W.L. Craig's Counter to Dawkins, June 5, 2011 Transcript

 Richard Dawkins Made the Worst Argument Against God in the History of Western Thought:

 From 4:59 - 15:37:

"Now, the argument is jarring because the atheistic conclusion, 'Therefore, God almost certainly does not exist', just comes at you suddenly out of left field. You don't need to be a philosopher to realize that that conclusion doesn't follow from those six previous statements. In fact, if we take these six statements to be premises of an argument leading to the conclusion 'Therefore, God almost certainly does not exist', then Dawkins' argument is patently invalid. There are simply no logical rules of inference that would permit you to deduce this conclusion from those six premises.

So perhaps a more charitable interpretation of this argument would be to take these six statements not as premises of an argument leading to a conclusion, but perhaps just as summary statements in Dawkins' cumulative argument for his conclusion that God does not exist. But even on this more charitable construal, it still doesn't follow that the conclusion 'therefore God does not exist', can be derived from those six statements, even if we concede that each one of those statements is true and justified.

What does follow from the six steps of Dawkins' argument? Well, at most, all that follows from these six statements is that we should not infer God's existence based upon the appearance of design in the Universe. It's basically an argument against a design inference as a basis for one's belief in God. But that conclusion, of course, is quite compatible with God's existence, and even with justified belief in God.

Maybe we should believe in God on the basis of the Cosmological Argument, or the Ontological Argument, or the Moral Argument for God's existence. Maybe our belief in God isn't based on arguments at all. Maybe it's based on religious experience or divine revelation, or maybe God wants us to believe in Him simply by faith. Now, the point is, that rejecting design arguments for God's existence does absolutely nothing to prove that God does not exist, or that belief in God is not justified. In fact, historically, a great many Christian theologians have rejected arguments for the existence of God without thereby committing themselves to atheism.

So Dawkins' argument for atheism is a failure, it seems to me, even if we grant that all six of its steps are true. But moreover, I think several of these steps are plausibly false. In steps Five and Six, what he's talking about there is the discovery over the last forty years or so of the incredible fine-tuning of the Universe for intelligent life. It's been discovered by physicists that the initial conditions simply given in the Big Bang are fine-tuned for the existence of intelligent life with a complexity and delicacy that literally defy human comprehension.

And these cannot be explained in evolutionary terms because these are initial conditions. And so Five and Six is just expressing a hope that perhaps someday, we will be able to come up with some sort of theory that will be able to explain the fine-tuning of the Universe for intelligent life. I want to be speaking more about that a bit this evening, but I'll just leave that point aside this morning.

Take Step 3, for example. 'Step Three: The Temptation is a false one.' That is, the temptation to infer design, that is because the designer hypothesis immediately raises the larger problem of who designed the designer. Now, Dawkins' claim here in Step 3, that you\re not justified in inferring design as the best explanation, the complex order of the Universe, because then a new problem arises: namely, who designed the designer?

It seems to me however, that this rejoinder is flawed in at least two ways. First of all, in order to realize that an explanation is the best one, you don't need to have an explanation for the explanation. In order to realize that an explanation is the best, you don't need to have an explanation of the explanation. This is an elementary point in the Philosophy of Science concerning inference to the best explanation.

For example, if archaeologists digging in the earth were to come across artifacts resembling hatchet heads, pottery shards and arrow heads, they would be justified in inferring that these were the products of some unknown group of people, rather than the chance results of a processes of sedimentation and metamorphosis, even if they had no explanation whatsoever for who this unknown people group were or how they came to be there.

Similarly, if astronauts were to find a pile of machinery on the dark side of the moon, they would be justified in inferring that this was the product of intelligent design, even if they had no idea whatsoever who manufactured this machinery and how it came to be there. In order to recognize that an explanation is the best, you don't have to have an explanation of the explanation.

In fact, requiring that immediately launches you into an infinite regress, right? So that nothing could ever be explained, and science would be destroyed. So, oddly enough, Dawkins is enunciating a principle here which would be destructive of natural science itself. So, in the case at hand, in order to recognize that Intelligent Design is the best explanation of the appearance of design in the Universe, you don't need to be able to explain the designer.

But second point. Dawkins thinks that in the case of a divine designer, the designer is just as complex as the thing to be explained, so that no explanatory advance is made in postulating such a designer. Now this objection raises all sorts of interesting questions about the role played by simplicity in assessing competing explanations.

For example, how is simplicity to be weighted, in comparison to other criteria for theory assessment? Like explanatory power, explanatory scope, degree of ad hoc-ness, and so forth. The fact is that many times in science, we may prefer a theory that is less simple because it has greater explanatory power or greater explanatory scope. It requires to skill to weigh the different factors in theory assessment against one another in order to arrive at the best explanation. You can't always simply go with the simplest explanation. But leave those questions aside for this morning.

I think Dawkins' fundamental mistake lies in his assumption that a divine designer is an entity which is comparable in complexity to the Universe. He thinks that the designer is  just as, or more complex, than the Universe itself, and it seems to me that this is patently false. As an unembodied mind, God is a remarkably simple entity.

As a non-physical entity, a mind is not composed of parts, and its salient properties like self-consciousness, rationality, volition, are essential to it. In contrast, to the contingent and variegated Universe with all of its inexplicable quantities and constance. In contrast to that, a divine mind is startlingly simple. It is an uncomposed spiritual or mental substance or entity that has no physical parts whatsoever.

Now certainly, a mind may have complex ideas, it might be thinking of infinitesimal calculus, this morning, for example. But the mind itself is a remarkable simple entity. Dawkins has evidently confused a mind's ideas, which may indeed be very complex, with the mind itself, which is a remarkable simple entity. Therefore, postulating a divine mind behind the variegating and complex Universe most definitely does represent an advance in simplicity, whatever that is worth.

So it seems to me that Step 3's argument is patently false and therefore the argument again collapses even if it were valid in the first place. Other steps in Dawkins' argument I think are also problematic, but I think enough has been said to demonstrate that this argument does absolutely nothing to undermine a design inference for a creator of the Universe, not to speak of it serving as a justification for atheism."

When Pointing Out Hypocrisy is an Ad Hominem

People like to rant. Listeners are critical. So, it comes as no surprise that there are people who will take the opportunity to point out that the ranter in question is being hypocritical if it seems apparent. One points out hypocrisy to accomplish a single task, and that is to invalidate the person's argument by virtue of their forsaken credibility. The logic is that if the dissenter in question's acting in a way that contradicts the cause they claim to be supporting, it follows that they shouldn't be claiming to support that cause. An example of this happening would be a smoker who tells others that they shouldn't smoke citing several reasons.

To point out this person's hypocrisy is to say, "You smoke, so why can you tell others they shouldn't do the same?" This situation raises several interesting points. Perhaps the one that jumps out at you first is the idea that the dissenter in question's apparently exempt for whatever reason, from taking their own statement as true. The second thing that jumps out at you is that the person probably isn't suitable for advocating this position if their statement is to be taken as true. When these two points are cemented in our minds, we easily come to the conclusion that the person's condemnation is unwarranted by virtue of them affirming the contrary by their actions.

What does this hypocrisy point to, then? It serves as an example of how the proponents of any position -- and hence any cognizant being  -- are seen as the extensions of their arguments. We've seen paradoxes arise when we point out the hypocrisy of others. If we accept that the person's statement is true to himself, we reasonably expect that he should not be carrying out the consequences of that position. If he's carrying those consequences out, does that make his position invalid? Certainly, but the logic behind the position is not invalid. Why does it make his position invalid? For one, it cannot be his real position because the person who claims you -- and this means all people -- shouldn't smoke, is smoking.

Hence, a position in any argument is exclusive to the individual who espouses it, and thus a position is interchangeable with the person who takes it. If we infer he doesn't take this position, then what we initially assumed from his statement (that he's against smoking) isn't valid because he has taken another one by virtue of his action; and so there is no negative position for him to take. He has pre-decided his position. What does this show? That we expect a particular position to be consistent with that same person's claims, otherwise we contradict. The statement is valid, but his actual position we inferred contradicts this statement. Rather, his position is aligned with a statement that supports smoking.

This distinction is blurred when the ad hominem card is played. The ad hominem fallacy is an attempt to invalidate a statement's concurrency with truth with a negative characteristic of that person stating it. The negative characteristic in this case is the person's hypocrisy. Not because it's seen as a socially repugnant quality, but because hypocrisy is logically inconceivable, and thus not desirable to commit. We expect that the person's claims be consistent with the actions they hence claim to support. Hypocrisy arises when the person's claims are inconsistent with their known actions.

However, a statement's truth value is not reliant on whether the person supports the consequences of that position or not. It is whether the logic behind that statement itself has any merit that determines whether the statement's worthy to be held as true. It follows from this, that while we link a person's claims and position together as one, that they are in reality, two similar but separate notions. We merely juxtapose related statements to make inference possible -- this inference resulting in what we believe to be the person's true position in a topic -- and this inference helps us maintain a consistent reality, as the process of attaining and sorting knowledge is the most prominent aspect of our daily lives.

It follows from this that pointing out hypocrisy is in fact, can be an example of an ad hominem attack. It's used to invalidate the person's claims by noting the inconsistency between the person's claims with their actual position to which the accuser is held privy to prior knowledge of to even make their accusation possible. Pointing this out relates to a personal level and not merely an argumental level because the position is interchangeable with the person. Any position that may be played out is part of a set that forms a personal philosophy and thus relates back to the individual. This is evident when we see people saunter into heated debate with topics they're very passionate about. The inference of this hypocrisy may not be abrasive to the individual, but it relates to a personal level.

This isn't to say that pointing out hypocrisy doesn't have legitimate applications. If the statement itself has truth, the accuser can acknowledge that truth. It only becomes an ad hominem when a person attempts to refute the statement's validity by pointing to the inconsistency between the person's actual position and their statement. This cannot work because the statement's consistency with truth, as I said before, is not reliant on the characteristics of the person stating it. It's reliant on the merit lent to it by the person's efforts to back up their statement with logical arguments that can form a tenable position. That the position is logical to take and thus tenable does not mean the person takes that position [as demonstrated by his hypocrisy]. There are many positions using truth that form variegating yet valid arguments that one may take.

Pointing out hypocrisy only works if the statement affirms an absolute in one direction or another. This implies that there exist at least two subjective statements that can be made from one objective fact. If you say "the Internet is useless for doing anything", and you are using the Internet to type that same message, you would be hypocritical. You've clearly found a use for the Internet, and so that usage of it contradicts the message your statement wishes to impart, although the statement is still subjective.You're now justified to point hypocrisy out though, because the statement's truth is invalidated by that same person's action. Returning to smoking, if you say no one should smoke because it can damage your health. That is an absolute because you're saying no one should smoke, yet you are smoking. If you're merely saying it can potentially damage your health, you're stating a fact.

What, then, can we conclude from people who accuse others of being hypocritical when they haven't affirmed an absolute? Simple. They assumed that the person took that position that you shouldn't smoke, when in reality, they did not. There is only the statement of fact, and not one of subjective opinion. Thus, the person pointing out hypocrisy committed the fallacy of the straw-man. Note that both the ad hominem and the straw-man fallacy can arise when pointing out hypocrisy, then. "You're being hypocritical, thus, your statement is invalid, because your statement differs from your actual position." It was never stated that it was that person's position, and you attacked the person directly to invalidate their argument.

One or both of these fallacies arise often in debates, and it's worrying to see that people extend the implications of perceived hypocrisy so far. In a word, considering the above, pointing out hypocrisy is often an under-handed attempt by the opponent to get an upper-hand that superficially seems justified because hypocrisy is socially repugnant. When the accusation is accurate, it has only a limited scope where it can be applied, and that's in proposed absolutes contradicting the proponent's actions. Since we've pointed out that one's actions don't determine the truth of the statement, it seems almost useless to do. It could very well be that no one should smoke [although personally I don't care if you do]. The problem here then, usually lies with the person and not the statement, if they're found to be hypocritical under the right conditions. Though I admit, I feel barring others from smoking seems ridiculous to me.