Faith and Its Critics - A Conversation by David Fergusson
Oxford University Press, 2009

Book Review by Robert Tulip

Christopher Hitchens, in a 2005 essay on the strangely unbelieving faith of American founding father Benjamin Franklin, quotes Franklin’s observation that he acquired the habit of disputation from his father’s Books of Disputes about Religion. Franklin observes that “Persons of Good Sense seldom fall into this habit, except lawyers, university men, and men of all sorts that have been bred at Edinborough.” (Hitchens, Arguably, p22)

One such Edinburgh University man, a Professor of Divinity no less, has given us a fine articulation of a reasoned response to the disputes about religion prompted in large part by Hitchens. Addressing themes including evolution, the status of belief, the social function of religion, and different ways we read texts, Professor David Fergusson provides a useful, if not entirely persuasive, conversational tour of some key points in the debate. The ‘New Atheism’ presents a reactive confident rage at the continued prevalence of religion, expressing a modern mindset whose assumptions are not always explicit, and whose arguments provide an important framework for public dialogue. Bringing the assumptions that support these arguments into focus is essential for progress in the conversation.

Hitchens, always the provocateur, suggests that Benjamin Franklin intentionally ridiculed theistic views. Clearly aiming to irritate those who prefer the myth of the gentle piety of the Founding Fathers, Hitchens is most deliberate, arguing that the unmasking of the sinuous intent of old Ben is a sign of the growing movement of atheism in modern times. Casting off the light disguise of religious language that it often had to wear when the church was more powerful, the new atheism has powerful roots in the deist views of the scientific enlightenment. In the last decade the former polite concealment has been put into stark public focus, especially in books such as Hitchens’ full frontal attacks on religion as poison, and Richard Dawkins’ suggestions that faith is inherently blind and that religion is an obsolete and dangerous delusion.

The fact that theologians now feel compelled to respond to the agenda set by scientists, especially Dawkins, shows how the ground has shifted for religious debate. And Fergusson responds well, with an informed and well reasoned defense of faith. Yet one comes away with the sense that his defense is on thin ice, relying too much on the attitude of Gibbon’s Roman magistrate who found all religions equally useful. Fergusson’s effective demonstration that the modern secularization thesis lacks psychological depth does not suffice to show that any religious ideas are true, only that they remain adaptive and convenient. Celebrating TS Eliot’s observation of the continued adaptability of religion is one thing, but proving the utility of religion does not address its truth.

The truth of religious claims is at the centre of the debate. Secularisation, as proposed by key moderns such as Max Weber and Emile Durkheim, assumes that progress towards a more reasonable world must involve disenchantment, a recognition that previous metaphysical frameworks are entirely false. But the rejoinder can be made that an enchanted sense of human relation to ultimate reality is plausibly essential to authentic life, and does not necessarily require belief in supernatural miraculous entities. The truth of Biblical claims seems to rest more in allegory than in history.

It seems rather arrogant for atheists to suggest that we can dispense with mystery, and Fergusson rightly argues that the atheist view that society can flourish without religion remains an untested article of faith. Against this new atheist dogma, Fergusson proposes a need for understanding of nature, of significance, and of our deepest convictions, suggesting that while atheism may have a sound understanding of nature, it skates over basic questions of how human life relates to the natural universe through moral and symbolic commitment.

The failure of atheist critique to address the utility of religion in ethical formation and binding of community illustrates that both sides in this debate have presuppositions that they struggle to examine. Fergusson ably shows that the quiet normal functioning of faith is highly virtuous, providing good social services, ethical teaching and basis for community life. After all, even Dawkins enjoys Christmas carols, and the wicked Mr Hitchens celebrates the literary beauty of the Authorised Version of the Bible. But the nagging doubt here, in a scientific age, remains that this rearguard action on behalf of faith still clings to a supernatural epistemology that grows steadily more unconvincing.

Science demands evidence, but religion is more about belonging to a community. Customs, rituals, ethical commitments and celebration of festivals are just as much a part of religious identity as assent to propositions (p36). With an evocative image from the celebrated scientist Stephen Jay Gould, Fergusson suggests there is a ‘complex fractal interdigitation’ between religious and scientific visions of reality (p44). And yet this convenient recourse to the ‘live and let live’ idea of ‘non overlapping magisteria’ begs the question of the evidentiary basis of faith, and of the risks inherent in believing things that are not true. Do not the cultural Christians whom Fergusson welcomes into the fold require a truth to live by?

Fergusson attacks Hitchens for flirting with the idea that Biblical inconsistency suggests Jesus Christ did not exist, .and points out that the Gospels give us a mandate for allegorical interpretation, for example with Christ’s respectful critique of Mosaic Law. He approves of Michael Buckley’s effort to recast the debate as one not of cosmology, but of experience, specifically experience of “Jesus as the embodied presence of God” (p.30). But these arguments put Fergusson’s personal commitments on display, revealing his evasion of the problem of evidence.

There is no clear evidence of any belief in a literal historical Jesus Christ in the first Christian century, even in the Epistles of Paul. This shocking lacuna in Christian origins, analyzed in books such as Jesus Neither God Nor Man by Earl Doherty, justifies doubt about Christian claims about the basis of their faith. Especially, the absence of evidence justifies doubt regarding the role of Christ as founder, whose historical circumstances are never demonstrably mentioned before the second century, generations after the claimed events of Bethlehem and Calvary. Yet Fergusson ignores this historical debate about evidence, preferring instead to call the Exodus and the story of Jesus “direct witness to the events of divine self disclosure” (p163).

Fergusson proposes the valuable principle that dialogue is only possible at the middle ground between faith and skepticism, since those at the extremes of this spectrum are more interested in preaching than learning. From a rational point of view, this approach to conversation suggests that the assumption that allegorical meaning may be found within traditional miraculous and supernatural claims is an important methodological principle in rehabilitating religion. It should be accepted that such discussion will often be confronting for the assumptions brought to the table by representatives of both faith and reason, in shared efforts to find consensus on the meaning of doctrines that hold a lot of cultural baggage. There are many surprises in store for those who wish to pursue an honest analysis of how Christian faith has evolved over its long history.

Although accepting Darwinian evolution, Fergusson makes the perceptive observation that analysis of the evolution of faith does not generally engage well with the question of the legitimacy and adaptability of contemporary religion. Scientists tend to think that a proof of the error of traditional claims, whether on cosmology, teleology or history, should result in the withering away of religion. Noting that John Polkinghorne has rightly argued that explanations of cultural meaning cannot be reduced to physical mechanisms alone, Fergusson points out that understanding the genesis and history of cultural practices does not by itself determine how we should respond to those practices today. For example science alone can barely begin to assess the value of sacraments such as baptism and eucharist, or practices such as worship and prayer.

However, Fergusson’s discussion of cultural evolution opens more questions than it answers. This is especially the case in his account of Dawkins’ concept of the meme as a unit of cultural evolution. Fergusson seems to detect a knock-down argument in his observation that the spread of science should be just as memetic as the spread of religion. But this is no refutation at all. Memetics is the study of evolutionary causality in cultural systems, on the hypothesis that cultural change occurs by the same law of cumulative adaptation as genetic evolution. Pointing out that a meme is not a physical object is rather like showing that love or justice are not physical objects.

The theory of memes says little more than that culture builds on precedent, with successful changes occurring when a practice is more adapted to its circumstances, just as more adaptive genes are those that prove more fecund, durable and stable in the struggle for existence. Memetic theory provides a powerful explanation of why false ideas persist, but it also helps to explain the historical evolution of successful true ideas, including those within science, thereby accounting for both the rational and the irrational factors in what people think. Observing that ideas mutate like viruses does not detract from the truth of ideas, in view of the expectation that true ideas should eventually prove most adaptive within the evolutionary contest. An emotional distaste for the idea of memes as ‘viruses of the mind’ ignores how viruses are among the most hardy of living entities, continually adapting to new circumstances, and in fact bearing a strong analogy to the place of religion within culture.

It's a kind of egotism that causes people to look for exact matches of their own views in the past, attempting to bolster their views' legitimacy by claiming a long pedigree. Both modern Bible believers and modern atheists do this with regard to the generation of notables we call the Founders. The Bible believers will fasten on the many private and public expressions of piety by these men to justify taking the country in a specifically Christian direction, such as allowing prayer or creationism in schools. They believe, and want us to believe, that Franklin, Washington, Jefferson, et al, would approve. Atheists do the same thing when they focus only on the criticisms of religion. They want us to believe that this amounts to atheism as we now see it. Both are cases of presentism. I think Christopher Hitchens hasn't fully come to grips with the native religiosity of his adopted country. He wants to find allies for his views in the Revolutionary generation, but if he thinks it was theism that these men were speaking against, I repectfully submit that he's distorting the Founders' thoughts. Additionally, the suggestion that whatever they said positively about religion was motivated by politics or fear of speaking out makes them out to be hypocrites or cowards.

On the campaign of the atheists against mystery, metaphor, ritual, or whatever else you might call it, I wonder if Fergusson offers any more proof than I've seen you offer, Robert. Clearly the campaign is against ideas that can be assailed through simple logic and modern standards of proof. If Hitchens or Dawkins say someplace that they don't prefer the way of mystery, myth or ritual, that's non-campaign stuff and we shouldn't see it as something they mean to make binding.

Oh, I see that Fergusson is a person of good sense by his take on memes! If this is a 2009 book, aren't his comments by way of a post-mortem? It's been a while, if you know what I mean. The word you use to describe memetics that I think isn't apprpriate is "powerful." Is there an example of memetics showing us something about culture that we didn't understand before? I don't knock Dawkins for coining the word. The language seemed to be wanting a word that would convey the similarity between physical changes as shown in a genome and cultural changes revealed in a developing historical record. Dawkins came up with it and it wasn't a mean feat. The word is still around, even though almost all instances refer to fads that spread on the internet.

It's not surprising what happened to the meme. The expectations were way too high because of the association with its cousin/brother the gene. Whereas with genes, there was a whole rapidly-developing science able to exploit the knowledge that genes existed, there appears to be no corresponding array of new technology producing new findings around the meme. You'd think that maybe information technology would be key to advancing memetics, but if this has happened, I don't know about it. It's an area that seems to be stubbornly qualitative, very unlike genetics and not scientific in any hard sense.

It's possible that Dawkins' invention of memes got scholars in other fields to do more work on the evolutionary aspects of culture, ecven though they don't use Dawkins' terminology. I don't think so, but it's possible.

DM Murdock provides some interesting comments on Washington and Jefferson at truthbeknown.com/washington-jefferson-m ... cists.html. I think Hitchens' point is that main founding fathers (is founders the PC term now?) were part of a modern enlightened rational culture. A summary of Jefferson's views is at http://nobeliefs.com/jefferson.htm.You misunderstand the nature of the debate. Hitchens describes religion as poison, and Dawkins argues that faith is inherently blind. Fergusson points out that these attitudes see no prospect for reform of religion to make it rational, and seek instead its abolition. On Dawkins' website an article on the end of religion argues that religion is a product of human weakness and gullibility, based on fear of death, the need to explain away the unknowns of nature’s mystery, hopes for controlling one’s destiny, a desire for social cohesion, and the corrupting allure of power, but not on the assumption that life has purpose and meaning. The general idea is that participation in a religious community is a form of atavistic idiocy, to be regarded with disdain by any person of sense. That goes far beyond a logical critique, into a cultural war, operating at unconscious as much as at rational levels.
Of course we have differed at length on the utility of the idea of the meme. It is a matter of simple logic and natural causality. Current culture builds on what went before and provides the basis for future directions. The units of cultural change are conveniently described as memes, because this term summarises the causal similarity in process between culture and biology. The causal continuity of culture evolves by the same laws of nature as genes do, namely that change is cumulative towards more adaptive methods, with the most productive methods proving most successful. 'Productive' just means fecund, stable and durable. It is an algorithm.

For example, we can analyse Jesus Christ as a meme. This means finding out where the concept was generated, how it evolved, and how it has related to other cultural ideas. At each step we find a building on precedent that follows the same cumulative causality as genetics, continually adapting to context, with successful mutations growing and unsuccessful mutations going extinct.

A concept does not have the same physical limitations as a gene, since it can change quickly by melding with other memes, features of it can go dormant for centuries and then reappear, and its evolution is not strictly limited by physical potential, especially since words can change their meaning while a gene cannot simply change its function. However, seeing a concept as memetic enables us to place it in a real material context, obeying the same causal processes as other living systems. It is a tool of systematic cultural logic, so it is not surprising that empirical scientists generally lack interest in it.

The real opposition to memetics comes from the residual metaphysical tendency to see language as inspired by supernatural entities who are beyond natural causality. If we see language and technology as evolving by the same general forces as genes, it helps to formulate a materialist explanation for religion, in which memes can be seen to have enduring value even though their content may not be a simple empirical observation but may embed complex symbolic meaning. For example the meme of Jesus Christ can evolve to adapt to a scientific materialist context.

Thanks DWill for your interest in my book review, and apologies to you and other readers if there is anything in it that is unclear.