My two questions, and I won't make any comments here about any opinions I might have, I'll let you all educate me and give your opinions first and maybe act more of a reciever and moderator than one arguing for my own point this time around.
To get one thing, though, quickly out of the way:
I do not like the New Atheist movement--and, again, this is my learning experience here, so if I'm in error here, please, correct me--partially because of the vengeful and utter bitterness I see in the movement, ie, going directly after religion and being somewhat antagonistic in my view, and so that gives Atheism and intellectual inquiry a bad name, at least where I live, and partly because I've always disliked the leaders of the movement to say the least (and if you've read what I've posted here before, you'll know just what I think of Dawkins in particular.)
I DO NOT have a problem with Atheism, however--my favorite three philosophers are Nietzsche, Plato, and Hume, and there you have at least two atheists, and Plato's sort of doing his own thing, so it's not atheism I have an issue with.
I ALSO do not have a problem with faith, and I say faith because I will admit that I DO have a problem with ORGANIZED faith, ie, religion.
So it's not atheism that's my problem or question here.
My two questions:
1. If you DO support New Atheism...please, can you tell me WHY? I simply cannot see the good that can come from this movement, it's a divise and antagonistic approach and, again, I attribute that largely to the general tone of the movement and the leaders. It wasn't good when religious authorities were able to actively persecute intellectual and scientific free thinkers, and I think it's poor form as well for the New Atheists to be intelelctually persecuting those not in their fold...maybe I haven't understood something, so that's why this is a question and not my arguing flat-out against the New Atheists, because, quite frankly, I'm not qualified to do so. (Really, I'm a college kid with four semesters under my belt, I'm not really "qualified" to intellectually argue for much of anything, really, with the kind of authority that would make that term "qualified" mean anything, but anyway...) ;) I just don't see the good in this movement, how treating science as if it's the be all and end all, like religion has been treated for so long, can be a good thing, and to be perfectly honest, with Dawkins in particular, with his videos, I'm left rather confused...is it that human beings are just a natural cog in his system, or are we supposed to believe that rationalist thought still elevates man somehow, he seems to want it both ways, that man is higher and yet the same as other animals...but again, I don't know the movement well enough to say this with certainty. So, yes, all these questions, let me know, especially the central one, if you ARE a New Atheist...WHY? Or, to put it another way, why should *I* take this to be a good movement?
2. For everyone, atheists and fellow agnostics and the religious alike--what do you think of Dawkins vs. Hitchens? I ask this because I used to lump them together, really, until I saw a video with Hitchens...and he REALLY just stood out and made his points with such scalpel precision and rather logically, and definitely keeping that air of superiority I get from a lot from the pair of them--again, tell me if that's unfounded--and he seems now a bit more like someone I might care to watch or read further on; Dawkins always seems a blowhard and controversy-hound first, Hitchens seemed genuinely interested in staying on topic and making his point with razor-sharp accuracy, and I really do ADMIRE that. So, yes, thoughts on the two, and also, for Hitchens fans--if you have a video of his or a clip to recommend, please do so, I'd like to see that...I'm aware of his "God Is Not Great" book, which I might have bought, but I just got 3 books and 3 DVDs of literature for the summer, so that boat's just sailed, not made out of money... ;)
What's in a defintion
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