It seems to be deflate-Richard-Dawkins week here at Random Obserations. In this series of articles, my point is not to prove Richard Dawkins wrong in his conclusions, but simply to show he's deeply irrational.

Today's argument is a rather remarkable one in which Richard Dawkins implies that the proof of God's non-existance is basicly that he himself, an atheist, exists. Doesn't sound like a very "bright" move, does it?

[Stephen Jay] Gould claimed that science and true religion never come into conflict because they exist in completely separate dimensions of discourse.... This sounds terrific, right up until you give it a moment's thought. You then realize that the presence of a creative deity in the universe is clearly a scientific hypothesis. Indeed, it is hard to imagine a more momentous hypothesis in all of science. A universe with a god would be a completely different kind of universe from one without, and it would be a scientific difference. God could clinch the matter in his favour at any moment by staging a spectacular demonstration of his powers, one that would satisfy the exacting standards of science.

Again, I want you to read this not with an eye toward proving he's right or wrong about God -- that's not my point here -- but in a way that checks for correct logic and methods of argumentation. How many errors can you spot?

I can see two already, and they're rather huge ones.

The first is that Dawkins talks about "the presence of a creative deity in the universe". That's not even wrong -- it's completely incoherant, on the level of a man raving about shapeless objects.

Dawkins knows full well that the theistic definition of God, the "creative deity" is the Creator, the one who created the universe. As such, "his" point of origin and residence would be outside, not inside the created universe. Yet Dawkins demands we only discuss a creator who resides "in" the universe.

Since the starting assumptions themselves are incoherant (defining the creator as existing inside a created object), he'll be able to "prove" anything he likes from them.

Also, this a bit like trying to find the shoemaker by prying apart his shoes. We might find evidence for what's he's done, but we wouldn't expect his body to be in there.

And he does this yet again, later in the article:

Intelligent, creative, complex, statistically improbable things come late into the universe, as the product of evolution or some other process of gradual escalation from simple beginnings. They come late into the universe and therefore cannot be responsible for designing it.

All this would be fine if theists were, in fact, arguing that God was a product of the universe, a material "thing" as Dawkins states here. Then we would indeed place "God" late in the development of things. But I find it telling that Dawkins continually needs to misrepresent the arguments of his opponents. Perhaps he has no ammo otherwise?

So there's two instances of the straw man fallacy: Dawkins is saying something, but it has nothing to do with the debate at hand. He's refuting points nobody has made. We also see circular reasoning: he smuggles the contradiction, which he uses to prove the result non-sensical, into the very assumptions he starts with.

Such tactics may make him feel good, and play well with the "true believers" in the room (undoubtedly the true point), but it rather reveals the sloppy "reasoning" he employs. He is utterly careless about getting the argument right. It's more important, apparently, that he feel he has "won", even if against a straw man.

Dawkins is a sloppy polemicist, not a rigorous scientist.

So what's the next major problem? There's a hint of it in this sentence:

A universe with a god would be a completely different kind of universe from one without, and it would be a scientific difference.

I'm not going to reveal it to you yet (unless you check the title of this blog entry), but notice, for the moment, that Dawkins is talking about the nature of the universe.

Let's continue:

God could clinch the matter in his favour at any moment by staging a spectacular demonstration of his powers, one that would satisfy the exacting standards of science.

First, let's ask, in all seriousness, what kind of demonstration God would have to perform to convince a devoted skeptic like Richard Dawkins.

It wouldn't be sufficient for God appear to a scientist. Or even to many scientists, to make it reproducable. They might simply dismiss it as an illusion, or worse, convert. If they did the later, Dawkins would dismiss their experiences out of hand, saying they are "religious" -- as he does with the 40% or so of scientists who hold some kind of religious belief.

It certainly wouldn't be sufficient to do a "miracle" or seven, for that would be, by its nature, a violation of law, and thus irreproducible. Indeed, I know of many cases where people have been documented of having been healed of diseases and conditions (a huge lump of breast cancer which completely disappeared, for example -- yes, X-rays were taken before and after, I know the case firsthand) but atheists like Dawkins simply dismiss such things as "remissions".

So that won't do.

And if God did a miracle consistently, it would then be a "law" -- a reliably repeatable event, like the production of particles and antiparticles ex nihlo -- and Dawkins would have dismissed it already as carrying no evidence of God's involvement, as he has with every other law of nature.

So that won't do either.

So what about a huge, showy display of power before a large group of people? What if God took one group of people (say, just for example, the Jews), and demonstrated his powers in unmistakable, macroscopic ways (say, at mount Ararat)? Let's also say they recorded the event (say, in the Torah) by standards which were entirely reasonable (or even exemplary) for their day.

Dawkins would certainly believe then, no?

No. He'd dismiss it as a mere myth. It happened a while ago, in another place, and was witnessed by people whose ignorance is clearly demonstrated by the fact they "have religion." ;-)

So God would probably have to do it over and over again, in each generation, in front of each major people-group. And if Dawkins missed out, God would have to stage a show for him personally. In short, the only kind of God Dawkins is willing to believe in, by the criteria he grants, is the kind who would prevent people like himself from disbelieving.

And Dawkins, as an atheist, exists, so God most surely does not.

As Dawkin said, the nature of that universe would be entirely different: God would put on a show every time someone expressed disbelief, and beg them, or force them, to believe.

Yes, boys and girls, that's what passes for "logic" in this man's world.

Dawkins is well aware there are different possible conceptions of God. He uses that idea, fallaciously, elsewhere (see here) and also references the idea later in this article.

Yet suddenly, Dawkins "reasons" (contradicting his own statements), if God exists at all, there must be exactly and only one kind of God. Not the God of the deists, who created the universe but doesn't violate its laws with miracles. Not even the Father of Jesus, who wouldn't perform on cue for sceptics like Herod. No, the only possible conception of God, at the moment, suddenly becomes the one who will make doubt impossible for a sceptic like Dawkins.

And if that God doesn't exist, then, apparently, no God can.

Riiiight.

How we make that last leap is not in evidence: Dawkins is hardly a careful thinker.

It's funny that he inveighs against thought-lite preachers like Haggard, since that's pretty much the same thing he's doing here. Sounds good on the surface, if you're a True Believer, but if you take it apart, you'll find there's nothing inside: it didn't really work, it just sounded good.

Again, I'm not here to disprove Dawkins' core beliefs. My point is simply to demonstrate that Dawkins clearly has a very tenuous relationship with logic, which is undoubtedly the result of his fervor in this area. He will contradict even his own positions in order to "win" a point against his opponents.

One minute, he claims there are all kinds of possible conceptions of God. The next minute, Dawkins assumes if God exists, there must be only one kind of God, and one kind of universe -- the kind that of prevents his own disbelief! Since he exists, he doesn't live in that universe, and thus that kind of God doesn't exist. And nor, presumably, does any other.

That's the problem with logical fallacies: they make you feel like you're "winning", when you haven't even entered the game.

But such antics can sure be amusing to viewers in the stands. :-)