Noam Chomsky on "New Atheism"

Discussion in 'Religion & Philosophy' started by junobet, Mar 2, 2012.

  1. junobet

    junobet New Member

    Joined:
    Feb 10, 2011
    Messages:
    4,225
    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Everybody has got some 'intellectual hero' or the other. For some here it's Richard Dawkins and Co. One of mine is Noam Chomsky.

    So here is what Chomsky has to say about the "New Atheists":

    http://www.myspace.com/chomsky/blog/395413368

    Spot on. There are real problems out there. Of course religious fanatics who want to teach creationism in science classes are worrying, but as Michael Ruse has once aptly pointed out the new atheists aren't really helpful to fight that problem, quite the contrary.
    The big threat to independent science these days is not religion but corporate power, for example here: http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agri...genetic_engineering/suppressing-research.html
    So get your priorities straight, guys!
     
  2. Bishadi

    Bishadi Banned

    Joined:
    Apr 26, 2010
    Messages:
    12,292
    Likes Received:
    52
    Trophy Points:
    0
    as sharp as noam is, he failed to administer the reality of his argument.

    atheist are labeled by theist

    atheism is not a 'new' diety

    but to comprehend HIS belief system, then realize guilt is the method of imposing a responsibility to another, without looking at the self.

    ie... he never observed that an atheist is like an insomer with different identifiers based on its source

    That quote (of OP), if even from him, is perhaps one of the stupidest items i could have identifed from him, today!
     
  3. junobet

    junobet New Member

    Joined:
    Feb 10, 2011
    Messages:
    4,225
    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Sorry Bishadi, but obviously you don't even have the slightest clue what the issue is here.

    This link might help you to understand, but to be honest judging from previous discussions with you I doubt that you will:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_atheism
     
  4. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    I'm not sure I see a point to this. It seems like an irrelevant discussion in total.
     
  5. junobet

    junobet New Member

    Joined:
    Feb 10, 2011
    Messages:
    4,225
    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    0
    The point is "What is the point to the New Atheism" ?

    It doesn't seem to have one other than raising non-problems (such as a supposed immanent conflict between science and religion). Their broad rejection of religion as the supposed monolithic source for all evil leads them to wear blinkers that keep them from aptly recognizing and addressing real problems.
     
  6. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    It's some intellectual-types mouthing off for money. I'm surprised that Chomsky can't recognize the point of this and the audience for it. It's intended to make some people money, and the audience are the people who buy in-fashion books because they're on the non-fiction bestseller list and being discussed in intellectual circles.

    He has noted similar instances in the past of other intellectuals cashing in through that precise mechanism.

    They're writing incendiary books because they know it will win them attention from people who like to think about thinking, and will therefore buy all the accessories one is supposed to have when thinking.
     
  7. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    You mean like Dawkins, Hitchens, et al?

    Funny how a standard can be some daming when it is turned on teh accuser.
     
  8. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    That's who we're talking about, after all. Chomsky would not fall into the same category.
     
  9. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Oh, well, I guess we'll take your owrd at it?

    I mean Dawkins is a standard biology book, and Hitchens is used in every history class in the world!

    Agh, you getting that double standard criticism yet?
     
  10. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    When was the last time you saw a Chomsky book on the best seller list? I think the only time one has popped up there in recent years was when Chavez gave one of his books a recommendation.

    We're not talking about their other works, we're talking about their books on atheism.

    What are you even talking about? You're literally not making sense. There's not two sides of this to be applying a standard to unevenly. We're talking about atheists who write books on atheism, and I commented on the atheists who write books on atheism, and nothing else. Where's the "double" part of "double standard"?
     
  11. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Chomsky, unlike Dawkins, is not attempting to pass his works off as science.

    Sometimes I wonder why I even bother with the athtards? Save the fact that anyone visiting get to see quite quickly how irrational atheists really are. Hopefully a few curious souls will be warned away from the dangers of becoming ... a hypocrite.
     
  12. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    He works on linguistics and politics; and as he himself has repeatedly noted, his work on politics is separate from his work on linguistics. In the same way that Dawkins' work in biology is separate from his works on atheism.

    Because you are a sad, shallow individual who derives his self-worth from attempting to diminish others on an internet forum. Even more depressing must be your routine failure to do so.
     
  13. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Umm, is English hard for you?

    Dawkins cleary passes off his books as science, and yet they very clearly are not. They are incindeary, strawmen aimed at nothing more than disparagement. Yet Chomsky should be condemed for it?

    Standards. At least try to use them.
     
  14. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    No, but apparently it is difficult for you. Is it your second language?

    Provide a quote. Because he has written some books on science, and other books on atheism,a nd to my knowledge he has never actually claimed that the books on atheism constituted scientific works. They reference other works that are scientific, but as far as I can tell he has never actually claimed that the work on atheism is scientific.

    You really, really, really have a hard time reading. My comment--the comment about incendiary books--was about the atheist authors we were discussing, not Chomsky. Who himself does write incendiary books, but for a different reason. You really can't understand what people are writing, can you? You just kind of make up some assumptions about what they must have been writing, and don't bother to actually read what the other person says. Because I can't see how else you could possibly have taken what I wrote about Dawkins, Hitchins, etc as referring to Chomsky. You can't possibly have read that and assumed that my comments were directed at Chomsky.

    How foolish do you have to be to leap out like that, to base such invectives on your own imagined assumptions? And it's not just here that you do it, you perform the same "trick" in every simple argument you involve yourself in here. You assume you know what a person is saying without ever actually reading what they write. Literally, you must start writing your response before the person has actually posted.

    I don't think you even realize how foolish and hypocritical that statement is, coming from you.
     
  15. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Well, as yu dodge and come up wth excuses lets try logic.

    You initially condemned Chmosky because his works were incendeary and not ... science. The actual veracity of the claim he made are of course, not even relevant.

    Yet, when they are compared to Dawkins (who does claim the mantel of science) and Hitchens (who does claim the mantel of history), its very clear that these things fall short of their claimed goals - indeed, in both cases, their real intent appears to be nothing more than needle people, the actuality of academic standards in both fields long forgetten in this emotive desire.

    Yet Chomsky, who offers a cirtque with no more intent than that, is dismissed because he is not meeting some effeminate standard?

    What I read was simply a double standard, how one applies to Chomsky and another to atheists who behave the same way or worse.

    Its not a dirty trick - its how atheists behave. But you guys don;t like it when others see you behaving like that? So its are fault you behave like this? Right.

    Try explaining in a simple, civil manner why Chomsky is inflammtory but atheists like Dawkins and Hitchens are not?

    And then understand that moral conflection and double standards that you will have to apply to maintain that stanadard are subject to something called peer review ... or debate.

    Hard, I know.

    BTW - maybe you should actually READ Dawkins before you defend him. His book the God Delusion quite clearly combines what he claims is science with politics and fails badly at both. But you excuse it? Chomsky is denied? And you have read neither? Interesting.

    I guess that is more pacifist warrior type stuff huh?
     
  16. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    You mental midget, you can't even understand what I was talking about, can you? My statements were directed at Dawkins, Hitchens, etc. You just flat out didn't read what I wrote. Do you understand what plural pronouns are for? Because they sure as hell don't apply to as single person.

    You literally can't read English as it's written by the rest of the world.
     
  17. Diuretic

    Diuretic Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2008
    Messages:
    11,481
    Likes Received:
    915
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    junobet you are spot on! As is Chomsky.

    As a long-time agnostic I wonder about this New Atheism. I smell a marketing ploy. But anyway, I wonder at the mindset of someone who chooses to define themselves in such singular terms. Yes, you're a New Atheist. Now what?

    It's a fad, contains pre-mixed thinking and is probably very high in sodium.
     
  18. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Yep, the ability to define and support a thesis statement makes me stupid.

    And another atheist blows his stack.

    Are you going to follow me around the forum like GZ and stoney now? Do I have to tell you as well? I am not gay.
     
  19. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Thesis statement? This is not a paper, it's an internet discussion forum. What would possibly make you think the subject of my comments was Chomsky? That's what the quote was for! To frame the discussion, to make it easier to follow what I was commenting on.

    What? You're the one inserting unrelated comments continuing arguments from other posts.
     
  20. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Yep, a thesis, the defending portion of a debate, is claerly not applicable - because it would force you to actually define and dfend a position .... and that is anethma to a pacifist warrior.

    Its impossible to figure out what you are commenting on, because you cannot even define what it is your support - and indeed reject the very idea of a thesis.

    Well, no doubt, like all the other 'atheists' on this forum claim, you are misquoted, a victim? Not what you are saying at all?

    Tell me S, what is it like to confront your worst fear? A religious person who is smarter than you?
     
  21. junobet

    junobet New Member

    Joined:
    Feb 10, 2011
    Messages:
    4,225
    Likes Received:
    53
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Well, I have to agree with both you and Someone. That it’s just a marketing ploy was my initial answer and to an extend it still is.

    But who’s the audience? How come books, whose topics are basically old hats as Chomsky has rightly pointed out, can suddenly become bestsellers and start a movement that is on the best way to become a new eerie cult?

    Keith Ward’s explanation was that the new atheists might be motivated by some form of undercover islamophobia after 9/11. Don’t know, there might be something to it, but maybe that’s just a sad side-effect.
     
  22. Diuretic

    Diuretic Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2008
    Messages:
    11,481
    Likes Received:
    915
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Could be a post-9/11 thing - a pox on all their houses and all that. But it could also be related to local issues. I'm now wondering where it is strongest, most strident as I think it could be a reaction to religiosity. I know it's here in Australia, but to what extent I don't know. A couple of years ago there was an Atheism festival in Melbourne and Dawkins attended, among others. I heard some of the discussions and comments from the audience on the radio and my initial reaction was that I'd stumbled across an undergraduate conference, everyone was so bloody smug and convinced of their own rectitude. Further listening didn't shift me from that initial view. I was glad I wasn't there, I think I would have lost it and punched someone :blahblah:

    I can't bloody well stand smug.
     
  23. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    "Debating" with you is a bit like debating with the furniture, and I won't participate any longer.
     
  24. Neutral

    Neutral New Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 3, 2010
    Messages:
    14,003
    Likes Received:
    87
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Oh, a scatter brain of non-standard accusation and finger pointing? And when someone points out the hysterics of teh pacifist warrior, suddenly you are offended, and like so many of your peers, fixated that someone would dare succesfully challenge you?

    So, tell me S, what is it like to meet your worst fear? To be reduced to sullen anger so quickly? To find that there is a religious person who is smarter than you? Scary isn't it.

    But go ahead, act emotional and accusatory, I am sure it all about me, not you.
     

Share This Page