Chris recommended attention-getting thread titles, so I obliged! Something I'll say for Sam Harris is that he doesn't back down or take the easy way out. This tendency has earned him a reputation as the most uncompromising and strident detractor of religion. I've tried to present a case that this is not necessarily so. He takes up some of the concerns of traditional religion in a way I don't see the others doing. He acknowledges that there were some important needs being served by religion, but that we now need to see that faith is not the vehicle that should be meeting them.

Anyway, Harris does say, early in this chapter, the following: "Some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them...otherwise tolerant people may be justified in killing [believers] in self-defense" (52-53). I said, "hold on" when I read this, but then reflected that this is pretty much what we're doing in Afghanistan with broad popular support (at least until recently). It's important to note that Harris equates real belief with actions, saying that it's difficult to conceive a belief that doesn't result in an action, such as joining the Taliban. It would of course be way beyond the pale to consider killing someone for a belief we think is implanted in his mind, minus the action. And we would still capture enemy combatants when possible rather than kill them. So his statement comes off as being not so extreme after all.

Maybe someone would like to comment. Other possible topics for comment from this chapter:

---Harris' definition of belief as a representation of the world

--faith as consolation

--the unreasonable actions of the faithful are often rational

--if nothing more than faith is supposedly needed for the assurance that propositions are true, why then do the faithful show such interest in seeking evidence for these propositions?

--faith bears a strong similarity to madness

--faith motivates people to self-sacrifice

That's a tough one. Perhaps there is a line that could be crossed, but I think it would be very difficult. If we could prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that someone was going to attempt to murder as many people as possible based on their beliefs, we would have to rule out the option to imprison them. What beliefs would be so bad that killing that person is ethical? A number of examples come to mind, but most of them are colored by the fact that I recognize them as harmful only in hindsight. Two men with nearly identical beliefs could differ in only a few small details, yet be complete opposites with respect to their moral agenda. That's only speculation, but if it's a possibility, then it must be considered. We have no way to read people's minds.

Beliefs alone may not be enough, but analysis of both belief and past actions could be. If a person is Islamic and believes precisely the same as a member of the Taliban, yet does not join any militant group, the only distinction is that of action. Meaning, the only way to distinguish which of two people with identical beliefs is more dangerous is by their actions, in this case joining a militant group. It's hard to see how belief alone is enough to condemn a man.

Harris does say the ethical thing is to capture if possible, but often that isn't possible. There does have to be some threat displayed in order to kill anyone, but Harris is saying that the belief can sometimes be considered the primary threat, regardless of any action having occurred. When you think about it, we would never be in Afghanistan just because of what is essentially a civil war. We consider the existence of the Taliban to be an existential threat to us, however, and this is because of their beliefs. Their beliefs about spreading Muslim rule cause them to harbor Al Qaeda, which has vowed to destroy us. So we go after the Taliban as well as Al Qaeda in what is basically a preemptive action. Somewhat the same fear was present before Vietnam, with communist belief constituting the threat. We're on better footing with our choice of enemies today, though.

Sam Harris is a sick and twisted person. It is unfathomable to me that intelligent people would waste their time reading his books. The statement he makes beginning on the bottom of page 52 that the link between belief and behavior has the potential to be so dangerous that some people should be killed merely for their beliefs is not the worst offense he commits. A far more insidious one is on page 51 where SH posits that our humanness is a function of our ability to perceive the world. This is a perverse view of humanity and devalues us to the point where there need be no hesitation about killing someone whose beliefs are unacceptable to us than to squash the bug that is annoying us. Let's carry the argument one step farther. It is not ony ethical but necessary to kill people if their beliefs are potentially harmful.

You have such a hair-trigger. Looking for things to pounce on, or conclusions to jump to, you don't sometimes appear to read what's in front of you. Is there no difference to be observed between your statement that Harris defines our humanness as a function of our ability to perceive, and what he really says, "the very humanness of any brain consists largely in its capacity to evaluate new statements of propositional truth"? (emphasis added) Similarly, there are qualifiers in his statement about killing for beliefs that you could notice if you chose to. But then you'd have less opportunity for high dudgeon.

First of all, I am not offended by SH. Frankly I think he is laughing all the way to the bank. He knows that the more outlandish he is the more books he will sell, and he is right.

Our humanness is not a function of any of our traits. From my perspective we are different from all other animals because we have a soul. SH does not believe that. You don't believe that, perhaps. But because our soul differentiates us from all other animals the killing of a human being is murder. When SH and others reduce the human to just another animal killing for convenience is not only justifiable but logical. Do you see the trap? Admittedly I simplified Harris' definition of human but using your expanded statement: Is a baby human? How about an alzheimer's patient? What about those religious people who are incorrectly evaluating statements of propositional truth? Maybe, in SH's world they are still human but just not quite as human are others. Perhaps they are subhumans.

Stahrwe, the problem is you aren't capable of seeing the moral conundrum. It is equivalent to the question of whether or not you would kill Adolf Hitler if you were transported back in time and were introduced to him as a child. It's not a simple problem, but to your polarized perspective it may seem so. My problem, in both cases, is that even the most destructive beliefs(all humans must die!) cannot be proven to be held to such an extent that death is warranted. Only when mixed with action, which is observable, can a decision be made. SH's argument is that action and belief are equivalent.

I'm not sure what you mean by the Hitler comparison. My answer to that puzzle would not be to kill him but to alter his life situation so that he would not become the evil man he ulitimately was.

As for SH arguing that action and belief are equivalent, I wonder if he knows that he is promoting something Jesus said. When talking about lust, Jesus said that if a man lusts in his heart, it is as if he had committed the act.

From your answers, you are truly missing the point. The conundrum in question, you have only a few minutes before you're returned to the future. With belief being equal to action, what is to be done for the person who wants nothing more than to murder and rape as many people as possible? If the two are equal, it's as if he's already done it. So, what is the punishment?

Sorry, I missed the time restriction on how long I had to act. Perhaps you should resubmit the puzzle with all of the errors corrected before I respond to it.

Either I missed something in this chapter or this discussion has gone way off base. In my reading of this Harris is saying that if all religious people were really following their religious writings (koran, bible, etc.) they would be killing each other because the writings tell them to do so. HIs statement is accurate.

All of the posts on this subject seem to be defending or defiling Harris and he is merely quoting the words that religious folks say they live by. Whether folks like it or not, the teachings definitively tell them to kill others who don't follow their own beliefs.

Thank you! This is a great topic.



I'd like to hear some Christians answer this question in detail. Why the thousands of books, essays, lectures, movies and sermons defending belief in God as rational and reasonable? Do we need faith or evidence to believe? And if evidence is ever considered why isn't it always considered? To me it seems that reason and science are used right up to the point where they no longer support belief in God. At some point when logic and facts conflict with the conclusion that a creator exists and is responsible for creating and overseeing the universe believers seem to drop the guise of caring about being rational and they quickly spout out, "Well, you just have to have faith." Really? Well, then why all the wasted time arguing about missing links, violation of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, and such? Should we have faith or trust in reason? Which is it?



I'm struggling to put my thoughts into words right now. The key is clearly the action someone takes as the result of their thoughts. I think I've heard the term "thought crime" used to describe what we're discussing here. OK, I looked it up and according to Wikipedia George Orwell's 1984 is about "thought crimes." I've not read the book. I'm sure we can agree that there is no crime in thinking thoughts, no matter how vile, disgusting and evil the thoughts. But we can also probably agree that there is a much higher probability of vile, disgusting and evil actions being taken by someone who has such thoughts. The problem is in knowing for CERTAIN what someone is thinking and knowing for CERTAIN they plan to act on those thoughts. I doubt this level of technology will ever be realized so freedom of thought must be protected.

But the moment someone joins a militant group that has committed crimes that person becomes a part of the larger group and can be judged based on the actions of the group. You're a member of Al Queda yet you've never personally beheaded a news reporter? You are still a target and guilty of supporting the actions of the larger group.

Where do we draw the line? Should each of us that live in the USA be judged for the actions of our government and military? Did any of us take an action to join the United States? (some did through immigration) And aren't there an infinite amount of beliefs within the populace of this nation and no real consensus on military actions? I guess the issue is the stated purpose or agenda of a group AND that groups actions.

I told you I was struggling to find the right words!



Premise 1: Souls are awesome
Premise 2: Only humans have souls
Conclusion: Humans are therefore awesome

I agree with Premise 1! Souls are really cool!

Premise 2 is actually not a premise, but an unfounded conclusion. We don't have any evidence that souls exist or that humans possess them.

So your conclusion is invalid because you've used an unfounded premise. There is currently no reason to conclude anything other than that humans are simply one animal of millions inhabiting this rock we can Earth. Yeah, we're pretty cool and all, but we're an animal nonetheless.



We're talking magic here. If you magically could be transported back in time to a scenario where you could kill Hitler prior to the Holocaust and you magically knew with certainty that if you did not kill him he would cause the Holocaust to occur would you kill him? Don't add any variables. You have two choices: do nothing or kill Hitler.

What would you do?



I don't have Sam's book here with me to go back and read his words so I'll assume that Sam has indeed made this argument. If he has I disagree much the same as it appears Interbane disagrees. But this is very valid point, Stahrwe.

With that said I have a few comments about lust. Lust is natural, lust is good, not everybody does it, but everybody should. (George Michael from "I Want Your Sex")

On a serious note...lust is indeed natural. To not lust and desire sexually is abnormal. All sexually reproducing species experience a strong sexual desire. This is nature's way of seeing that we get together, have sex and create more little lustful beings. Wow, I said that in such an anthropomorphic way! Let me revise my words. Those organisms that had a strong enough lust for sexual reproduction did the deed and passed along their horny genes. Nature selects for horniness.

It has always bothered me how the Catholic Church (I was raised Catholic) teaches that masturbation is self-abuse and lust outside of marriage is a sin. If we all stopped lusting our species would be doomed. The Catholic Church has an unnatural and unhealthy stance on human sexuality and reproduction. And people ask us atheists why we don't just keep our mouths shut and let people believe whatever they want to believe! Some beliefs are dangerous and deleterious to society. And keeping in line with the topic of this discussion - many beliefs don't stay inside the believers head. Catholics are continuously fighting to get their beliefs incorporated into public policy. Atheists can sit around and wait for believers to act on their beliefs, which can prove to be too late at that point, or we can attempt to teach believers how to think more clearly and critically. We can attack the weed at the root so it stops growing.

I want to mention how much I appreciate Chris O'Connor's comments on this thread. As a lapsed Catholic myself, I know there is no end to the idiocy that comes from the Catholic Church. Harris briefly mentions one of my favorites, transubstantiation.

"Jesus Christ—who, as it turns out, was born of a virgin, cheated death, and rose bodily into the heavens—can now be eaten in the form of a cracker." (73)

As others have said, Harris assumes that people actually believe these things, but as a recent religious survey shows, almost no one really does. Most folks aren't even aware that the Catholic Church claims that at mass the wafer actually becomes Jesus' body, and the wine actually becomes Jesus' blood. So what Harris has failed to account for (so far) is our amazing ability to "believe" the tenets of religion to a very marginal degree. He does say that the terrorists who flew the planes into the World Trade Center were not cowards or lunatics—"they were men of faith—perfect faith, as it turns out—and this, it must finally be acknowledged, is a terrible thing to be." (67)

Just to clarify, Ch. 2 is entitled "The nature of Belief" and nowhere does Sam Harris actually suggest that people should be killed for their beliefs. He does ask this question hypothetically. See DWill's first post on this thread for the exact quote.

What Sam Harris does unequivocally argue is that faith should not be taught as a virtue. "Religious unreason should acquire an even greater stigma in our discourse, given that it remains among the principal causes of armed conflict in our world." (77)

Even if you aren't quite persuaded by the second part of this equation—that religion is the principal cause of armed conflict—Harris is absolutely right on the money with his argument that faith is not a virtue. We have talked about this many times before on BookTalk. How did we even get to this point where faith is considered a virtue? I think it is an artifact from the old, old days when we simply didn't know much about the world we live in and we made up stories to explain it. Science came along and filled in many of our knowledge gaps, but many people still hold on to this quaint(?) notion that faith is somehow a good thing.

Sam Harris has been widely criticized for taking such a hard line on religion, but he really makes some eloquently worded observations here.

". . . Religious faith is simply unjustified belief in matters of ultimate concern—specifically in propositions that promise some mechanism by which human life can be spared the ravages of time and death. Faith is what credulity becomes when it finally achieves escape velocity from the constraints of terrestrial discourse—constraints like reasonableness, internal coherence, civility, and candor. However far you feel you have fled the parish (even if you are now adjusting the mirror on the Hubble Space Telescope), you are likely to be the product of a culture that has elevated belief, in the absence of evidence, to the highest place in the hierarchy of human virtues. Ignorance is the true coinage of this realm—“Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed” (John 20:29)—and every child is instructed that it is, at the very least, an option, if not a sacred duty, to disregard the facts of this world out of deference to the God who lurks in his mother's and father's imaginations." (65)

In this chapter, Harris says there is a very thin line between faith and madness. Harris asks: what's the difference between a man who believes that God will reward him with 72 virgins if he kills a score of Jewish teenagers and someone who believes that creatures from Alpha Centauri are beaming him messages of world peace through his hair dryer? The difference is that the second guy is the only one who believes it. So he's crazy. But the first guy's beliefs are shared by an entire culture. And if your delusions are shared by others it's sign of faith, and that's a good thing.

Thank you, Geo.

I've heard people refer to the terrorists that flew the planes into the World Trade Center as cowards too. But in my opinion people throw the word "coward" around as a tool to belittle their enemy into changing their behavior, making a stupid move, and exposing themselves to a quick demise. I mean...if we call them cowards maybe we will embarrass them into walking right out in the open with a big target on their backs so we can pick them off like ducks in a shooting gallery.

In my opinion there is nothing cowardly about flying a 727 into the side of a skyscraper 1,000 feet over the streets of New York. My heart races just thinking about how terrifying it must have been for the terrorists and the people on board. Those terrorists had large testicles, which is why they were chosen or why they volunteered for such a scary suicide mission. No matter how many times we call them cowards they don't suddenly become cowards.

What do people expect Islamic terrorists to do to show their manliness? Walk up to a US soldier and challenge him to an arm wrestling match? They are out-gunned and stand no chance without employing tactics that we consider barbaric. I'm not defending their actions, but damn they weren't cowards. Those guys had more courage and conviction than most people could ever muster up.

To me this was the most jarring aspect of the 9/11 attacks. That anyone could be so motivated (programmed) to hurt others that they would be willing to sacrifice themselves in the process. This "perfect faith," as Harris puts it, illustrates the true evil nature of religion.