The End Of Faith

[jlew]

I saw an ad for The End Of Faith by Sam Harris in The New York Times Book Review a few weeks back. It seemed very interesting, because the secondary title was Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. Great, I thought, someone is finally going to stand up for reason and against religion.

Well...no dice, folks...

The first two-thirds of this book are great. Mr. Harris takes religion and faith to the mat, saying that its time to put our myths and legends away and stop believing in foolish things. Its time to require proof and evidence of religion, and if it can't prove any of its bleatings then its time to chuck it in the bin. A few times I caught myself saying, "All Right!" out loud.

But then it comes time for Mr. Harris to tell us how to protect ourselves from faith and religion. What is the antidote? Unfortunately, just as Mr. Harris is about to cross the goal line and dance around like Billy "White Shoes" Johnson, he drops the ball ala Ernest Byner. Doh!

Mr. Harris proceeds to spew the most irrational defense of rationality I've ever heard. Here's a quote:

"The belief that human beings are endowed with freedom of will underwrites both our religious conception of 'sin' and our judicial ideal of 'retributive justice.'...Free will is actually more than an illusion (or less) in that it cannot even be rendered coherent conceptually, since no one has ever described a manner in which mental and physical events could arise that would attest to its existence."

And that was stuffed in a footnote at the end of the book.

Mr. Harris goes on to claim that we cannot be held responsible for our own thoughts, because we don't know where they come from. They just rise up unbidden. (Rise up where, he doesn't say.) He calls for us to use our "intuition" to fight against religion. (But then, isn't that what religion is doing to us? Using their "intuition" i.e. feelings?)

What made this book all the more shocking is that I have also been reading The Ominous Parallels along with it. Just about everything that Mr. Harris wrote in the last third of his book was being spoken by the "intellectuals" of pre-Nazi Germany. Truly frightening.

If you want an ugly example to what modern philosophy has done to us, read The End Of Faith. It'll flip you...it'll flip you for real.

(Maybe someone can help me: I see a lot of lip service paid to "The Science of the Mind." From what I can understand, it purports to explain away everything that a person does by blaming the "wiring" of their brain. Chemical imbalances, nerve endings misfiring, all of it taking the place of thought, logic, reason, free will. Am I right in this assumption? What can I read that will give me the inside scoop, as well as a quick immersion in the subject? Mr. Harris' conclusion is based on these ideas, and it seems dangerous not to understand that basis. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.)

[Oakes]

(Maybe someone can help me: I see a lot of lip service paid to "The Science of the Mind." From what I can understand, it purports to explain away everything that a person does by blaming the "wiring" of their brain. Chemical imbalances, nerve endings misfiring, all of it taking the place of thought, logic, reason, free will. Am I right in this assumption? What can I read that will give me the inside scoop, as well as a quick immersion in the subject? Mr. Harris' conclusion is based on these ideas, and it seems dangerous not to understand that basis. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.)

I think you're talking about the Meme Theory, first formulated by Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene. Two other major books, which I have, are The Meme Machine by Susan Blackmore, and The Electric Meme by Robert Aunger. I was planning on making a topic on this, because the Meme Theory influenced me more than anything else before Ayn Rand - nothing else is more responsible for my Marxism and nihilism during that time.

BTW, I think I saw Sam Harris on Bill O'Reilly awhile ago. He seemed pretty rational. He said that it is religion as such - not Islam in particular - that is the danger. O'Reilly conceeded that the Inquisition happened under Christian rule, but still disagreed with him.

[jlew]

Thanks, Oakes...

I have seen books on meme theory, but never read one straight through (I guess their meme wasn't strong enough!). I'll go back and give them more of a chance.

I guess what I was originally looking for was something more along chemical/biological lines. You know..."We've found the part of the brain that likes nicotine, so that's why people smoke."...or..."This nerve ending digs porn, so that's why people read Hustler." Stuff like that. I suppose its books on behaviorism that I'm looking for. Explaining people and their actions away because of their chemical make-ups. Anything you can recommend on those lines?

And, no, I didn't see BO'R, but, yes, Mr. Harris does seem very reasonable and rational. That's why I was taken aback with the last third or so of his book. The end of his arguement was to hold up Buddhism and other Eastern "schools of thought" (he didn't call them religions) as the perfect systems. Being kind and gentle for the sake of being kind and gentle...that kind of stuff.

Its funny. I work at Barnes & Noble here in Savannah, and this gentleman walked up to my register with a copy of The End of Faith. While I was ringing him up, I said that I had read it and enjoyed it, but that I thought it pooped out in the end because Mr. Harris just based his refusal of religion on another form of faith (i.e., intuition). His reaction was that as long as it gave him something to refute Bush's reliance on religion, he didn't much care.

People like Bill O'Reilly and the aforementioned customer make me shake my head sadly. They seem ready to concede that religion (and all the baggage it brings with it) is a bad thing, but aren't willing to scrap it altogether. They seem to think that the Inquisition and 9/11 were just caused by a few bad apples, when in fact it was the worm of religion and faith that caused the rot. (...my metaphor went of the rails somewhere...but you get my drift...)

[Oakes]

I guess what I was originally looking for was something more along chemical/biological lines.

Well, Aunger's book The Electric Meme is supposed to reveal the physical basis for memes - some have said that Aunger is to Dawkins what Mendel was to Darwin. I haven't read it yet, though... it's been collecting dust on my desk for over a year. I'm not sure, but I believe this is behaviorism. Dan Dennett, also connected to the meme movement, wrote the book Freedom Evolves which might be considered behaviorism.

BTW the internet is filled with info about the meme theory so you don't need to buy any of these books. Maybe some more knowledgable board members can shed some light on this.

[BurgessLau]

I saw an ad for The End Of Faith by Sam Harris in The New York Times Book Review a few weeks back. It seemed very interesting, because the secondary title was Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. Great, I thought, someone is finally going to stand up for reason and against religion.

What did Harris mean by "faith" and "reason"?

Did he provide definitions and discussion of the concepts?

If not, what would you infer to be the meaning of those ideas for him?

[jlew]

What did Harris mean by "faith" and "reason"?

Did he provide definitions and discussion of the concepts?

If not, what would you infer to be the meaning of those ideas for him?

I don't have the book with me any longer. I signed it out from work (Barnes & Noble) and had to return it last week. I'll try to remember what I can.

Unfortunately Mr. Harris didn't spend a whole lot of time defining concepts like "reason", "faith", or "intuition". He just jumped into the fray. He (rightly)derided "faith" in religion, but then turned around and basically said we must have "faith" in reason - or "intuition", as he puts it.

Mr. Harris, as I've said before, started off well. His attack on religion and faith was very well done - even though (as per your question, BurgessLau) he never came out and defined his concepts. If you'll pardon the analogy, its like a soccer team that's all attack. It looks good as long as you're pinning your opponent in his own end. But as soon as the ball is in your half, if you don't have the midfield or defense to support you - you're done for.

Well, once Mr. Harris got past attacking religion, and the "ball" was in his end, he scored an "own goal." Because he was unable to base "reason" on anything real, because he was unable to give his attack support, the book fell apart.

What I saw in his argument was just a bunch of free-floating terms that he assumed would do his job for him, not because he had defined them, but because they all carried a sort of "weight" and we would just "know" (maybe this was his "intuition"?) what he meant.

He took religious people to task for blindly believing in the Bible, the Torah, the Koran. He pointed out all the calls to violence against the "unbeliever" these texts make, even though there followers claim that their religion is peaceful one. But again, when it came time for him to list the good reason can do in the face of these insanities, Mr. Harris just couldn't do it.

What would I infer to be the meaning of those ideas for him? To tell you the truth, I can't see them meaning very much at all to him. He speaks of "reason", but ends up decrying the mind through modern neuroscience. (Which, Oakes, is where my question at the end of my first post came from). He speaks of ethics, but because he doesn't anchor the "good" into solid ground, it ends up floating pragmatically around, blown by whatever whim man feels - so long as it isn't "faith" based.

One of the great things about Objectivism, and the thing in particular that attracted me when I first started reading Ayn Rand's non-fiction, was the confidence that she had in her own abilities to tackle issues and dissect them, and the confidence that I could understand her dissection. We were both rational, thinking people. She never wrote in a manner that talked down to you. If anything, she raised you up to her level and then spoke to you. Few writers of any ilk can do that, let alone a philosopher discussing esoteric subjects. Too bad for Mr. Harris he isn't one of them.

BurgessLau, it was just a frustrating read. One, because I can see the basic fault in his argument and it angers me that people reading the book will think that its a perfect antidote to what's happening in the world. But it was also frustrating for the secondary reason that I don't have the proper schooling in Objectivism (I'm a complete amateur "philosopher" and I've read just about everything, but its hard to bring all the information to hand when I need it), so its hard for me to decidedly refute all of his silly arguments. I can see his mistake through Objectivist "common sense", but I can't strip his argument naked using the full philosophical toolbox...if that makes any sense.

If you go to http://www.samharris.org/ you'll sorta see what I mean.

[Evangelical Capitalist]

I finished reading this book last night, and while my overall evaluation agrees entirely with that of jlew, I'd like to add a few thoughts of my own.

Yes, it was a very frustrating read. Harris' primary thesis, that the problem is not Islam specifically, but faith as such, is sound and well-presented. He even takes to task the doctrine of religious toleration as enabling of such religious radicalism. His greatest beef with modern social discourse is that issues of people's faith are considered beyond the bounds of criticism.

He provides a definition of faith, ostensively if not explicitly, as holding a belief without evidence. He does not, however, define reason as far as I can remember. He relies instead upon “intuition”. Intuition, he says, are those things which we “just know,” irreducibly. He concedes that our intuitions may be incorrect, but gives no suggestion of how we might distinguish true from false when one intuition, or the logical consequences thereof, contradicts another. In his view, these intuitions have axiomatic status, but unlike the axioms of Objectivism there is no indication of why they should be that way. To give you an idea of just to what extent he relies on intuition, he effectively lumps the entire scientific method, things like control groups and repeatability, into the category of mere intuition. With defenders like these, reason needs no enemies. Given his endorsement of the statement, “That which can be asserted without evidence, can as easily be dismissed without evidence,” one wonders why his intuitions are any more valid than someone else's faith.

In his attempt to define a supposedly scientific morality, he begins with the assumption (or presumably his intuition) that ethics is a matter of happiness and suffering. Of whom? Well, others, of course! We incur a moral obligation whenever we have the capacity to influence the happiness or suffering of others, he says. Since he has already dismissed any notions of free will, as jlew has pointed out, one might be prompted to ask by what means we are to exert such influence. Blank-out. His solution to the problem of defining a scientific morality? Love and compassion! Never mind that these are effects of one's value-judgments. Values would require free will and as such have no place in his discussion. (Without free will, one might wonder, how are people expected to reject faith in favor of reason in the first place?)

His last chapter, which seems largely tacked on to a book to which it otherwise bears little relevance, is an attempt to define some kind of rational “spirituality.” (He also uses the term “mysticism,” but I don't think he means the same thing an Objectivist would think of when hearing this term.) His answer to this question: Buddhism. He concedes that Buddhism has some unfounded, dogmatic elements, but he defends the Buddhist meditation techniques as a means of introspection. He devotes considerable space to arguing that the “self” does not in fact exist. Given his means of searching, i.e. of clearing one's mind of all external thoughts and focusing solely inward, I would consider his failure to find a self, if truly valid, as a spectacular vindication of Rand's statement that, “A consciousness conscious of nothing but itself is a contradiction in terms: before it could identify itself as consciousness, it had to be conscious of something.”

Overall, I would agree that the first two-thirds of the book are extremely good, though not perfect. There were hints here and there that led me expect the utter “dropping the ball” that occurred in the last two chapters. Particularly, it was clear that Harris' idea of philosophy meant Immanuel Kant and linguistic analysis.

[Hal]

(Maybe someone can help me: I see a lot of lip service paid to "The Science of the Mind." From what I can understand, it purports to explain away everything that a person does by blaming the "wiring" of their brain. Chemical imbalances, nerve endings misfiring, all of it taking the place of thought, logic, reason, free will. Am I right in this assumption? What can I read that will give me the inside scoop, as well as a quick immersion in the subject? Mr. Harris' conclusion is based on these ideas, and it seems dangerous not to understand that basis. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.)

Daniel Dennett lies at the more extreme version of this school of thought and tends to be an excellent writer, so you might want to start with him ("Consciousness Explained" or "Freedom Evolves"). Dawkins and Pinker also belong firmly in this category, so they could also be worth checking out. Antonio Damasio provides a popular exposition of neuroscience in a less 'dogmatically materialist' manner in several books; I've only read "The Feeling of What Happens", but have also heard positive things about "Descartes' Error" and "Looking For Spinoza".

The Churchlands (Paul and Patricia) tend to go even further than all of the above. I cant recommend anything in particular, but I think "Neurophilosophy" was quite influential (although its almost 20 years old now).

edit: Daniel Wegner's "The Illusion of Conscious Will" is something which I keep hearing about but havent got round to reading yet.

Edited November 16, 2005 by Hal