The Repentant Gene

Christmas Greetings to Richard Dawkins from the «other» Richard.

2011-12-18T22:43:00.001-08:00

Christmas Greetings to RichardDawkins from the «other» Richard.

Richard Morgan

Dear Dr Dawkins,

Thank you.

Thank you for The Blind Watchmaker, which rescued me from mylabyrinthine search for God and spirituality over a quarter of acentury ago. Reading that book was a true “I once was blind, butnow I see” experience. You made an atheist of me, Dr Dawkins.

Thank you for being a bright beacon of Reason and Science shining inthe darkness of religious folly, even though that darknesscomprehended it not – and still doesn't.

Thank you for that “oasis of clear-thinking”, theRichardDawkins.Net Forum which so brightened my life in 2006, and towhich I led my thirsty mind several times every day for over fourteenmonths.

Thankyou for publicly expressing your appreciation, in thepages of that same Forum, of my little composition, “You'll seeit again, but...” ⁽¹⁾ that was inspired by thetouching incident that you related in"Climbing MountImprobable". In this book, you recall waking your daughterJuliette, then two, one night and carrying her in a blanket to lookat Halley's Comet. "She didn't take in what I was saying,” youwrote,” but I stubbornly whispered into her ear the story of thecomet and the certainty that I could never see it again, but that shemight when she was 78."

Do you remember, Dr Dawkins, how amused you were by the musicalcaricatures I cheekily composed of some of my favourite members ofthe Forum? And how you suggested that I do the same thing for yourdetractors, your “fleas” as you called them with a wink at Yeats'“Was there ever a dog that praised its fleas?"

How cruel I was, much to everyone's glee, when I posted “The WeeFlea” ⁽²⁾representing that “dishonest fruitcake”,Free Church of Scotland minister, David Robertson. He had had thegall to attack your Zeitgeist-lifting book, The God Delusion,by publishing The Dawkins Letters.

Do you remember how our demolition job of TDL became the longest everdiscussion in the Forum? How we loved to hate The Wee Flea ashe called himself.

You know, I almost feel the need to apologise for spoilingeverybody's fun by becoming a convert to Christianity in April 2008⁽³⁾, as a result of interacting with that ploddingPresbyterian minister. Do you remember how one of the members of theForum kindly suggested I seek help since I had clearly suffered atemporary brain infarction? Well, either it wasn't a braininfarction, but a genuine “road to Damascus” conversion, or itwasn't temporary, because more than three years later I'm stillpraising God and looking forward to celebrating the birth of Christ -as a real Zeitgeist-lifting event.

Thank you, Dr Dawkins, for stepping in personally and shutting downthat discussion in your Forum (September, 2008) which had startedbecoming almost libellous, as my former RDNet friends publicly ventedtheir anger and scorn, and hate'n'bile on me, after I had had thetemerity to go on a Christian radio and talk about my experience inyour oasis of clear-thinking.

As we approach Christmas, 2011, I realise that I have much to thankyou for, and I wish to do so in this open letter. I imagine you willinterpret this as a Christian attempt to kiss and make up. Well, youknow you, that's exactly what it is. Why have I chosen Christmas?Because I think we may have some common ground on which we could meetnow that the dust has settled.

My thoughts naturally turned to you as I left a Carol Service thisafternoon. I recall your saying back in 2007, ⁽⁴⁾ "Ilike singing carols along with everybody else. I'm not one of thosewho wants to purge our society of our Christian history.”

So, how about it, Dr Dawkins? For old times' sake? A quick chorus ofGloria in Excelsis Deo, perhaps?Or maybe We Three Kingsfollowed by Silent Night?

You see, Dr Dawkins, truth to tell, I still am, and always will be,deeply grateful to you, since it was in your oasis of clear-thinkingthat I found the Living Waters.

Go figure.

May I wish you a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year?

I may?

Thank you very much, Dr Dawkins.

Yours faithfully (sorry about the “f” word),

Richard MORGAN

1 http://youtu.be/mgXPNAPNc-E

2 http://youtu.be/uhmXA3zVBGs

3 http://www.freechurch.org/pdf/monthlyrecord/sept08.pdf

4 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7136682.stm

2011-11-07T20:52:00.000-08:00

Fred Hahn, over on Cosmicfingerprints, has just made this fascinating post.

FredHahn says:

November 7, 2011 at 6:42 pm

No Rich, I don’t think you get it at all.

What Jesus meant by that statement was: “Be happy now. Rejoice in life for its own sake.”

The kingdom of “heaven” is happiness here on Earth.

I have issued him this challenge:
Do you have any more gems where that came from? Perhaps you could treat us to your personal exegetics concerning, ““Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” According to you, this would be blatant blasphemy, since my SELF is God, and Christ requires us to deny our SELVES.

If Fred should take up this challenge (I'm not holding my breath), here's what he might say:
What Jesus really meant was that we should put our false beliefs and unnecessary fears on the cross. Get rid of them. We must deny our erroneous concept of self in order to discover the power and joy of true Selfism.

Any bets?

Pump up the Spirit Chapter 1

2011-09-13T03:23:00.000-07:00

Pump up the Praise?

« I wonder how that one managed tosneak though the spam-filter, » thought Jon.

« News from Full Praise SoundSystems : Christian amplifiers for all your worship needs. »

It was early Monday morning, Jon’s firstcoffee hadn't yet kicked in, so everything was still blurred and unreal anddifficult to understand. He had just rolled out of bed, struggled to work outthe difference between "horizontal" and "vertical", optedfor "lurching diagonal" and switched on his computer almost as areflex.

Aiming with difficulty and almost missing,he flopped down into his battered COE chair, purchased on eBay, screwed up hiseyes to make them both point in more or less the same direction, and opened hiseMail page.

The previous evening's Praise meeting hadbeen wonderfully spirit-filled, and the congregation had kept them on stage foran hour longer than planned.

It had been a perfect session. As usual,all the members of the group had prayed fervently together in the wings beforegoing on-stage - the two singers, the two guitarists, a keyboards player, adrummer and himself - the bass-player. They had prayed, as usual, in the wings- humility oblige, but just loud enough for the audience to pick uptheir sincerity and fervour.

The sound system worked perfectly, thecongregation had been warmed up by a particularly stimulating sermon. Thepreacher had handled the audience with professional skill, drawing them alongwith him as he alternated between uproarious anecdotes, booming denunciationsof sin, Democrats and liberals, soft, broken-voiced anguish for the lost, andclarion-call exhortations to repentance and salvation. Yes, they had all been truly blessed, ashearts were opened, people released from sin and suffering, lost souls broughtto the Lord. All of which promised hope for the future and increased CD salesafter the service.

Praise the Lord!

But now it was Monday morning. And Jonwasn't praising anybody - yet. Except, perhaps, the world's coffee-producers.

The morning-after is never easy.

Had Jon been more alert he wouldn't haveopened the rogue spam.

Hackers are always one step-head ofanti-virus programmers (Door's Law), and as a rule Jon consigned all unfilteredspam mail to the bin without taking the risk of opening them.

But that morning was not like just anyother Monday morning.

And the FP Sound Systems mail would turnout to be unlike any other spam message Jon had ever received.

Looking back, with hindsight, Jon thoughtthat perhaps it was the coffee that was the problem.

Not the coffee he had drunk.

The coffee that had splashed onto hiscordless (thus tail-less) mouse.

Perhaps that had caused some sort of systemmalfunction. Certainly the cursor had developed a mind of its own. It had takento hovering over blank spaces on the screen, and sitting there, tremblingexpectantly as if saying, « Will somebody please click me? »

That was Jon's second fatal error – he hadclicked.

And as the saying goes, « Click inhaste, re-install Windows at leisure. »

There was a URL for FP Sound Systems whichtook him to an ordinary-looking site, which opened directly onto its « HotNews » page.

So what was hot? wondered Jon.

He had recently acquired a BassTone 400 Pro amp with 10-band graphic EQ, mid-notch switch (great for slapplaying), two-band studio-grade compressor, with an integrated GPS for finding out-of-the-way church hall venues, sowhy bother looking at what FPSS had to offer?

The "Hot News" page was almostcompletely filled with a photo of what seemed to be a fairly impressive four byten half-stack bass amp, though white seemed to be a strange colour for anobject that got knocked around a lot.

He clicked on the image to see ifcould get a more detailed close-up ofthe head.

A pop-up opened which allowed him toidentify the controls.

No less than four bass-specific bands ofactive EQ, clip LED, 10dB pad, mute switch with LED... fairly standard stuff.

So - apparently nothing of interest to himthere.

Then he saw that there were two controlbuttons that had started flashing gently.

Something new and original perhaps?

He zoomed in on them to try to identifythem.

Below each button there was a jack inputsocket and above one of them the letters HSB and above the other SIT:Int.

HSB?

SIT:Int?

Jon shut the image window, and scrolleddown to see if there were more detailed specifications.

Yes, there, right after the voicingfilters.

HSB : Holy Spirit Booster.

With six pre-set levels :

1) Unitarian (this also doubles as the« Off » switch);

2) C of E (low church) (environment-friendly, low-energy consumption. Safe for usein the presence of children of all ages.) ;

3) C of E (high church) with automatic cut-off level filter which can beby-passed for week-day charismatic prayer meetings;

4) Calvinist (functions with the« Sola Scriptura : Psalms-only by-pass » plug-in);

5) Evangelical (general) – an excellent,all-purpose function with high-frequency emissions to

stimulate endorphin secretions. (FDA approvalpending);

6) Pentecostal: automatic HSlevel-detection, kicks in when ambient levels fall below « snakes andpoison ». Can be pre-programmed to emit brief, high-intensity"slain-in-the-Spirit"

signals. Ensure that epileptics have beenhealed (see 5) or invited to leave the room before use

« Hilarious, » thought Jon.

« What a great joke. I'll have to sendthe link to the other members of the group. »

At that moment he noticed that his IM iconwas flashing.

The little window opened « FPSS ison-line and would like to invite you to chat. Accept? Refuse? »

Fully awake by now, Jon clicked « Accept » but immediately typed in« BRB – need another coffee first. »

FPPS says: I'll b w8ing 4 u, Jon. I'vebeen w8ing a long time. C u l8r

Changing his status to « absent »Jon was about to go to the kitchen when he realised that he hadn't yet checkedout the "SIT:Int." function.

Scrolling a bit further down the page, hefound it.

SIT:Int : Speaking in Tongues: Interpretation only (for use withFPPS« Gifts of the spirit » vox-sensitive microphones : see :Optional extras. Can be linked to any word processor or voice simulator, aselection of regional accents available, celestial reverb integrated.)

Priceless. And it wasn't even the First ofApril.

What a joker!

He didn't yet know that it was no joke.

That something was about to happen that wouldchange his life.

Pain

2010-09-05T12:53:00.001-07:00

Pain may close my eyes to You
For pain can make me selfish;
Hurting seems a lonely place,
Where hope can seem so foolish.

"Lord, please take my pain away!"
Becomes my only prayer,
Sometimes shouted, sometimes wept
As if there's no-one there.

"Come into my Sanctuary,
There you'll understand.
Though still in the desert,
Behold! The Promised land."

I dared to open tear-filled eyes,
And as I looked around,
I saw that both my pain and I
Were now on Holy ground.

I knew then that the pain I felt
Would one day disappear,
And, knowing that, I suffered less,
As Love pushed out my fear.

"Lord, you gave my pain a sense,
As Your pain bought Salvation,
For in my pain I found your Grace,
- This is my Celebration!"

Not today...

2010-09-05T12:51:00.001-07:00

They said "Look to the Cross" so I did.

But it didn't look the same today.

The Cross hadn't changed

But my eyes were seeing differently.

The Cross gave me no comfort

For today my heart would not be comforted.

An icy cloud of grief has numbed

All my Cross-sensitive emotions;

Yesterday it was the shape of Hope,

Today it is only geometry.

They said, "Read the Bible" so I did.

But the words were dry and empty.

The Bible hadn't changed,

But I was reading it differently.

They said, "You should pray to God" so I did.

But I couldn't find the right words.

Praying hadn't changed,

I supposed that God hadn't changed either,

But how was I to know?

They said, "Talk to a friend" and so I tried,

But on days like this, there are no friends,

Because on days like this

Words of comfort hurt so much

I have to shut them out;

Sympathy is maddening

And kindness just seems cheap.

They said "Well, we can't help you then, can we?"

And they were right.

But beyond Hope or Despair,

Beyond Joy or Anguish there is faith.

Today I can not feel it, or touch it,

Read it or hear it,

But one word reaches out

And draws it in for me - "Today".

This is only today.

Many of my days have resembled today

So I can have faith that tomorrow or perhaps

The day after, or even

The day after that (Who knows the day?)

That which was true yesterday

Will again be felt and seen as true.

God will not disappear because I close my eyes,

Nor will His word lose its power

Because I can not hear the author's voice.

No, today is not a good day.

But there again, I suppose,

Neither was that Friday.

Not a good day, Good Friday.

But then and now there were and will be

Happier tomorrows.

I believe that I believe that.

And perhaps faith is stronger

When all the proof has been dashed away.

And perhaps faith will be stronger...

But not today.

You may have to run with what you've got...

2010-09-05T12:46:00.000-07:00

GREEN.

At the age of five, Mathieu wasn't what you could call an overly demanding child. He would be content if we simply bought him everything he asked for. And what he asked for depended on which of his friends he had seen that day. If Paul had a Dragon-ball Z sandwich box, then Mathieu just had to have a Dragon-ball Z sandwich box.

When Sébastien turned up one day with Cosmic Power roller-blades, Mathieu knew his days of walking were over - for ever.

That Sunday afternoon, however, our walk in the park started off as a relatively low-cost, overdraft-friendly outing.

It was one of those almost warm,early Spring days and the park was still a fairly safe place to take Mathieu. It would probably be fairly deserted, and the vendors usually didn't show up until the weather got warm enough to entice people out of their houses.

Not that Mathieu was ever tempted by the vendors, or the wares they usually peddled - giant, chrome-coloured, helium-filled balloons, guaranteed to carry your Granny off into the sky if you attached one to her arm, or bags of multi-coloured, life-threatening sweets that fizzed in the mouth with fierce, foaming, chemical intensity. But this was pre-vendor season - or so I thought.

So it was with a sort of blithe, innocent joy that we set off across the Park.

But, as you've no doubt guessed already, my innocence and joy were to be short-lived that day. As we rounded the band-stand, we came across one, lone vendor, a forlorn-looking man whose melancholy expression was explained by the absence of any wind. There was not even a breeze. And he was trying to sell made-in-China, aerodynamic, break-when-you-get-home, toy windmills on sticks.

Mathieu would never have given them a second look if he hadn't spotted his school-friend, Paul, running around in circles with one.

In spite of the lack of wind, he was hurtling around fast enough to make his windmill spin with a malevolent whirring sound.

"Daddy, can I have a windmill like Paul?"

"Sure, Mathieu, as long as I don't have to re-mortgage the house to buy one."

I left him staring spell-bound at Paul's dizzying performance and tentatively advanced a few paces towards the vendor, hoping to be able to read the price somewhere before getting too close

I saw "5 fr. 8 fr pour 2" scrawled on a piece of cardboard at his feet, and heaved a sigh of relief. The house was safe.

"What choice of colours do you have?" I asked him.

He looked at me as if I was intellectually disadvantaged, and with a disgruntled shrug, nodded towards the bunch of windmills he was holding. There was no choice of colours. They were all identical, sporting alternate blue and yellow sails.

When I cheerily announced, "Fine, well, I think I'll take one of the yellow and blue ones," he handed it to me and took my five francs without saying a word, perhaps hoping that if he remained silent I might just take my windmill and go away and leave him to concentrate on looking forlorn.

I went back to Mathieu and proudly showed him his blue and yellow, plastic windmill. He turned around towards me, grinning with anticipation, but his smile disappeared almost immediately, and large, father-torturing tears formed in his eyes.

"What's wrong, son?"

"I wanted a windmill like Paul's."

Without bothering to check up on Paul's windmill, I explained to Mathieu, "This windmill is exactly like Paul's. The man selling them had only one kind of windmill - they are all the same."

Mathieu continued to eye me reproachfully.

"No. It's not the same as Paul's. That one's yellow and blue. Paul's isn't."

I gazed around and saw Paul terrorising elderly strollers with his angrily droning windmill.

He seemed to be running even faster than before, creating a slipstream to make his windmill spin.

Surely he too had a yellow and blue windmill, I thought. When I spotted him, however, I immediately understood Mathieu's disappointment.

I bent down, and placed the stick of the windmill in my son's little hand.

"This is the one you wanted, Mathieu. It's only yellow and blue because you're standing still. If you run as fast as you can with it, it will be the same colour as Paul's - green."

Always take what you're given, even though you may have to run with it to get what you want.

The Nuthatch and the Piano Delusion

2010-09-05T12:42:00.000-07:00

Nuthatch Matt: Hey, Flint, I've just seen something incredible. Absolutely amazing!

Nuthatch Flint: (peck-swallow-peck-swallow-peck-twitch-nervously-swallow). OK. But you'd better talk fast. The turtle doves are just over there, and they look rather hungry. Any minute now they're going to come over and throw us out. (peck-swallow-peck-swallow)

Nuthatch Matt: Well, you know that weird Morgan-plant that appears every morning and leaves a pile of seeds on the tray?

Nuthatch Flint: (peck-swallow-look-round-nervously-peck-swallow) Yeah?

Nuthatch Matt: Well, I just heard it playing the piano.

Nuthatch Flint: Piano? What are piano seeds like? Don't believe I've ever seen those. ((peck-swallow-peck-swallow-peck-twitch-nervously-swallow).

Nuthatch Matt: Well, you wouldn't. It doesn't produce seeds - it produces music.

Nuthatch Flint: Never heard of that. Music. What does it taste like?

Nuthatch Matt: It doesn't have a taste, Flint.

Nuthatch Flint: OK. So what colour is it. Black and white like these sun-flower seeds.

Nuthatch Matt: No, it doesn't have any colour either.

Nuthatch Flint: OK. I get you. It's like water - you can drink it, right?

Nuthatch Matt: No, no. In fact you can't even hold it in your beak...

Nuthatch Flint: You've been at the Neighbour-Plant's parrot food again, haven't you? I warned you they sometimes put weird seeds in there that give you weird ideas and see things that aren't there.

Nuthatch Matt : No, I swear I haven't touched anything like that today. As soon as I woke up, I came straight here, chased away a few cheeky coal-tits, and I was just getting down to breakfast, when the the Morgan-Plant appeared the other side of the window and he started playing the piano and making music.

Nuthatch Flint : You've been warned to keep away from windows. You know you can't always see them, but when you try to fly through them.... You could end up with a broken beak, for crying out loud.

Nuthatch Matt : Flint - the window was part open. I didn't try to approach the Morgan-Plant, but I saw and heard it making music?

Nuthatch Flint : OK. So it "made music"? What's that go to do with the price of maize?

Nuthatch Matt : Well, it was a very beautiful experience.....

Nuthatch Flint : But did it feed your gut?

Nuthatch Matt : Flint, no but....

Nuthatch Flint : Well, it doesn't interest me. And I'm warning you - if you go round telling the others that you've been wasting your time with stuff that you can't see, you can't eat or drink, you're likely to lose your place in the pecking order for the rest of the season. Music? Noise?

If you're interested in noise, go and stir up the magpies and the crows. You'll get all the noise you want.... But try to get it into your head - sure, the Morgan-plant has an exceptionally high seed-producing capacity but this has been verified by other, more experienced Nuthatches, evidence of the morning appearance of sun-flower seeds has been collected, collated, peer-reviewed - AND THAT'S ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW. Morgan-plant's sunflower seeds are a fact. Why do you need to add "muzak"?

Nuthatch Matt : Music.

Nuthatch Flint : OK, music, I'm telling you, this balcony is exactly as we would expect it to be if there were no piano, and no music. (peck-swallow-peck-swallow-twitch-head-stare)

Nuthatch Matt : Yeah... I suppose you're right.

Nuthatch Flint : Oh- oh! Watch out. Here come the turtle doves. (Flaps in a panic and disappears into the trees.)

Two turtle doves arrive, and without ceremony squat in the middle of the pile of sun-flower seeds.

Nuthatch Matt : Excuse me, Mr Turtle-dove - but have you heard the Morgan-plant playing the piano and making music?

Mr Turtle-dove : (plodding aggressively around the seed tray) Just clear off, ok? I'm busy eating, and you know what happens to nuthatches who interrupt me when I'm eating...? Yeah, head-first into the grease-ball and a quick invitation to the Neighbour Plant's cat. So scram while you can.

Nuthatch Matt : OK, OK, don't get your feathers in a twist. I'm off. Maybe the piano and music was just a dream after all.

Flaps away into the trees, and disappears behind the branches.

He will be back for sunflower seeds. They will all be back for sunflower seeds.

Never trust anything you can't eat, OK?

Rational thinking passes through the beak and and belly.

All the rest is fairy tales.

Through the living room window, the strains of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata drift languidly out on to the balcony. The C-sharp minor arpeggios slip briefly in the the warm reassurance of D major without lingering for more than a brief moment, then lapse back into the heart-wrenching melancholy of the initial minor key, first holding us teetering on the brink of the dominant seventh with it's excruciatingly suspended forth, then dropping with an almost sickening, inevitable but abrupt plunge into the angst announced at the beginning.

Anyone for sunflower seeds?

The God Chemicals.

2010-09-05T12:36:00.000-07:00

As Paul said to the Corinthians, "For now we see through a glass genetically..."

OK, that's not precisely what he said.

But what about Jesus' words as related in Matthew 22:37 :"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your evolutionarily selected cognitive faculties."

No?

Your version doesn't say that?

Man, are you behind the times!

You must know Peter's words: "Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an overflow of endorphins." (1 Peter 1:8)

You don't?

Well, you haven't been reading the right books, have you?

OK, let's put that right.

You could start with André Comte-Sponville's "The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality."

which explains how you can get all the spiritual buzzes you want without having to burden yourself with stuff like believing in God.

Then you could check out Sam Harris (Rational Mysticism) who will show you how to find bliss and paradise by tinkering with your neurons the Buddhist way.

Then you will need to move onto Dean H. Hamer's "The God Gene" - How faith is hard-wired into our Genes.

(Please! Stop eyeing your Bible and concentrate on what I'm telling you already!)

After all that, you should be ready for "Where God and Science Meet. - How Brain and Evolutionary Studies Alter Our Understanding of Religion.

This is heavy stuff, but even if you can't actually read it, it is still a good book to have lying around in your living room, because it's presence will likely offend Christian and atheist visitors to your home. A kind of two-in-one thing.
(It has also been known to work as a mother-in-law repellent, and has the same effects as a nerve gas on Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormon missionaries.)

As a reward for having waded through all that, you could then relax with Barbara Bradley Hagerty's "Fingerprints of God - The search for the science of spirituality."

This is truly effortless reading, since you don't have to actually open the book to find her conclusions: her search for a science of spirituality enables her to conclude that there isn't one. (Maybe.)

(As an Englishman, I am preparing my very own contribution, "The Coffee Delusion : in search of Tea.")

I hope you've realised by now that I'm trying to make life easier for you.

Forget about "the dark night of the soul", harrowing doubts, persecution, painful sacrifices, existential angst, flat knees and all the other problems that come with trying to be a true believer.

Your brain is physical matter, right?

OK, you may possess less of it than I do, but that doesn't change the basic issue.

What are your brains made of?

Mostly neurons and neuron-packaging,OK?

What are neurons made of?

Complex molecules too small to serve up and stir into your coffee, but physical matter all the same.

How did all those molecules get to hang together the way they do to make neurons, brains and you and your beliefs?

Just by obeying the programme delivered in your DNA, another molecule.

But it's all matter - and that's what matters.

There's no question of "mind over matter" because mind is the brain which is matter.

And of course all this business of heart and soul is just poetry for describing certain activities of the brain.

Feeling happy or angry or sad or Republican is all down to the chemical cocktails swilling round in your brain.

You don't believe me?

That's OK - perhaps you haven't been hard-wired for atheism.

But the scientific proofs are there.

Now for a little confession.

Not even my Bible says, "For now we see through a glass genetically..."

Paul didn't know anything about genes and chromosomes and DNA. That's why he had to talk about stuff like mysteries and seeing through a glass "darkly".

In fact, he knew less about physics and chemistry and biology than your average, next-door, high-school drop-out.

But we lucky people, living in the 21st century, we know that all those so-called spiritual experiences are just down to, well, brain chemistry. So we can dispense with cumbersome belief-structures and rituals and sermons and cut to the chase.

Use you brain to use your brain!

You want to have a vision?

Easy.

Stop eating for a week, recite a few mantras (on-sale at your local WalMart (DVD and BlueRay versions available) and you'll have your brain getting up to all sorts of tricks - visions, epiphanies, enlightenments.

You might also get hypoglycaemia, severe constipation, halitosis and death, because it takes a lot of practice and a bit of getting used to.

(If you don't want to play with your brain the "natural way," there are leaves and plants you can swallow, smoke or inject yourselves with, but you might just end up discovering the Ultimate Truth about Everything in jail; or the morgue. I suppose it's a question of personal choice.)

Now here's the downside of all this.

What if you didn't get the God gene passed on to you in the heredity lottery?

Maybe you won Asperger's syndrome instead?

Or maybe you share a bedroom with five brothers, four sisters, three chickens and a goat, none of whom are willing to respect your need for the silence and calm necessary for meditation.

Perhaps fasting is something you do every day, because in your part of Ethiopia all the MacDonald's are closed on account of local wars.

In that case, you're just going to have to get yourself a life, brother.

Dying of starvation is just one of those things you need to learn to handle.

Maybe it'll work out better in the next reincarnation.

"For God so loved the world.."

It's all down to chemicals, neurons and genes?

Heaven forbid!

It's all up to God.

The Dawkins paradox.

2009-05-22T12:34:00.000-07:00

Dear Reader,

After having been a Dawkinsian atheist for many a long year, I was powerfully touched by the love of God on April 12th 2008.
There have been many changes in my life since that date, but there is a question which has been intriguing and perplexing me, and which won't go away.
Of course, I have Googled the contents of this question until my cordless mouse crept under the keyboard and begged for mercy.
I have Googled in English, French, Welsh and Brazilian Portuguese, wishing to cast my net as widely as possible.
But I have found nothing.
At least nothing satisfying.
So here's hoping you can help me out.
Perhaps this question could be a subject of discussion, debate, or even an award-winning article in the category "Natural theology for the under-fives."
My problem is that either I am seeing something that isn't there (in which case I will immediately reduce my coffee intake) or I am seeing something that others don't deem worthy of comment – which I would find surprising, and I need to know why.
As a card-carrying RDNet atheist I had successfully acquired almost all the necessary "blind spots" (intellectual and emotional) in order to join in the merry but merciless sport of "believer-bashing".
The blind spots, of course, concerned such questions as "Why is there something rather than nothing" (Our answer, naturally, being "Who are you to decide that "nothing" is the default state?") and the Pinker "hard problem" concerning the nature of consciousness (our answer being "We don't fully understand yet but we will one day soon. In the meantime just keep buying the DVD's and get on with being rude to theists! What is wrong with you?)
Today I am in the totally thrilling position of rediscovering everything in the light of the love of God, but I have the impression that one of the Dawkinsian blind spots seems to pass unnoticed by Christian authors.
I am probably mistaken.
I would love to be shown that I am mistaken.
(The last time I was shown to be in the wrong, it changed my life.)

Allow me to sketch out a summarised time-line of Life, the Universe and Everything as seen by Atkins, Dawkins and my postman. (French postmen can be very talkative, and very opinionated. They have also been known to deliver the mail. The Quantum Delivery Service - both my neighbour and I receive my letters.)
In the beginning there was nothing. (An RDNet mathematician once tried to explain to me that mathematical nothing, or zero, was "unstable" and bound to become something sooner or later. Well, that reasoning didn't work with my bank manager, so it won't work with me either.)
Then there was a Bang and it was very Big. (We don't know why, but that doesn't matter. Get yourself a life.)
Perhaps three minutes later there was a generalised baryon, invitation-only knees-up which led to the appearance of helium and hydrogen.
The grand cosmic Dance of the Particles continued ("What was there to stop it?" a Yorkshireman could ask) yielding atoms, molecules, galaxies, stars and eventually – perhaps ten billion years later - life.
When life was only beginning to flex its muscles, it was just a question of some complex molecules accidentally acquiring the capacity for self-replication which required their eating each other from time to time then going to pieces and falling apart.
Simultaneously, evolutionary mechanisms kicked in, and it was just a matter of time (about 3.5 billion years, give or take a few nano-seconds, but who's counting?) before the appearance of Manchester United supporters, Dawkins and me.
So far so good.
Evolution explains everything about Life.
Whatever shows up, if it favours survival and replication, Evolution invites it to the party.
Sooner or later.
Usually several magnitudes of later.
Except for the occasional surprise, open-air concert given by The Saltation Army.
(Sorry - I digress. Normal service will be resumed as soon as probable.)
The human being is an example of evolution in its most staggeringly complex, tax-paying form.
The human brain evolved leaving the brawn with flat feet, inguinal hernias, and chronic back pains (none of which apparently hinder reproduction. Well, that's what they say in the books.)
Ah, the human brain.
That's where things start to get messy for the Dawkinsian atheist.
In RD's own words (according to the blurb on the cover at least)

"The brain exists originally as a device to aid gene survival; the ultimate rationale for the brain’s existence and very large size in our own species is, like everything else in the living world, gene survival, which tends to imply short-term selfishness. "
BUT
as part of this the human brain has been equipped by the natural selection of genes with the power to make its own decisions, which can override the ultimate goals which were originally used to programme it."
(Keep your Prozac handy.)

Elsewhere Dawkins has said:
“Our brains are flexible enough to be reprogrammed away from the goals that are directly concerned with gene survival, and toward a new and competent purpose, led by a religion, by patriotism, or a sense of duty or loyalty to a party or faith.”
Faith?
Well, hallelujah, brother!
Er, no, not exactly.
But almost.
"We need to rise above our Darwinian heritage," he says.
In what way? "Well, we devote our lives to writing books, composing music, creating poetry — all higher functions of the brain. If we were following Darwinian dictates, we males would be spending all our time fighting other males to get females ….in order to have lots of children and grandchildren. I'm very glad we have risen above all of that."
Hang on a sec, what is going on here?
Evolutionary forces have allowed us to rise above.....evolutionary forces?
OK. Let's accept that for a moment.
We'll move into our "Willing suspension of disbelief Happy-Hour."
What do we get when our brain has out-evolved evolution?
Books, music and poetry.
Patriotism, a sense of duty, loyalty to a party or faith.
Religion and God.
Brotherly love.
Self-sacrifice.
And a whole truck-load of other non-essential stuff.
(I sense myself reaching for my coffee at this point – my disbelief suspenders are being stretched to their limits.)
Do our evolutionary gurus have an explanation for any of this noble silliness?
Well, yes, actually.
Things like brotherly love, symphonies, a sense of humour, condoms, child adoption and God are:
"evolutionary misfiring",
"spandrels",
"exaptations",
"by-products"
and more recently "neo-purposes "
or "neo-goals" as an accidental extension of "archi-purposes".
I'll bet that makes you feel better, mate!
(Just don't make the same mistake as I did last Valentine's Day. I sent my significant other a card with the message:
"My evolutionary survival mechanisms are powerfully misfiring in your direction.
You are the spandrel of my dreams.
Let us exapt together forever"
She put salt in my coffee.)

As I consider all this, I am tempted to paraphrase Shakespeare and say, "There is something mad-bad-or-stupid in the kingdom of Dawkins."
Humankind's finest aspirations are simply evolution gone wrong? (including Dawkins himself, who shamelessly cherry-picks his exaptations, his ability to exercise this choice being another exaptation of course. Like the legendary turtles, it's exaptations all the way down.)
"I am a passionate Darwinian," he tells us, " in the academic sense that I believe that Darwinism is the main ingredient in our understanding of our own existence and that of all life, I am a passionate Darwinian in that sense, yet I am a passionate anti-Darwinian when it comes to human social and political affairs and political planning for the world."
So, Darwinianism got us into all this mess, but it will take anti-Darwinianism to get us out.
Darwinian in order to make a living and sell books.
Anti-Darwinian when he gets the chance to rule the world.

One of Dawkins' chums, the biologist and blogger, P Z Myers, in a lecture to the Minnesota Atheists on the brain said, "It is not idiotic to be religious".
He also devotes a lot of his time to calling religious people "idiots" and proving his superior intelligence by doing clever things like stealing communion bread and doing silly things with it.
That must be misfiring in spades!

So - has the blind watchmaker's watch stopped telling the time?
Has the selfish gene become the accidentally repentant gene?
Have Dawkins and his pals arrived at the summit of Mount Improbable and fallen over the edge?

Dear reader – this has been a long letter because I tend to get carried away and anyway I am Welsh (never use three words when thirty will do).
But I would appreciate your feed-back.
Or a nomination for the 2009 LHC (Large Hermeneutic Collider) Literary Award in the category, "Evolutionary Cordon-bleu Cuisine : things are seldom what they meme."
(You will remember that last year it was won by the MIT chef for his best-selling: "A hundred ways to prepare tasty unicellular kebabs: beyond the primordial broth.")

PS I notice that Steven Pinker (The Moral Instinct) is also rejoicing that evolution has out-evolved evolution : "Far from debunking morality, then, the science of the moral sense can advance it, by allowing us to see through the illusions that evolution and culture have saddled us with and to focus on goals we can share and defend. As Anton Chekhov wrote, “Man will become better when you show him what he is like.”

God's love will show you what you are like.