Customer Reviews

God is No Delusion: A Refutation of Richard Dawkins

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(19)

 

 

Raised a 'Young-Earth-Christian' but having accepted that the physical world tells a quite different story, I am actually looking for a synthesis of faith and reason that I can respect. Crean's book is not a contribution to such a search.

On page 123, Crean makes the scathing claim of Dawkins, that "So little does our author care to enter into the mind of the believer, that he doesn't bother to argue his case."

One might ask, since Dawkins presents his ideas over some 400 pages, and Crean dismisses them in about a third as many, who might have 'argued a case' in more detail.... but quantity is distinct from quality.

Exactly the same criticism might be leveled at Crean. He parodies Dawkins' arguments, creating cartoons of them that he then pretends to dismiss with references to such works as the Catechism of the Council of Trent, (from 1566). All well and good, for the Catholic believer. But such a response simply fails to address the question, "What hard evidence exists for the validity of your religion?"

Curiously, for any who might, like myself, have been ignorant of it, the cited Catechism, taken by many to be the most definitive statement of Catholic beliefs, includes the following jem:

"Faith Excludes Curiosity
From what has been said it follows that he who is gifted with this heavenly knowledge of faith is free from an inquisitive curiosity. For when God commands us to believe He does not propose to us to search into His divine judgments, or inquire into their reason and cause, but demands an unchangeable faith, by which the mind rests content in the knowledge of eternal truth. And indeed, since we have the testimony of the Apostle that God is true; and every man a liar, and since it would argue arrogance and presumption to disbelieve the word of a grave and sensible man affirming anything as true, and to demand that he prove his statements by arguments or witnesses, how rash and foolish are those, who, hearing the words of God Himself, demand reasons for His heavenly and saving doctrines? Faith, therefore, must exclude not only all doubt, but all desire for demonstration."

Now, let's see. Isn't there an old riddle about someone named Epimenides who, being a Cretan, claimed, 'Cretans always lie'? Here the Catechism says, all men lie, so it would be arrogant to doubt the words of a man. Yeah, that trumps science, any day!

Had I understood the Catholic church had so profoundly slammed the door shut on Crean's mind, I well might have saved the cost of this book.

The author tries--and I emphasize the word try--to refute Richard Dawkins' attack on religious faith. While the God Delusion is far from flawless, God is no Delusion fails to counter any of its arguments. The author makes absurd claims, e.g. children are less likely than adults to believe in false things--Father Crean doesn't account for the relative adult lack of belief in Santa Claus or the tooth fairy. Crean claims that atheists will never accept any evidence for a divine being. Being an atheist, I will offer him this challenge: show me one instance in history when an amputee has his arm or leg restored through prayer to Jesus. If you can do this, I will become a devout Christian. (Or, slightly more frivously, if God strikes down Christopher Hitchens with a bolt of lightning in his next debate, I will also be convinced). Until then, I remain unconvinced of God, resurrections, holy books, and miracles, and other far-fetched claims of religious people.

There are other weaknesses in Crean's argument that I could bring up, but let's not beat a dead horse. (God is good, because,well, he must be, is one). Don't buy this book and don't take it seriously.

If you're already one of the "faithful" and are convinced of the existence of God, reading this book will make you feel good and put to rest any doubts reading Dawkins' book may have given you. However, if you're at all a reasonable person there is nothing in this book to convince you that God exists. People who call Dawkins "militant" are simply not used to someone making a clear and convincing argument against "faith" and God, and so they feel very threatened and respond with stereotypes and labels (i.e. calling Dawkins "fundamentalist" when atheism has no dogma at all).

If you're one of the choir and you like being preached to, feel free to buy this book. Otherwise, I wouldn't waste my money.

This book, like the book it purports to refute, is hogwash. Dawkin's main argument, the so-called 747, seemed to rest on a deductive fallacy. Yes, I know he claims the argument was inductive, or abductive. However, his conceptual scheme was a straw man. In the same vein, Fr. Crean's book is also full of fallacies.

Crean betrays his lack of knowledge of some hundred years of literature on the nature of mental states, i.e. he seems to have ignored the history of the philosophy of mind as it has developed from, let's say, Aquinas. His argument that materialism is false is childish. It is based on the outdated assumption that thought is immaterial, i.e. categorically distinct from material things. He takes the claim that "the brain causes the mind" means "the material brain causes the immaterial mind". What justification does he have for this? It seems to me the claim "the brain causes the mind" could mean "the material brain causes the material thing called the mind." To assume the first interpretation over the second one must actually show the mind is immaterial. He does this by attacking the infamous psychoneural identity theory, that is thoughts, or mental states, are identical to brains states. Even materialist philosophers, like Jeagwon Kim, Daniel Dennett, John Searle, Paul and Patricia Churchland, reject this position, though they still hold a physicalist position. He fails to take into account the Functionalist account of the brain/mind relation, or the connectionist account, or the behaviorist account. He ignores all but the easiest, well maybe not the easiest, but assuredly a dead materialist position of how the brain relates/causes the mind, and calls that a refutation of materialism. I don't buy it. This is the fallacy of the false dilemma; that is he assumes, either materialism via the psychoneural identity theory is true or materialism is false and the mind is immaterial. I reject this dichotomy, and he presents no argument in favor of it.

On another topic, Crean finds Dawkins views of morality troublesome, so do I, but I also find Crean's view of morality troublesome. I quote him "Morality is by definition something binding: an objective standard by which we must govern our personal impulses and desires." Crean thinks that morality is about duty, like a good Kantian or Utilitarian. What does Crean have to say to Aristotle, or to a lesser extent Aquinas, or me? I find the notion that morality is about duty highly suspicious. I do not define morality as something binding. What argument does Crean offer in support of his definition of morality? I found none.

The point of my review is that a refutation of Dawkins is pointless if you stand from an assured conceptual scheme, like Crean's. Much like Dawkins, Crean is guilty of arguing for his point from a conceptual scheme that is in doubt. Neither author approaches the other's position on his grounds, but tries to convince us, the undecided observe. However, neither author puts in any serious effort into arguing for their conceptual scheme. Thus, a rational skeptic, like me, finds both books riddled with biases, fallacies, and the occasional ad hominem. Both books are worth reading, in a sense, but neither book is worth the paper it is written on. However, I do give Dawkins more credit his fallacies are harder to find, though they are still there. Crean, like a good Catholic theologian, starts from the conceptual scheme implied by Dogma and never looks back.

The God Delusion has been one of the most enlightening books I've ever read (and I never speak in superlatives!). This one however, exemplifies perfectly in a nut shell the eternal conundrum between religious people and us atheists: it's blind, unquestioning religious obedience on the one hand against rational thought based on logic, reason and historical/scientific evidence on the other.
However, as we all know - and this is were I admired so tremendously Dawkin's clear and precise argumentation - religion is not about reason, questioning, curiosity, evidence; certainly not common sense. This is not what religion is there for. In fact it would be highly counter active and ultimately would defeat its purpose.
This book is a prime example of this. No holocaust denier, no creationist will respond to historical facts or scientific evidence. It cannot be anything else than a threat to their "belief" system, so why would they?
But for anyone who actually enjoys being curious about this world we're living in, who does not accept authority as truth (may it be political or religious) should definitely avoid a tragic waste of paper as God is No Delusion and should read Dawkins' highly important writing(s) instead. And even they aren't perfect by all means. Just like us humans. Fallible and imperfect still, after all these millions of years of evolution. Marvellous!
Now go on. Dare. Read the God Delusion if you still haven't, open your eyes, start living and enjoy!

Not sure if parody or fundie delusion. Read if you like a good laugh. On the plus side I'm now sure I'm an Atheist. I thought I'd read one last book to try to hold on to my beliefs.

Yet another author enters the realm of ignorance and intellectual dishonesty. The God debate is over and it has been over for a long time. I may argue that a single refutation within the scriptures collapses the very foundation of theism. Numerous elements have been refuted thus his argument is a little too late and are extremely primitive. Morality is innate and human beings do not need deities to know what it takes to support the things that enhance life and what it takes to hinder its essence. If one day the whole world determines that there never were any gods in the first place...would you go out there and start stealing, raping, and murdering others? I do not think so unless there are psychological and circumstantial problems. Ask this question to yourself, your parents, your sisters and your friends. The author should be ashamed of himself. Think people!!!

The book's title is quite telling. Whereas Dawkins takes on the concept of a deity and all of the history (and misery) it has inspired, this book aims lower and takes on a single individual. As mentioned in numerous other reviews, this "aim lower" approach starts at the title and runs through the belly of this underdeveloped tome. Dawkins and his arguments barely move in the breeze of this inane refutation.

An attempt to wring the damp cloth of faith into droplets of facts just doesn't work.

This book didn't contain any evidence for a god. Just more of the same magical thinking that religious people believe it.

I am an atheist, point blank, end of story. However, I read this book and found it well argued for and very well written. Crean defends his thesis statements well.

Even though Crean did not convince me that a God existed, I'm completely convinced that Richard Dawkins does not know what he's talking about, and to be honest I wasn't all that impressed with "The God Delusion."

So that's what I think of the book. I don't think I'd believe in God unless I actually saw God face to face, but I won't deny that the arguments contained within this book are very strong and support his claim very well.