Mr. Phillip Ball is the victim of a fundamental misunderstanding. I believe that this project aims to bring forward positive and reality-based knowledge and philosophies to fundamental questions.

It is not aimed at destroying any religion as long as it is compatible with an approach to life and the world that is based in mutually ascertainable reality.

If it isn’t it may not do so well. That cannot be the responsibility of the The Reason Project.

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Of COURSE BioLogos is funded by Templeton. What a vile organization. And good thing Nature got the title of Hitchens’ book right.

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Faith is believing without valid evidence.  When one continues to believe in the face of evidence which falsifies the belief, that is foolish.  Such is the case with those who advocate creationism, or “Intelligent Design”, as it is called today.

For far too long religious beliefs have enjoyed immunity from rational critique.  Many of the “militant” atheists will no longer honor that immunity.

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It is absolutely false that science and religion cannot coexist. It’s alright to talk about valid evidence and ascertainable reality, but if you think it is possible to live your life without accepting anything on faith, I’m afraid it is you who are the victim of a misunderstanding. We can ignore the fact that, regardless of who you are, 99.9% of everything you ‘know’ you’ve basically accepted on the argument from authority, because it’s simply impossible in one human lifespan to verify every piece of information you encounter. Surely, if so motivated, a critical thinker could go and verify any of those beliefs which had been called into question. The endeavor of science itself is based, surprise, on unprovable tenets, such as ‘nature is inherently good and worth studying’. I’m certainly not saying that that statement isn’t true, but it’s not something that can be established through experimentation either.

If the Reason Project actually adheres to its mission statement, then it deserves all the support we can muster. It is critical, however, to avoid confusing religion in general with the sects who have garnered so much media attention and who have declared war on the agnostic/atheist community: American protestant biblical literalists and Islamic extremists, to name two examples. This would probably not be at all obvious to someone living in America (or Turkey it seems), but the majority of people who hold themselves to be in some way religious have no problem with evolution, atheists or critical thinking. Don’t ask me why they have faith, because I’m an atheist myself.

I agree completely that we must eradicate bigotry, religious oppression, and dogmatic, uncritical thinking. What needs to be understood, however, is that none of those behaviors are necessary conditions for a person to have religious faith. Don’t camp all of them together simply because you do not understand them. That, after all, is the trademark of the very kind of thinking we are trying to do away with.

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Wait wait - did he just say it’s OK to believe in nonsense ?
So if my leaders belief in fairies I shouldn’t worry ? Crikey, that is horrendous !
And at least couldn’t he get Christopher Hitchens book title correct, or is that not factual/important enough - a little here a little there who would know ? I can’t belief people can learn such big words and then not get their fundamentals right…

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What a disappointing article, not at all what I would have expected from Nature.  “I’m glad people make it their business to expose bigotry and oppression. If some choose to focus on instances where those things are religiously motivated — well, why not?”  I think it’s difficult not to focus on the instances of bigotry and oppression that are religiously motivated, considering that these surely make up the bulk of the cases of bigotry, oppression and willful ignorance throughout human history and up to the modern day.

Science and religion are completely incompatible.  Their respective ways of thinking are polar opposites of one another.  Science is concerned with rational thought and evidence-based enquiry, while religion is characterised by blind faith and acceptance of dogma with little or no questioning of beliefs.  Science admits it doesn’t know everything, and so works to uncover more truths about the world; religion meanwhile contends to have all the answers and thus happily wallows in ignorance and outdated thinking.

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I subscribe to John Parathyras’ comments above. What a shame, I would not have expected this article coming from Nature. Sad.

Raising kids to truly believe in the ridiculous lies contained in our most popular holy books into their adult life is wrong, psychologically oppressive and stigmatizing, and certainly a form of child abuse. It is time we put a stop to it. The world needs critical masses of people in society actively denouncing this terrible practice, and organizations such as ‘The Reason Project’ or ‘Richard Dawkins’ Foundation for Reason and Science’ are well positioned to help us get there.

Science delivers useful models or reality that are constantly being built, pruned, improved, refined, updated. Science doesn’t claim to know everything, the way religions commonly and condescendingly do. Religions are in fact simply successful or popular cults which have achieved critical mass-delusion, deliver nothing but lies, and result in masses (in the billions) of well-meaning people confused to their bones, wasting their precious lifetime spreading these ridiculous memes around, living, loving, but often also HURTING and HATING others by them, in their battle for minds and real estate. But times are changing, and the Global Brain has realized that this is wrong. Unless we do ourselves in, it is only a matter of time that the world will fully wake up and abandon these unsavory myths for good. In the most modern, educated and enlightened societies,  the trend is clear, so there is reason for hope.

Popular science magazines should do their bit to help and not hurt the valiant efforts of those trying to put an end to “the bullshit”, because “the bullshit” hinders us from growing as an “intelligent species”, and will likely spark more ‘freak actions’ (meaning destructive incidents using modern tech, such as planes being flown into buildings and bombs -or pathogens- being planted in train stations) in a few people which could escalate and be globally catastrophic. Thank you.

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Two points.

One, of course Science and religion are incompatible.  To proceed with scientific endeavour with a preconceived notion of what life is all about taints science.  You never know; science may prove one day that there is a god, but you cannot start with that premise.

The second point is why people constantly label atheists with strident adjectives, e.g. militant.  One can argue quite strongly about politics without such labels being brought into play.  It may be that people think religion deserves some sort of unconditional respect, and anyone who disagrees is militant.  That is not the case, most atheists I know and read or listen to think religion is an individual right, but what we all tend to have in common is the desire for religion to be kept out of education, politics and science.  On that point I will argue strongly and to my death.

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Reason and organised religionism are incompatible. The same books in one century after another are the fundamentally illogical claims that breed the fanatics and extremists. But they are just the obvious oil slick the toxic tanker (organised religionism) that transports these ideas sometimes leaves on the surface. Religionism breeds illogical nonsense into the very mind of the human race from infancy. To tell a children, against all reason, and on pain of suffering that a bit of wafer is transformed magically into a dead man is retarding millions of vulnerable minds every day. Indoctrinating minds at their most impressionable stage of development to see planet Earth as little more than a holding cell and trial run for some wispy post death Valhalla is corrosive. Religionism is not just anti-reason it’s actively anti-human.

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Lyle says that ‘Faith is believing without valid evidence’. Philip Ball says that ‘the United States and Turkey are the two Western countries with the lowest proportion of population who believe in evolution.’ Such sloppy use of language doesn’t help the debate.

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I think sbooder puts it very well. As a scientifically trained person who believes in the scientific method, I can’t possibly believe in some all powerful, all knowing, invisible god.  However, I am most certainly not militant about this fact when it comes to other peoples’ personal beliefs - as long as these beliefs don’t intrude into areas such as education or public policy.  Heck, I’m married to a person who is fairly religious - she knows how I feel, I know how she feels and we get along quite well for the most part!

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I don’t see the author’s point.  Religion IS the problem no matter how you spin it.

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The problem with these discussions is the lack of historical context.  Religions are faith based traditional views.  Historicaly they have been responsible for both good and bad aspects of human nature.  Being part of a religious or cultural community was of benifit to survival.  I have many West African friends who have a very tribal or clanish out look.  If you live in sub saharan Africa you need that community to survive.  To be cast out is a death sentence.  These people have a great love of life and a strong sense of community.  These are aspects that many americans could benefit from.  At the same time, the restrictive thinking and the ability to cast people out raises the spector of many peoples worst elements.

Certainly religions are to a greater or lessor degree responsible for much of human war, hate and violence dispite the fact that it is often contrary to some of the religious tenets they expressed.

If you take a historical perspective, you will see that though Islam is strugglinhg to find a way to exsist in a modern context, 700 years ago it was in practice far more tolerent then contemporanious Christian cultures.

At the center of this dispute is the difference in thought paterns between “believers” and “non believers”.  This difference in thought is a gulf that cannot be crossed.

Seeing traditional veiws, religious or otherwise, as absolute truth is foolish, but to deny that they arose through thousands of years of human experiance, and at some level deserve fair consideration is also foolish.  America has decimated native American culture, and yet what is left shows many concepts of respect for nature and our place in that wider community as esential for our continued survival. 

Finding away the respect and understand traditional views and see there merit (or demerit) in a modern world is important.  But to hold tradional views against all reason is idiocy.

I have read Sam Harris first book and found it very informative.  The nuerolical research in the function of reason and belief is very interesting and will no doubt ultimately shed light on these processes.

I would also point to Joseph Campbell’s discussion of whether myths are true to be most enlightening.  The truth or falsehood of religon and science are in the understanding and meaning in the context and application. 

Certainly there are historical examples of stupid practices brought on by false or incomplete science as well.

In this day and age, the real battle is in separating truth from fiction in all areas of human knowledge.

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FUNNY!

So many frustrated writers who think folks actually read their words and change their minds?!

Until God rocks your world, everyone shuns him.  Only half of us can adequately describe the love for a child… muchless meeting God in our hearts.

If you seek, you will find.  If you lash out at imperfect humans following a perfect God, you miss an eternity of joy. 

Open you heart and He will give you all the proof you need.

Close it, and there’s no debate I can win with you.

Isn’t that true of any issue?

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As a longtime atheist and sober member of AA I deal with religious zeal and bigotry everyday.  I am told often that I have no chance of happiness because I do not believe that God exists. I let the dervishes whirl. As a newcomer to, The Reason Project, I am concerned that Atheists will get as absurd as the religious fanatics themselves. Fundementalist Atheists? Did anyone see the great South Park episode on Atheism? I believe that people made god. I also believe that people should be free to believe or not believe as the choose. I never allow people to tell me what to believe, and I could care less that they think I am going to rot in hell. This site has energiszed me and has me thinking again. Thank you.

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The fundamental disconnect between religion and science is that religion asserts that there are things that we cannot understand or explain; science seeks to expand our knowledge of the universe and does not accept any bounds to our potential knowledge of how things work.  Religion (at least faith-based religion) imposes limits on humanity, while science continually seeks to break through these limits.

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Of course reason and science are compatible.  The treatment of Giordano Bruno and Galileo Galilee should convince any objective observer of that fact.  Those persuaded by reason fill the headlines right along with the religiously motivated, no difference whatsoever.  Why, just today there has been a rash of punctuated equillibrium-motivated suicide bombers whose last words reportedly were “Death to Dawkins and his ilk!”

Hey, the economic downturn has hit everyone; the newspaper and magazine industry having been especially hard hit.  It is sad to see that, in their desperation to recapitalize, a journal with the prestige of Nature is whoring around looking for some of that Tempelton prize money.  Go write and editorialize for a religious newspaper or magazine if you want to espouse religious viewpoints.  Doing so in a venue dedicated to reason and science cheapens the memory of those in generations previous who were killed, tortured and otherwise made miserable by the religious. Yet, in spite of the persecution by the pious, continued on in their research, the fruits of which support the modern and convenient life you now live.  Had they not persevered over religious persecution, we would all STILL be illiterate, something that someone who makes a living writing should think about in depth.

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I think most of here agree that if someone wants to believe in the supernatural then he or she has that right. Some of us here may even be closet deists. I hope what unites most of us is that we find it intolerable that belief in the supernatural, or some illogical, contradictory books written thousands of years ago, should inform public policy. Obama’s speech at Notre Dame yesterday is a good example of how society still gives religious considerations too much weight when it comes to policy. We should be able to have a discussion about the sanctity of human life without bringing the Bible into it. Regrettably, such a discussion will never happen in my life time.

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Yo Philip,

Could I buy a pound of what ever it is that you’ve been smoking because Zeus knows I’ve never been that high before! Yes Yahweh and science belong together do they? The bronze age religion of wandering, barbarian, syphilitic sheepherders is certainly equal to science,eh? Better make that two pounds of that Maui Wowie Phil!

Your radical, Atheist pal,
Ernest

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Glad he acknowledges that we have philosophical rigour on our side. Philosophical rigour always wins in the end, IMO. The early Enlightenment thinkers had little else, at first.

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This is just so typical.  Some kind of catalyst (in this case an article in “Nature”) occurs which fires up faith’s haves and have nots, and we get the same back and forth conversation, with all the same sentiments on the compatibility of science and religion, and when it’s all said and done, nothing is solved.  We even had the obligatory brain-washed Bible thumper chime in on how we should “open our hearts” to God so he can show us the way.
Don’t get me wrong.  Discussion is a good thing, as is dissent, but in this case, Sam Harris is doing something USEFUL.  As usual, he has decided not to pander to political correctness or the status quo.  With the Reason Project, there is finally the potential to put this issue out front, where it can be seen and not ignored.
  Absolutes are dangerous.  When you use one, you better be sure.  Here goes anyway.
Science and Religion are not compatible.  In fact, in principle, they are diametrically opposed.  It’s frustrating because this is the key issue.  If more people could understand this, we would be living in a better world right now.

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I also don’t think the author really makes a strong point for anything in this article. Why does he feel the need to “instruct” us that religion is a social construct? I think everyone associated with The Reason Project would agree that it is- many have been pushing that the whole time!

I think this article is generally a misunderstanding of the true threat of all the aspects of religious dogma as well as a denial/dismissal of the problems he actually does recognize.

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I feel compelled to respond to the claim that the general conflict between science and faith is “not that big a deal”. I wonder, would the author say that to a little girl who has recently suffered a spinal cord injury at cheer leading practice, and for whom stem cell technology may one day grant the gift of mobility? Surely I need not remind anyone of the countless roadblocks to stem cell research that the faithful have implemented over the last decade. Philip Ball may not see this as being a “big deal”, but I would beg to differ, as I assume many people who are suffering from the types of ailments that stem cell research hopes to assuage would. The fact of the matter is that the political manifestation of the conflict between science and religion, which Dr Ball does not deem “a big deal”, is prolonging the suffering of innumerable masses.

Dr Ball essentially states that while religion, admittedly, wrongly picks on certain aspects of science, religion and science can coexist, and thus we should not eliminate religion. This is a non sequitur. Of course science and religion can coexist; they have for thousands of years. The real question is whether or not allowing science and religion to coexist is a good strategy for increasing our well being. How much better off would we be today if the church hadn’t persecuted scientists for having novel ideas for so many centuries? How much better off would we be today if the church hadn’t impeded on stem cell research over the past decade? The fact is that religion has slowed the progression of scientific discoveries that can increase our well being, while offering little to nothing in terms of reducing suffering.

I am an economist, so allow me to make a slightly more technical argument. We should increase our devotion of resources to science and decrease our devotion of resources to religion until the point where the marginal benefit of scientific endeavors is equal to the marginal benefit of religious endeavors. Given the dramatic life saving,  life improving discoveries coming out of science, and given the complete void of real benefit coming from religion, I dare say that we have not reached this socially optimal point. If we were to ever reach such an equilibrium, I surmise that if we were ever to reach such a point, we would have little religion indeed (as religion simply doesn’t seem to yield any social benefit) and a whole lot more science.

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I find it particularly disturbing that this artical was in a science magazine. Once again we have a document declairing ignorance as a right of passage. There is no “empty argument” on the part of science, that I think would fall on the religous camps.

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The battle line for the Reason Project should not be drawn between science and religion; it’s a minefield! Rather, let us challenge the staunch and firm quality of any “belief” vs. the open and pragmatic virtue of the “inquiry”.  Let’s reframe this dialogue so we can side-step the knee-jerk responses of our colleagues who cling to beliefs.

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The author fails at any point of his argument to identify what he means by the term “religion.” Without doing so, his article is gibberish. One guesses that religion means whatever the author needs it to mean on any given occasion. This will not do. He needs to propose a reasonable, relevant definition, and then specifically defend it against the charges of incompatibility with reason and science leveled by the so-called “militant” atheists, if indeed the “religion” defines he is the religion they are attacking. If not, he is swatting at a straw man. What a pointless, evasive commentary this is, and how like much of the feeble defenses we have seen.  Like so many of the complaints of those who have not actually read the the “New” atheists, or who have read them without comprehending the point, he tries to persuade with undefined terms and platitudes. Back to the drawing board,“Nature,” and this time engage the subject.

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I found this part objectionable, “atheistic absolutism works as long as it ignores what people are like.”  I feel it misses the point that people are not like anything.  It is the memes that make people believe in sky fairies and all the other wishful thinking crap.

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The call for the application of evidence to matters of life and belief is now louder than ever.  Modernity is partly responsible for the lack of need for evidence gathering skills in everyday life.  If Wal-Mart guarantees low prices, and if joining church ensures you can sell your goods and services, what else is there to know?

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I am an agnostic that applauds the work of Sam Harris.  The Reason Project appears to be off to a great start, with so many voices making themselves heard.

I also agree with RikkiW.  Staunch dogmatism, whether scientific, religious, or under another guise -is the real problem.  It seems that if we could settle down a bit and let go of the bad memories we may have regarding religious Biblical teachings, we may be open enough to try and reasonably ascertain what these musings of the heart actually are.  I tend to be of the mindset that there may or may not be a God, but there is certainly an experience that people have that can be the impetus of positive action in the world.  You can call it a religious experience, spiritual experience, an “oceanic feeling” . . . whatever.  Ultimately though, I am in the camp that sides with open scientific inquiry, and does not treat certain types of experience as mere hallucination or folly.

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“False dichotomies”, Philip Ball? How about your own amazing straw man creations? “Militant atheism” and “atheistic absolutism” are phrases that highlight the sheer lack of intellectual honesty on the part of the user. Anything else someone who reaches for those phrases to falsely accuse his opponent says, is obviously drawn from the same garbage heap of dishonesty and treachery. No matter what the religious nutjobs believe about the atheists, if they are as incapable in the rest of their thinking of adjusting such demonizing beliefs about others to reality when faced with the quite different facts, they should excise the word “science” from their vocabulary and should be honest about how they form their beliefs: “It is true because I feel it.”

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It is really really simple:

You need faith to believe any form of superstition (and that includes any religion) because superstition is by definition anything not based on any verifiable evidence.

You don’t need faith to accept science which is by definition based on verifiable evidence.

I may not be an expert in airplane design but it is an observable fact that airplanes to work and airplane crashes are so extremely rare that it is safer to fly than to walk across most streets.

I do not need to believe in science. I need to accept science because I can see for the most part that it produces predicable results without me becoming an expert.

By its very nature, science and superstition are incompatible.

Who would date to say these days that alchemy and chemistry are compatible? That astrology and astronomy are compatible? That the stock theory of baby delivery and gynecology are compatible?

Alchemy, astrology, the stock theory, creationism and its words-of-mass deception called intelligent design cousin, and all religions are superstition.

We can respect the people who believe in superstition but we should stop respecting the superstitions they believe in.

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I find it curious that atheists can be labelled “militant”.  How many people in history have been killed in the name of atheism?  How many suicide bombers or politicians are motivated by atheism or influenced by atheist lobbyists and groups?  Strange then to label the atheists as “militant”, don’t you think?  Any militancy on their part surely pales in comparison then with that of the dominant religions of the world?

I am an atheist.  But I do believe that everyone should have the freedom to believe in whatever it is they want to believe in.  The only problem however is this: deeply religious people have no doubts about their being right, and as such see nothing wrong with forcing their religiously-motivated views on others.  This absolute certainty and lack of doubt is what fosters militancy, intolerance and oppression.  The Latin Proverb “Ubi dubium ibi libertas” says it best: “Where there is doubt, there is freedom.”  Religion removes all doubt.  That is why it does so much harm in the world.

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How much reason do I want? I want it all.

Philip Ball says it himself—“religion is a social construct.” Science is not. In defending faith without evidence, does he really not see the irony in this statement?!

To coexist with Fishheads and their equally benighted brethren is to keep our mouths shut as they yammer on about about what is left (in tatters) of their “faith”, as though we have the time or patience for the unreasonable, the irrational, the downright ridiculous. I do not.

The false priests ARE the temple. Shall we all believe in a social construct just because it is there, invented and embellished and cherry-picked and massaged over centuries of xenophobia, misogyny, political machinations and superstitious paranoia? None for me, thanks. I’m driving.

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Phillip Ball doesn’t know the name of Hitchens’ book - “God is not GREAT” not “God is not Good”

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Andrew, trust and faith are different concepts. We accept things told to us by authorities because there is evidence and usually first hand experience of this trust being valid. This is not the same as faith, which is based on no such evidence.

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Matt McDonough makes some very interesting points.  I wonder what life would be like if more time and resources weren’t put into science instead of religion.  I think most people do see religion as being a teacher of morals (mistakenly, of course).  Can we somehow pair scientific education with moral education?  I would love to see the day when we can shed the silly beliefs that so many religions have.  Let’s focus on the good virtues that many religions provide, drop the very seriously wrong things that religions teach, as well as drop all the supernatural nonsense.

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Although I regard myself as either an agnostic or an atheist, depending upon how one defines these terms, I find many secularists/rationalists critical of religion to be quite ignorant of progressive/modernist believers and theologians. Paul Tillich and Alfred North Whitehead were not fundamentalist yahoos whose faith couldn’t countenance evolution. And many modern “believers” have plenty of room for doubt and uncertainty. There is also a venerable tradition of non-theistic spirituality based on direct experience through various sorts of meditation which is quite comfortable with scientific rationalism. And finally, systems of ethics and aesthetics finally are based not exclusively on reason and empirical fact, but also on choice and emotion, albeit moderated by logic and fact.

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The author wants to make sure the common people don’t think he is one of “Those Scientists”.

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Philip Ball presents Francis Collins as a happy peacemaker vs the “militant atheists.”

Francis Collins presents himself as a middle-of-the-road sort of guy, who rejects “extremists” at both ends, including people, who, like me, disavow the supernatural for copious lack of evidence..  Collins labels me and my fellow atheists as “arrogant.”  That’s his argument in a nutshell.  I know this because I heard him speak on NPR, Science Friday.

Francis Collins doesn’t distinguish between “militant” atheists ( I guess that means any atheist who self-identifies or speaks up) and closet atheists…no, to Collins, all atheists are “arrogant” by definition.  How so? Because they’re not “believers,” like him.  And why is he a believer in a supernatural something?  Because his personal life experiences have led him to having some oceanic feeling that there’s more going on than he can directly explain… more than “just” nature…. it must be a god, therefore…

And what if someone else either doesn’t get the oceanic feelings, or attributes them to something that’s ultimately explainable, like brain activity?  Well, that’s arrogant.

Philip Ball did Nature a disservice with his weak and poorly researched point of view.  It goes to show how much we need the Reason Project!  Thank you, Sam Harris and company.

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Andrew makes a good point that we do accept an awful lot on faith.  While I think this point will help me avoid making blanket statements against faith, I do think there is an important distinction to be made.  Most of what we know may very well be based on faith, but it’s not the same as religious faith because the everyday shortcuts of knowledge are actually verifiable.  Faith in the existence of a divine power is an intellectual shortcut we needn’t value because it’s unverifiable.

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I am a fan of Harris, Dawkins, et. al., but I find myself agreeing with Philip Ball more than I disagree with it. I do find that we New Atheists are often a little idealistic and Utopian and it would be a good idea to be pragmatic and get back down to Earth.

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Reading Mr. Ball’s “Nature” article, I understand your disagreement with his point of view, but land his article and “Nature” in your “Hall of Shame”?

Sounds a bit like he stepped on someone’s orthodoxy, violated someone’s sense of orthodox purity, like ideological purists within the GOP right wing declaring moderates political heretics and wishy-washy know-nothings. Surprises me coming from an organization that identifies itself as a Reason project.

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“If we can recognize that religion, like any ideology, is a social construct — then we might forgo a lot of empty argument….”
that is exactly the point atheists would make… religion is made by MAN, not god.  hence the problem….

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“Like most Utopian ideas, atheistic absolutism works as long as it ignores what people are like and remains in a cultural and historical vacuum.” seems to me mr. ball has chosen to ignore ignorance and forgo any attempt to educate.
Personally I would have to assume that he has perfected his own way of partitioning the cold hard facts far away from the warm fuzzy things his loved ones told him when he was a child.  I’d have put him in the pit of ignorance.

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Andrews statement “The endeavor of science itself is based, surprise, on unprovable tenets, such as ‘nature is inherently good and worth studying’.” is incorrect. Science is based on the experience that nature can be understood and that we benefit by that knowledge. No faith whatsoever is required.

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Philip Ball need not speculate whether Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens have “the Almighty Himself” as the prime target because they know there is no such thing.  Their concerns, as are mine, are with the highly-marketed religious movements and their threat and suppressing effect on the world.

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I know of no religious belief which requires evidence. I know of no scientific “belief” which is not wholly dependant on independantly verifiable evidence. Therefore religion and science are not compatible.
We may choose to hold certain religious beliefs, but we cannot ignore scientific evidence for a proposition, no matter how unpleasant we may find the consequences. The Earth obits the Sun. This is a scientific observation. The Earth is the centre of the universe, between Heaven and Hell. This is a religious belief, which is incompatible with the evidence. Religious belief is an act of self deception. Science is dedicated to overcoming self-deception. Religion and Science cannot be compatible. The only way they can be is based on a religous belief, not a scientific one.

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Of course, God does not exist. But we rarely ask the equally interesting question… why does God not exist?  The reason has been reiterated by enlightened sages for millennia but institutionalised religions have successfully distorted the original truth and caused most of the confusion that prevents understanding. The reason is that God is not an object. This leads scientists to deny the existence of God because they only deal in objects. Their study is entirely of the objective world. And this is hardly surprising because when we observe – with naked eye or assisted with telescope and microscope –  what we observe automatically turns into an object. Thinking creates thoughts and conceiving creates concepts, which thereby also become objects.  But the seer or conceiver is not an object but subject which can never be seen, heard touched or conceived without being turned into an object. And you can’t have an object without a subject. There is no evidence that any object ‘exists’ without it being perceived or conceived by subject.
Subject is, quite simply and rather obviously, Mind or Consciousness. What the wise men of the past saw all too clearly was that all perceiving and conceiving is Mind functioning and it (although it’s not an ‘it’ but we only have limited language to talk about it otherwise) functions through the apparatus which is the phenomenal sentient being: such ‘being’ being everything from a single cell organism to a human being (consciousness here defined as an attribute of any organism that reacts to its environment). This leads to the conclusion that mind, which conventional wisdom tells us is associated with the body, is in fact Mind operating through the body and thereby confined to the limitations the body imposes (while the body lives).
But then there is nothing but Mind. Mind manifests continuously ‘creating’ phenomena that, as the word makes clear, are nothing but appearances and the phenomena appear in the minds of sentient beings that are in themselves also appearances. The appearances or phenomena, in themselves, possess no mind. There is only Mind – there is nothing else and there is no need for anything else.  In other words, God does not exist but then neither do we! We are simply concepts in Mind.
Many choose to call Mind or Consciousness: God, but at the same time make the fundamental but primitive error of turning God into an object, which has to be propitiated, worshipped and feared. The histories of all the major religions show how the Church Fathers exploited this error in pursuit of power and money. The insights of the originators (not necessarily and in fact rarely the founders) of all these religions, that we are God, that there is no God but ‘I’, was distorted almost (but not completely) beyond recognition.  The original truths only survive in the esoteric branches of the religions such as Sufism, Kaballah and Christian Mysticism.
While the truth is hidden in the religious, religions as such cannot go back and correct their distortions without ceasing to exist as institutions. One cannot have a religion where everyone believes they are God! So established religion is never likely to lead to understanding. But then neither can Science, which objectifies everything and seems determined to perpetuate the myth that it contains all truth and it is only a matter of a short time before we all understand what that is. This situation is unlikely to change although some of the great such as Einstein, Böhm and Schrödinger admitted to being at the limits of the objective and there seem to be more and more, mostly physicists, who are waking up to the same insight. However, many of these make the mistake of assuming that somehow a combination of Religion and Science will get us to that complete understanding. In other word, Religion and Science are compastible in that they perpetuate the basic misunderstanding.
So with Religion and Science unable to bring us understanding, what is left? The answer is Philosophy and in particular the branch of Philosophy that deals with Being and Knowing which is Metaphysics. Western Philosophy seems to have exhausted itself and seems unable to foster understanding from within its own traditions (though many of the Greek Masters and modern philosophers such as Bishop Berkeley and Immanuel Kane were pointing in the right direction). What is lacking are the insights of Eastern Philosophy and the Chinese and Indian Masters which still make stunning reading today in the simplicity and directness of their few concise statements.
See Sam assesment of Eastern Philosophy in the last chapter of his “End of Faith’.

Of course, God does not exist. But we rarely ask the equally interesting question… why does God not exist?  The reason has been reiterated by enlightened sages for millennia but institutionalised religions have successfully distorted the original truth and caused most of the confusion that prevents understanding. The reason is that God is not an object. This leads scientists to deny the existence of God because they only deal in objects. Their study is entirely of the objective world. And this is hardly surprising because when we observe – with naked eye or assisted with telescope and microscope –  what we observe automatically turns into an object. Thinking creates thoughts and conceiving creates concepts, which thereby also become objects.  But the seer or conceiver is not an object but subject which can never be seen, heard touched or conceived without being turned into an object. And you can’t have an object without a subject. There is no evidence that any object ‘exists’ without it being perceived or conceived by subject.
Subject is, quite simply and rather obviously, Mind or Consciousness. What the wise men of the past saw all too clearly was that all perceiving and conceiving is Mind functioning and it (although it’s not an ‘it’ but we only have limited language to talk about it otherwise) functions through the apparatus which is the phenomenal sentient being: such ‘being’ being everything from a single cell organism to a human being (consciousness here defined as an attribute of any organism that reacts to its environment). This leads to the conclusion that mind, which conventional wisdom tells us is associated with the body, is in fact Mind operating through the body and thereby confined to the limitations the body imposes (while the body lives).
But then there is nothing but Mind. Mind manifests continuously ‘creating’ phenomena that, as the word makes clear, are nothing but appearances and the phenomena appear in the minds of sentient beings that are in themselves also appearances. The appearances or phenomena, in themselves, possess no mind. There is only Mind – there is nothing else and there is no need for anything else.  In other words, God does not exist but then neither do we! We are simply concepts in Mind.
Many choose to call Mind or Consciousness: God, but at the same time make the fundamental but primitive error of turning God into an object, which has to be propitiated, worshipped and feared. The histories of all the major religions show how the Church Fathers exploited this error in pursuit of power and money. The insights of the originators (not necessarily and in fact rarely the founders) of all these religions, that we are God, that there is no God but ‘I’, was distorted almost (but not completely) beyond recognition.  The original truths only survive in the esoteric branches of the religions such as Sufism, Kaballah and Christian Mysticism.
While the truth is hidden in the religious, religions as such cannot go back and correct their distortions without ceasing to exist as institutions. One cannot have a religion where everyone believes they are God! So established religion is never likely to lead to understanding. But then neither can Science, which objectifies everything and seems determined to perpetuate the myth that it contains all truth and it is only a matter of a short time before we all understand what that is. This situation is unlikely to change although some of the great such as Einstein, Böhm and Schrödinger admitted to being at the limits of the objective and there seem to be more and more, mostly physicists, who are waking up to the same insight. However, many of these make the mistake of assuming that somehow a combination of Religion and Science will get us to that complete understanding. In other word, Religion and Science are compastible in that they perpetuate the basic misunderstanding.
So with Religion and Science unable to bring us understanding, what is left? The answer is Philosophy and in particular the branch of Philosophy that deals with Being and Knowing which is Metaphysics. Western Philosophy seems to have exhausted itself and seems unable to foster understanding from within its own traditions (though many of the Greek Masters and modern philosophers such as Bishop Berkeley and Immanuel Kane were pointing in the right direction). What is lacking are the insights of Eastern Philosophy and the Chinese and Indian Masters which still make stunning reading today in the simplicity and directness of their few concise statements.
See Sam assesment of Eastern Philosophy in the last chapter of his “End of Faith’.
posted on May 19, 2009

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”...this is not a matter of science versus faith, but of the rejection of scientific ideas that challenge power structures.”

What scientific ideas challenge any power structures other than the power structures of religion?  The power structures of the church are severely challenged by science, and, if the churches don’t fight back then their business will fail.

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Wow, how on earth did this get published?  I’ve submitted scientific papers to Nature before, only to get shot down like 99% of all their submissions.  I’ve held Nature on a pedestal for so many years, considering it among the pantheon of scientific journals.  But somehow this article gets through the review process??  How is this possible, Nature?  What a disappointment.

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John says: “I know of no religious belief which requires evidence.”

The Bible says: “if Christ has not been raised from death, then we have nothing to preach and you have nothing to believe” (1 Cor 15:14). Paul, and those who believe in his words, are saying that christianity depends on evidence. And he supports that statement by listing alleged eyewitnesses.

You presumably do not find the evidence compelling, but it is nevertheless a fundamental claim of christianity that it is based on evidence, as some christian debaters have argued with some success (e.g. Habermas vs Flew, Craig vs Hitchens).

I think a sound strategy in any “battle” is to know your enemy, which I don’t think you have done.

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Building conflict between religion and science is a fun game.  Yet we are all humans together with a really big task ahead if we are to live sustainably on this planet.  Our biggest task is to learn how we can all be brought to learn how to work together - whether religious or atheist.  We must work with religious leaders to find what they believe about their god’s care for our planet.  If their god gave us this planet to support us for a definite or indefinite period, then they must have views on how we should care for it, nourish it and all the species of plants and animals “he” created for their followers.  If “he” is to come again, how will we be judged if we have destroyed “his” creations?  The religion I learned as a boy hardly dealt with this subject, yet it is now moving to be a central topic for all of us - one that the representatives of the gods must come to terms with.
Clearly we need as many of the 6+ billion people alive, most of whom are religious, to join in the huge job we have ahead.  We do little to foster cooperation by emphasising how clever atheists are compared with theists.  We need all to help.  We need to seek ways of working towards common goals - and it won’t be easy.

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The author says he’s an atheist.  One is therefore left to conclude that the author, or the author’s editor, is merely rabble-rousing for the benefit of his employer—Nature.  We see this dynamic over and over again in the mainstream media—antagonize the issue to provoke reactions and increase readership.

Mr. Ball is just another corporate shill.

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It seems to me that the scientific magazines all have new editors, they don’t inform like they use to.  NPR is no longer the same either.  My Sci-FI channel has shows on Ghost Hunting all the time.  Something is happening.  It’s a war over minds.  Hopefully people will figure it out, but most will still listen to NPR expecting unbiased info.  I’m not Militant Atheist.  What does that mean anyways??  Does it mean I carry a gun and have secret meetings planning militant religious attacks!!!  WTF???  It’s just a label to stigmatize me, like they do to democrats, calling them liberals.  I think the reason project is right on time.  We need dialog.  My pet peeve is when folks say religion teaches morality.  How would they know, when they’ve never raised a child without religion?  Religious people I find to be so narrow minded, and in this world we can’t afford to stick our heads in the sand. Thank you sam harris.

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There seem to be two issues here that keep getting confused: 1) Faith-based thinking tends to undermine science, and 2) How to appease the majority of persons in the world who are faith-based thinkers.  While its easy to imagine how the efforts of Collins and the Templeton foundation might have found a cultural “sweet spot”, how can one help but be bothered at having science confined within metaphysical boundaries erected solely to keep from trampling upon whimsical ideologies?

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I have just completed reading the excellent and hearty invective between Mr Harris and Mr Ball and I thank them both very much. There are aspects which I have taken seriously to heart and they are that if any of us are to contribute to the reason project then we need to think before we write.  Some of the comments made by contributors are hot headed reactions that lack reason and are often just plain silly. The religious folk are not looking for an argument they are without question looking for their God. I say “looking “as those that say they have found God really mean that they have perfected their imagination in favour of illusion. However, they are encouraged to discover this magical scenario by manipulative intelligentsia who know better. The grateful and joyous are the easiest to control and solicit wealthy contributions. The non-religious amongst are behaving like the fabled kid who shouted “the King is not wearing any clothes”. We need to be more persuasive in our countering comments to the believers who have muffled ears.

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Both the respondents are wooly. Neither notes that fundamentalism prefers arbitrary statements, rejecting empirical verification as the penultimate arbiter. Neither notes that, with this accomplished, the individual to whom this considered opinion “feels good” is then the ultimate arbiter.
  Nor, does either note that the seeming mystery of the soul (as reasoned from the experience of consciousness) is religion’s trump card. Until that can be rationally explained, dualism triumphs over monism, and people (including many scientists) double-think; for lack of a credible monism, they choose to tolerate the inconsistency of a blatantly dualistic world-view.

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*If we can recognize that religion, like any ideology, is a social construct — with benefits, dangers, arbitrary inventions and, most of all, roots in human nature – then we might forgo a lot of empty argument and get back to the worldly wonders of the lab bench.*

Having recognized that, why would I participate it or grant respect to others who do?

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“But it seems important to acknowledge that the supposed conflict between science and faith is actually not that big a deal.”

Please shoot yourself now.

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“If we can recognize that religion, like any ideology, is a social construct — with benefits, dangers, arbitrary inventions and, most of all, roots in human nature”

That seems to be a defeatist attitude. Why try to improve as it can all be attributed to human nature. At one time it was human nature to live in caves, certainly there is an almost endless array of things about human nature that have changed due to a better understanding of reality. Why give up when faced with mythology?

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