character travels to Cathay (ancient China) and witnesses a conversation in which the venerable philosopher is asked his opinion of the practice of burying an entire household of living servants with the corpse of their master (hence the intensity of mourning on the event of the master's death!). An embarrassed Confucius, extremely reluctant to say anything that might possibly be construed as disrespectful of traditional practices, haltingly suggests that it might be adequate to inter statues symbolising the members of the household rather than the persons themselves. Shermer, like Vidal's Confucius, knows that many traditions are absurd, but is afraid to say so frankly.



Conclusion


Why does Shermer adopt such an uncritical attitude towards religiosity? Is it a strategic decision, appearing to be sympathetic in the hope that his non-theistic arguments will sneak more easily into the mind of the religious reader? Is it because he still has one foot stuck in his Christian past? Does he in fact lack respect for the very people he tries so hard not to offend, talking down to them as if they were intellectual weaklings who, he fears, cannot face what he himself sees as self-evident? Who knows?

Nevertheless, Shermer does have some important things to say. In the book's last, and best, chapter, Shermer discusses the interplay of chaos and order -- or contingency and necessity as he refers to them -- in evolution, in the flow of history and in the unfolding of an individual's life. In the course of this discussion he responds to those who claim that their religious beliefs are necessary to give meaning to their lives. Shermer writes convincingly, almost eloquently:

I am often asked by believers why I abandoned Christianity and how I found meaning in the apparently meaningless universe presented by science. The implication is that the scientific worldview is an existentially depressing one. Without God, I am bluntly told, what's the point? If this is all there is, there is no use. To the contrary. For me, quite the opposite is true. The conjuncture of losing my religion, finding science, and discovering glorious contingency was remarkably empowering and liberating. It gave me a sense of joy and freedom. Freedom to think for myself. Freedom to take responsibility for my own actions. Freedom to construct my own meanings and my own destinies. With the knowledge that this may be all there is, and that I can trigger my own cascading changes, I was free to live life to its fullest.

Review by David Rand



References


  1. . Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things.
  2. . Stephen Jay Gould, "Non-Overlapping Magisteria,"Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 23 #4, July/August 1999.
  3. . Giving in to pressure from creationists, the Kansas State Board of Education decided in 1999 to eliminate almost all mention of evolution and modern cosmology from their curricula. Fortunately this decision was eventually reversed, but the Christian creationist movement remains strong and dangerous in the United States, and has certainly not given up.
  4. . Gore Vidal, Creation, Random House, New York, 1981.


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