In the spirit of science as a process of constructive disagreement, Evolution: This View of Life is pleased to feature a critique of my previous article "The New Atheism and Evolutionary Religious Studies: Clarifying Their Relationship" by evolutionist and prolific blogger PZ Myers, titled "You Want Evidence that Religion is Bad for Our Species? OPEN YOUR EYES." Unfortunately, Myer's critique raises the issue of whether he is functioning as a scientist at all on the subject of religion.
Imagine Myers teaching a class on his academic specialty -- evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) -- and telling his students that all they must do to understand the topic is to open their eyes. This would be absurd. The whole point of science is to understand topics that are too complex to be self-evident.
It is just as absurd for Myers to say that the impact of religion on human welfare can be understood merely by opening one's eyes. At the very least, he should acknowledge that it is sufficiently complex to merit scientific inquiry. Myers should learn from another evolutionist, A.J. Cain, who said that "Only the shallowest mind can believe that in a great controversy, one side is mere folly".
Who pretends that complex issues are so simple that they can be comprehended merely by opening one's eyes? Religious fundamentalists and political demagogues come to mind. I do not mean to insult Myers by making this comparison. Fundamentalism and demagoguery are ways of thought that can be objectively defined and measured. They are forms of discourse with a purpose -- to motivate a given suite of behaviors -- and they seldom let factual reality get in the way. The real world has too many shades of gray for a fundamentalist or demagogue. Better to construct a black and white world where one path leads to glory and the other to ruin. When I say that Myers is thinking like a fundamentalist and a demagogue, I am stating a testable hypothesis.
Fundamentalists and demagogues are not stupid. In fact, the human mind is probably better adapted to operate in these modes than a scientific mode. Great intelligence is required to craft an effective ideology, although less intelligence is required to follow one, since the whole point of an ideology is to instruct anyone who falls under its spell exactly what to do. Constructing an ideology is so different from scientific inquiry that it's easy to tell the difference. In the case of Myers, all we need to do is compare how he thinks and writes on the subject of evo-devo with how he thinks and writes on the subject of religion.
Myers the ideologue thinks that he can demonstrate the harmful effects of religion on human welfare with a single word -- WOMEN. Here's how a scientist would set about studying women in relation to men. The first step would be to ask what evolutionary theory predicts about male-female relationships and how the predictions are borne out in nonhuman species. That inquiry would show that sexual conflict is common in the animal world and that the kind of sexual equality that has become a virtue in contemporary western society evolves by genetic evolution only under special circumstances. Among the great apes, gibbons are monogamous, bonobos form female coalitions that resist domination by males, and males boss females around in all of the other species (and most other primate species). None of this variation can be explained by religion.
The second step would be to see if variation in male-female relations within the human species can be explained by the same evolutionary dynamics that explain cross-species variation. For example, it is likely that in both cases, the ability of males to control resources needed by females will result in sexual inequality. This is one reason why agricultural societies are more patriarchal than hunter-gatherer societies -- regardless of their religions.
To measure the effect of a given religion on sexual inequality, that religion should be compared to the other cultural forms (religious and otherwise) that existed at the same time and place, such as early Christianity vs. Roman pagan society, early Islam vs. the many Arabic cultures of the region, or Christianity vs. scientific views about sexual equality in Britain during the Victorian era. I won't try to second-guess the result of such an inquiry, but I do know this -- it isn't self-evident.
Myers and other new atheists seem to think that their action-oriented agenda doesn't leave room for such scholarly footwork, but the reverse is true. Scholars who remain in the Ivory Tower can make mistakes without hurting anyone. Those who leave the Ivory Tower to make a difference in the real world need to be extra careful, lest they hurt people on the basis of faulty theory and information. Humility is called for, which is the very opposite of ideological braggadocio.
Elsewhere I have written about the problem of scientists who use their reputation in one topic area to hold forth on other topic areas without doing the same homework that a good science journalist would do, and even without functioning as a scientist in any way at all. PZ Myers has a fine reputation as an evolutionary developmental biologist, but on the topic of religion he is defrocked.
This article first appeared in Evolution: This View of Life
Follow David Sloan Wilson on Twitter: www.twitter.com/David_S_Wilson
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Myers does not comment on this aspect of the article. neither the materialist nor the religious look outside their cherished beliefs. a few exceptions of course.
Religion has brought great benefits to a society and it has bought great harm. as I visit churches and observe from a distance often these churches are like social clubs and the people form clicks.
As far as opening one's eyes, my eyes see much of religion having to do with the male ego and its fear of losing control of its women. religion helps them keep control in their minds. I see religion as very male ego oriented. muslim beliefs and the catholic church are fine examples of male ego centered religions.
As my friend has stated, with what God gave women and with men's desires to mate it is no wonder men live in fear of losing control of their women. :-)
If you supply weapons to warring gangs, you are complicit in what happens.
There are of course other uses. But since im still relying on other peoples strategies atm it wouldnt be wise of me to explain that part of it. Its like having people work for me, I just dont have to pay them.
To understand religion is really quite simple. Like much of everything else, its broken, has been for awhile.
Lady Gaga is a good example.
Christians and Muslims both dont like her much. I personally think its because she is a better example of either christian or muslim.
She doesnt rape, rob, and pillage to gain her wealth. Nor im pretty certain, a history of. Rather she uses her god given talents exceptionally well. Granted some things may be over the top, but if you dont like it, dont watch it. She is a performer. She also uses her wealth/status to help others.
That has always been the point the point of religion. All of them.
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2012/05/30/real-scientists-dont-let-the-evidence-get-in-the-way-of-the-theory/
So you didn't actually read his response then? No, he didn't say there would be no discrimination. Not once.
Wouldn't that require you to define religion?
How would YOU define religion?
The question is had religion not developed, what would have developed in its place. When religion is removed, what will take its place. What I would propose if I could decide on how society behaved by fiat would be much better than the reality in religious societies. In the real world our biggest examples of religious free societies were the communist states, and they did not do very well by this standard.
It is very complicated how much religion determines our biases, and how much our biases determine our religions. Myers response to this issue really seems to be as simple minded as Wilson suggests.
No, actually the point of science is to use evidence to study topics using a careful methodology so that you avoid fooling yourself. Nothing about that means pretending every single topic is too complex to be self-evident. In fact, some topics are self-evident. You should acknowledge the obvious, not work very hard to deny it. You can work very hard to deny just about anything, but that would be just fooling yourself and that is directly contrary to the scientific spirit. Scientific integrity is a very very bad and absurd reason for denying the obvious.
And that's the whole problem with this blog. With Wilson looking at other species, etc. This is an attempt to think and work very hard to deny the obvious. Wilson, being high school and college educated, almost certainly already knows about sexual conflict in other species and about cultural factors other than religion influencing gender inequality. Using this you can easily fool yourself that religions have little to do with gender inequality, even though many religions plainly advocate for gender inequality and are an obvious cause of some specific instances of gender inequality. This isn't looking at the totality of the evidence to make a good, well-informed conclusion, it is just using well-known evidence while ignoring other well-known evidence in order to deny the obvious. This is not at all scientific.
If someone is self-evidence, then there is nothing to explain really. It is simply self-evident, no further inquiry into the matter needs to be done.
The point is that science is not a discipline that actively works to doubt the obvious and pretend every problem is overly complex. If the evidence is clear cut, that settles the matter.
Moreover, scientists focus on what is unknown or not obvious. If something is obvious, that may indeed be part of the science, but scientists then move forward to study something less obvious.
You have only dealt with the subject and byline of the article Myers wrote. You did not dig into the substance of what he was saying in the least little bit. You even veered WILDLY off Myer's topic when you started to refute his claims of the religious treatment of women throughout time.
You sir, were a waste of time.
Such a religious attitude reminds me of the European explorers who used to claim distant lands for themselves, their kings, their countries and even their deity - while ignoring those who already dwelt in those lands.
If a paleontologist had said that about any aspect of paleontology would you not laugh at him?
It really is as simple as Myers says.
Delusional people in large groups all mumbling the same thing doesn't count for jack.
And your critique of his argument on women and religion is beyond astonishing!
Are you completely unaware of 100 years worth of feminist scholarship? In anthropology? In sociology? In biology? In psychology?
This work has already been done, and done again, and discussed and critiqued and refined.
Ye gods and little fishes!
Next you'll probably be saying Mary was knocked up & didn't want Joseph (who was a really gullible fellow) to get into it with the baby's daddy.