{"id":1716,"date":"2010-11-22T06:15:21","date_gmt":"2010-11-22T06:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2018\/11\/27\/546-revision-v1\/"},"modified":"2019-07-09T11:29:46","modified_gmt":"2019-07-09T11:29:46","slug":"dawkins-god-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2010\/11\/22\/dawkins-god-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Dawkins’ God"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dawkin’s God<\/strong>\u00a0is a non-fiction book by\u00a0Alister McGrath<\/a>\u00a0published in\u00a02004<\/a>. It is a response to\u00a0Dawkin’s<\/a>\u00a0views, especially as they\u00a0regard religion<\/a>. The book is subtitled\u00a0Genes<\/a>,\u00a0Memes<\/a>, and\u00a0the Meaning of Life<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n

Comments:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The most\u00a0intelligible<\/a>\u00a0interpretation<\/a>\u00a0of McGrath’s take on Dawkins is that Dawkins is attacking academic-religion and not pop-religion. The reason for making this distinction is that the author indicates Dawkins’ arguments as being outdated, as not relevant to current theological thinking when at the same time the reader suspects that Dawkins’ arguments address religion as conceived by the average, contemporary religious individual. This does not make McGrath’s points irrelevant, but they do reduce their range of relevance so that his adjusted thesis becomes: Dawkin’s anti-God arguments present no liability to\u00a0religion<\/a>\u00a0qua<\/a>\u00a0theology<\/a>\u00a0(i.e. that\u00a0academic discipline<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The author’s own philosophy is made mostly through negative statements, as in the form of “Dawkins was mistaken that X” so that by implication the author holds not-X. While positive implications can be supposed from the negative statements, they cannot be proved as being held by the author. For example: given what McGrath writes, it seems likely that the theology he is defending allows for the\u00a0evolution<\/a>\u00a0of life on Earth and the\u00a0big bang<\/a>, but he does not specifically and obviously says so. One of the few positive statements made by the author relate to a definition of faith (which he holds not to be “blind trust”): “It commences with the conviction of the mind based on adequate evidence; it continues in the confidence of […] emotions based on conviction, and it is crowned in the consent of the will, by means of which the conviction and confidence are expressed in conduct.<\/em>” The other area he provides clear positive statements is when discussing\u00a0aesthetics<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0theology<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The author is very well educated, and his (occasionally\u00a0non sequitur<\/a>) titbits of knowledge are dispersed throughout the text. While this sometimes means going on an unnecessary (or misleading) tangent, it does make reading interesting. One of the areas he wastes space is his discussions of memes. The term memes is useful, but memes-theory is poorly developed and really not worth addressing critically at length.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dawkin’s God\u00a0is a non-fiction book by\u00a0Alister McGrath\u00a0published in\u00a02004. It is a response to\u00a0Dawkin’s\u00a0views, especially as they\u00a0regard religion. The book is subtitled\u00a0Genes,\u00a0Memes, and\u00a0the Meaning of Life. Comments: The most\u00a0intelligible\u00a0interpretation\u00a0of McGrath’s take on Dawkins is that Dawkins is attacking academic-religion and not pop-religion. The reason for making this distinction is that the author indicates Dawkins’ arguments as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[159,198,204,190],"tags":[],"metadata":[],"class_list":["post-1716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all-posts","category-book-review","category-everything2","category-religion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":39990,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2014\/09\/30\/reading-hegel-part-5-on-the-unhappy-consciousness-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":0},"title":"Reading Hegel [part 5] on “The Unhappy Consciousness”","author":"Pala","date":"September 30, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Reading Hegel about a form of consciousness he calls \"unhappy\", because not only does it define itself as a dichotomy, but it divides and separates the aspect of itself that it feels to be unchangeable and essential. This leaves a self that sees itself as a changing transience, and that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "All Posts"","block_context":{"text":"All Posts","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/all-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1776,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2011\/05\/03\/mere-christianity-br-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":1},"title":"Mere Christianity (BR)","author":"Pala","date":"May 3, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Editorial notes: This Book Review was found as a 'draft' entry in Everything2 with the Summary section missing. It was last updated on 03\/05\/2011. C.S. Lewis\u00a0is the British\u00a0author\u00a0best known for writing the\u00a0Narnia\u00a0series of books, but he also authored a number of books that discussed his religious beliefs, including this one\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "All Posts"","block_context":{"text":"All Posts","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/all-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2392,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2011\/05\/27\/thomas-aquinas-five-ways\/","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":2},"title":"Thomas Aquinas’ Five Ways","author":"Pala","date":"May 27, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Thomas Aquinas\u00a0spent the last twenty years of his life writing the famous\u00a0Summa Theologica; a guide to the\u00a0divine. The\u00a0Summa\u00a0included the\u00a0quinque viae, the \"five ways\" by which the existence of\u00a0God\u00a0can be proved. A few months before his\u00a0death, Aquinas stopped writing. 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