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There’s this post over at Gawker with the shocking headline “A Majority of Icelanders Believe in the Existence of Elves.” What is the basis for this outrageous claim? Why, this study reported on Iceland Review, of course, which found that only 8% of Icelanders believe that elves definitely exist.

I must have skipped one too many math-classes in school and missed the one about 8% constituting a majority. Even if you add the amount of people, who believe in the likelihood of elves to the ones believing they definitely exist, that still only makes 25%

Gawker must have misread, right? The following, however, is part of their direct quote:

Only 13 percent of participants in the study said it is impossible that elves exist, 19 percent found it unlikely, 37 percent said elves possibly exist, 17 percent found their existence likely and eight percent definite. Five percent did not have an opinion on the existence of elves.

What the Hell, Gawker? Didn’t you even read what you were quoting? Okay, let’s be charitable. It’s true that a majority of Icelanders (62% > 50%, see how that works?) believe the existence of elves is at the very least possible. That’s fine. So what? So do I. Since elves aren’t, to my knowledge, logically self-contradictory there is a possible world at which elves exist. It might even be very close to ours.

I don’t really understand the questionnaire placing “possibility” between “unlikelihood” and “likelihood.” Unless the likelihood of something is either zero or one, it has no bearing whatsoever on the possibility of said something. Perhaps the researchers intended “possibility” in a more colloquial sense, but if so then they can hardly lament ambiguity in their results. In any case a majority believing in the possibility (no matter the sense) of something isn’t exactly sensational.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I have no idea who these people are and I’m too lazy to research this in-depth. So pardon me if I judge them solely by the merits of this short conversation. The man doing most of the talking (hereafter ‘The Gambler’) seems intelligent enough as apologists go. Unfortunately he is not doing a particularly good job explaining himself. If you find this video hard to follow, no worries. I did too. Just blame The Gambler. John Ankerberg, the host, isn’t doing much to improve matters either. He clearly has completely the wrong idea about the topic being discussed and The Gambler is doing nothing to correct him. Quite the comical farce.

Let’s start with some of the misconceptions. As I understand The Gambler he’s talking about the fine-tuning argument for the existence of God. The argument deals with the well-known aspect of the universal constants (certain fixed quantities partly governing our universe’s behaviour) that had some of them been altered ever so slightly, then life as we know it could not have existed. To use a popular analogy, our universe is like a machine with a bunch of dials, many of which seem carefully tuned to “life.”

This concept is hopefully understandable even without getting into too much detail. We can leave aside what those constants are and why fiddling around with them would turn off “life mode.” In any case, it has nothing whatsoever to do with whether the age of the universe is sufficient time for “evolution to occur.” I’m not even sure what Ankerberg means by this. Given large enough reproduction rates any amount of time is sufficient for evolution to occur. Not to mention that evolution is entirely irrelevant. The driving force of fine-tuning arguments is usually the supposed improbability of life; not its diversity. Why would the laws of physics allow the existence of life at all, when they could have failed to do so even more easily?

The other main misconception is that the idea of multiple universes arises solely from the atheist’s discomfort with the improbability of life. Many philosophers, theoretical physicists, and quite a few authors have postulated multiple universes for all sorts of reasons. By all means let’s concede – as I did before – that:

Accepting the actual existence of many worlds in order to escape the existence of God seems arbitrarily discriminatory

This doesn’t in any way detract from the fact, that if you have independent reasons for believing in multiple universes (e.g. because they allow you to make sense of modality or because they allow you to retain determinism in quantum physics) then it dissolves the mystery of “fine-tuning” quite neatly into a weak anthropic principle at no added cost. That is to say, if you already believe we live in a multiverse for reasons nothing to do with theism/atheism, then you get to shrug your shoulders at fine-tuning and say “Well, I suppose there had to be life as we know it in one of them.”

Which leads us neatly into The Gambler’s critique of atheists, that we commit the Gambler’s fallacy. He likens it to tossing a coin repeatedly. The coin lands with ‘heads’ up improbably often. Atheists allegedly then conclude that the coin therefore must have been tossed prior to the ‘head’ run. The Gambler considers this conclusion fallacious because the coin might be double-headed. He is right in his assessment that what he describes is an example of Gambler’s fallacy. He is wrong about the dialectic.

This is closer to how the real dialectic goes:
Theist: “The universe is remarkably structured. If you fiddled around with some of its constants, life couldn’t exist.”
Atheist: “Surely you mean ‘life as we know it’ couldn’t exist? Maybe other possible “tunings” could support other kinds of life?”
T: “Alright, but that’s just speculation.”
A: “Sure. So the universe is unlikely. What’s your point?”
T: “So it must have been purposely designed! God obviously wanted life and therefore created a life-supporting universe!”
A: “She might have done a better job…”
T: “Excuse me?”
A: “Never mind. But hold on. Surely your premise, that the universe is improbably life-supporting, doesn’t support your conclusion that therefore a life-desiring creator exists.”
T: “How so?”
A: “Well, perhaps it’s just a massive coincidence or…”
T: “Yeah right.”
A: “Oh, I agree it probably isn’t. However, it’s still not ruled out by your premise and so invalidates your argument. Or maybe there are multiple universes.”
T: “Aha! That’s the Gambler’s fallacy!”
A: “It would be if I had tried to argue that there are, in fact, such universes based on nothing but the premise that it’s improbable that our universe should support life. However, I’m not the one arguing for a multiverse, you’re the one arguing for God.
T: “But surely God is more parsimonious!”
A: “Perhaps. But if you think I would have committed a fallacy in arguing for a multiverse, because the conclusion doesn’t deductively follow from our agreed premise, then surely you must admit that your God-conclusion is equally fallacious.”
T: “But concluding that a coin, which always lands heads up is double-headed isn’t a Gambler’s fallacy.”
A: “No, it isn’t. It is, however, an argument from ignorance. At least until you’ve ruled out other possible explanations for your improbable tosses. You evidently believe in God. Suppose God intervened in the coin tosses?”
T: “But the double-headed coin is analogous to God. What is ‘God’ then analogous to?”
A: “I honestly don’t know. Some other supernatural explanation for the universe being the way it is? Maybe humans will discover magical means to time-travel, go back in time, and design the universe.”
T: “That sounds perfectly ridiculous.”
A: “Not more so than your God does to me…”
T: “…”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Where’s your God now, William Lane Craig?

Maybe it’s just because I’m from the Faroe Islands but, in my experience, Christians seem obsessed with falling into the ocean. Another frequently used canard is the good old “If you saw someone falling into the ocean and you knew they couldn’t swim, wouldn’t you do anything to save them?” This is usually the go-to excuse for the “tough love” of the unpleasant and dishonest kind of proselytism and of the forcible injection of religion into education and politics. A variation is the oft-repeated bridge-gambit; “If someone were about to walk onto a bridge, you knew to be unstable, wouldn’t you be justified in saving them from danger by any means?”

The danger is Hell, the rickety bridge is your life-style, and what’s being justified is any immoral conduct perpetrated by the believers. After all, they only want the best for you. If establishing a theocratic dictatorship or orchestrating medieval torture is all that’s keeping you out of eternal damnation, isn’t it actually the moral duty of the theist to do so?

This is what Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen, in their book ‘Heaven,’ call the Querists’ Fallacy:

“Most querists honestly believe that what they do is necessary for the good of their victims’ lifesouls. You know why. You have heard their reasoning.” Epimenides paused for emphasis. “And you have asked them: What if their reasoning is wrong?”
“I have,” said Sam. “And I can’t detect any flaw in their answer: `By accepting the possibility of error, we risk our own lifesouls for the good of others. What greater love can there be than this?’ That was the answer that led me to become a torturer myself. I tried to inflict mortal harm on Second-Best Sailor!”
“You did,” said Epimenides calmly. “But nevertheless, there is a flaw. You could not find it because you looked for it within the querists’ logic, and that was what seduced you. But the flaw lies in the context, not in the content. Understand this, and you will never make such a mistake again.
“The Querists’ Fallacy is to pose the entire argument within the context of their own belief system. However, if they are wrong to torture innocents, those beliefs may also be wrong. In particular, the belief that the querist’s own lifesoul is at risk may be wrong. And then, what they do is based not on love but on ignorance and superstition.”
“But—are you saying that the Lifesoul-Giver doesn’t exist?”
“No. Neither am I saying that it does. I am saying that it is a fallacy to make deductions on the basis of a false hypothesis.”

So, theocratical believers, if your fall-into-ocean/rickety-bridge analogy is set within the context of your own belief system, what would the analogy look like if set within the context of reality? Well, for one, you don’t know. You don’t know that we’re in danger. You don’t know that you’re not in danger. You don’t know that your belief system will save us. You don’t know that we can’t swim or that the bridge is unstable. You don’t know…anything. You believe. You believe that if you don’t believe, you’ll go to Hell. You believe this for no other reason than your fear of going to Hell.

We’re all standing by a seemingly bottomless chasm. Spanning over this chasm are countless bridges, only one of which is stable and will bring you to the other side. All of the other bridges, no matter how sturdy they look, are unstable and will collapse under the weight of a person. Now, you might be willing to risk your own life on one of these bridges. Are you truly willing to risk someone else’s life on your ill-founded beliefs? Are you presumptuous enough to claim, without a shadow of doubt, that you know better than everyone else? You know better despite the fact that neither you nor anyone else have ever been to the other side or met anyone who has? Despite the fact, that all of us have equal access to the relevant facts? Do you have a moral obligation to force people onto your bridge against their will? Or do you have a moral obligation to let everyone make their own decision?

We don’t even know that the chasm is bottomless. Maybe there are trampolines and amazing sweets down there.

This is why ‘what would it take for you to change your mind?‘ is such an important question. If you don’t know, or if you can’t answer it, you’re a danger to all of us; your querist logic might as well lead you to believe the ends justify the means.

I recently watched the Notre Dame debate between Sam Harris and William Lane Craig entitled ‘Is Good from God?’ I can refute everything Craig said in just three words:

Ideal Observer Theory

Look, theists, if you want to argue that Divine Command Theory farts rainbows and brings orgasms to needy little children, knock yourselves out. But honestly, stop acting as if it were the only coherent meta-ethical theory ever devised in the history of humanity. It doesn’t make you look clever, it makes you look either ignorant or dishonest. Craig must certainly be immorally dishonest, since as a Research Professor of Philosophy he ought to know better.

No, I don’t intend to defend Ideal Observer Theory over Divine Command Theory – though I’ll recommend Michael Martin’s book ‘Atheism, Morality, and Meaning‘ for the interested – and Ideal Observer Theory isn’t even the only theory that fulfils Craig’s criteria of ‘objectivity.’ I don’t even know why we should take seriously Craig’s assertion that ‘If God doesn’t exist there can be no objective morality’ since it basically just boils down to an argument from Craig’s personal incredulity.

However, my point is that philosophical integrity demands that we ought at the very least acknowledge that there are other positions available. We don’t have to accept them. Hell, we can argue vehemently against their veracity. But the least we can do is to not pretend that there is no opposing view; no legitimate disagreement. That’s not philosophy, that’s just plain old propaganda.

For shame!

Last Christmas, I gave you my heart
But the very next day, You gave it away
This year, to save me from tears
I’ll give it to someone special

Tra-la-la special, special. Wait…hold on. Seriously? Look, Mr. Michael I appreciate the sentiment and I can sort of see what you were aiming for in this song, but you need to put that tormented metaphor out of its sordid misery!

I know what giving someone your heart means, you know what it means. Hell, everyone does. But who among us can honestly claim to get a grip on what it means to give Person C the heart you got from Person A? Does this mean that George Michael fell in love with Person A, but that Person A then somehow made George Michael fall in love with Person C instead – possibly with some sort of mystical love-transference ritual? It just doesn’t work as a metaphor.

So what the Hell, George? Did you actually hand someone your physical honest-to-goodness literal heart? Because if that’s the case, you know, I’m sure you can’t possibly blame the person for giving it away the very next day – say, for instance, giving it to a paramedic or a coroner would surely be the right thing to do!

What the fuck?

Cowabunga, dude! I’m so badass that I don’t even have to touch the ground.

Seriously though, I can accept that Donatello might have found a footstool to pose with for the groupshot or something but what the Hell were the animators thinking when they positioned Leonardo? Invisible Buffalos?

I suppose hovering a few inches above streetlevel for extended periods of time is a very handy ninja-technique though. Shredder won’t see that one coming.

Let me explain.

Loose change is a constant curse in this country. My trousers are sagging around my ankles with the weight of copper in my pockets – baring my arse for the world to see. Yes, I am that rich. Why would I ever need to buy anything with 1p coins? The Queen must have some sinister ulterior motives for turning us all into walking and talking lightning rods. Making use of the resulting conductivity for evil mind-control rays or some su – God Save the Queen!

Ah, where was I? Oh, yes. Loose change. As horrifically annoying it is to have too much of the bleeding stuff, you never even have the right stuff. When I do laundry the washers will only accept 1-pound coins. Three of the buggers per wash. Yes, three. I usually fill up two machines at a time. There is no need to waste any more time doing laundry than you absolutely have to, now is there? Except for the fact that you never, ever have 6 bloody 1-pound coins in your wallet by sheer accident.

No, big deal. I’ll just go down to the store and have them exchange my people-money into the native currency of the Laundrian Republic, won’t I? No, sir. That won’t do! What were you thinking, sir? Tricks may be for kids but convenience sure as Hell isn’t for Brits. Boldly I blasted open the store-doors just before closing time! Armed with a single 1-pound coin, an additional 2-pound coin, and a 5-pound note I prowled in on my prey; the lady at the register. With weary eyes she acknowledged my presence, ‘yes?’

‘Yes, hello,’ I said with thick Scandinavian accent that probably makes people think I’m thick. ‘Could you exchange these,’ I held up the 2-pound coin and the 5-pound note ‘for 1-pound coins.’ Panicked at the sight of a crazy Scandinavian with an apparent loose change fetish she started to glance to her sides for backup.

‘Uh, I’m afraid I can’t do that,’ she said. ‘I can only give you two pounds.’

‘Yes, fine,’ I said in the bitter knowledge that I would need 3 more pounds to satiate the Angry Sock-Eater. But, aha! In my mind I hatched an ingenious scheme. Nervously I reached for the coins she was handing me back. Could she tell that my intentions were less than pure? Had she noticed? Would she have looked more sophisticated with a beard? No, she wasn’t on to me. I successfully obtained the two washer-snacks. Success! And now for the tricky part.

‘How much is this disgusting Lilt pineapple & grapefruit soda?’

‘Uh, 99p,’ she responded with bewilderment on her face.

‘Great! I’ll have two.’ With an evil grin I reintroduced her to my neglected friend Mr. 5-pounder.

by Heini Reinert

The good reverend, Bryan Griem, has been assaulted by a skilful acupuncturist with a vendetta. That is, at least if we are to take his review of Bill Maher’s new film, Religulous, as any reliable indication. If there had been any more knee-jerk reactions therein the man would have been positively river dancing. His stock-portfolio one-size-fits-all apologetics strike me as equally appalling in their condescension and unintentionally hilarious in their consequential absurdity. I would be hard-pressed, however, to care much about the poor, nerve-wrecked padre’s issues with the film. Although, I will say as much; the only way to truly please a theist as a non-believer is to stop being one – or, at the very least, to have the decency to stay ashamed and quiet about it. What concerns me, however, is the absurd view about the nature of knowledge and arrogance in the following excerpt:

Maher vehemently denounced what he deems arrogance on the part of people who speak with any certainty about spiritual matters, but that causes me to ask why Maher’s certainty of everyone else’s ignorance should be preferred. He is certain that nobody else knows anything for certain, but only their certainty is arrogant? Maher has not thought all of his logic through, nor has he done enough homework to get beyond the atheistic canards of the past.

I can just about imagine Rev. Bryan Griem patting himself on the back over constructing such a marvellously water-tight argument, while allowing himself his annual peek into a 70′s issue of Penthouse as a reward. However, guilty of not thinking his logic through as Maher may be, surely that would make Griem himself equally so. If Maher is arrogant in his certainty of pointing out the ignorance of the pious, then is Griem not by extension arrogant in his certainty of Maher’s ignorance?

In pointing so out have I too joined in this karmic wheel of ignorance by arrogantly proclaiming that Griem does not have certainty of Maher’s uncertainty of the ignorance of the pious? Furthermore, in arrogantly pointing out my own arrogant certainty about Griem’s ignorance, am I now doomed to be stuck in some sort of recursive loop of ever-increasing arrogance and uncertainty forever? How astoundingly marvellous! In one fell swoop Griem has conclusively proven that if you have any sort of epistemological standards – any requirements for valid knowledge – whatsoever then you are an arrogant bigot. You may believe whatever you wish, make any kind of outrageous claim, and it must be accepted unchallenged as long as you never, ever, dare to do any sort of critical thinking about the beliefs and claims of others.

In short, Griem has managed to eradicate even the slightest glimmer of any objective reality or argumentative validity – and in a single paragraph no less! Need I say that this is quite a feat? However, this does raise quite a problematic paradox since Griem’s views as a requirement demand that Maher is wrong. Maher’s views, on the other hand, do not demand that all spiritual assertions must be false – merely that the asserters themselves are fallible and can therefore not be certain of their claims. Is this truly such an arrogant point to make – on par even with certainty of unproven, unverifiable claims beyond mere human capabilities?

The crux of the matter is quite simply one of nuance – albeit one that I suspect all too many people are unable to fathom. You might well have reached a factually true conclusion accidentally and by hopelessly invalid reasoning. This is especially the case in matters of faith-based conclusions that cannot be independently verified. If we – and, perhaps more importantly, those around us – have no way of verifying our conclusions independent of our reasoning then we must admit the fact that we, as fallible human beings, might be reasoning wrongly. Quite possibly we might still be wrong even if our conclusions by sheer happenstance and dumb luck just so happen to be right.

Image shamelessly stolen from internet

While it is true that Bill Maher most certainly could be described by the tongue-in-cheek epithet ‘Militant Agnostic,’ which can be summed up in the slogan ‘I don’t know, and you don’t either,‘ this is hardly as brusque and radical as it may initially appear. To point out that none of us know anything with absolute certainty encourages us all to question our own convictions in joint dialogue. It also disparages us from taking rash actions – actions based on an absolutist mentality where the ends justify the means and the intellectual autonomy of the individual is brushed aside for the “common good.”

It is true that none may claim absolute certainty that others possess no more knowledge of the supernatural than they do. However, it is ludicrous to designate it arrogant to make such a claim in practicality. After all, we do have standards. It is quite right and proper to disbelieve, even to the point of stating bluntly that the claimants do not know, since the onus is on them to prove their knowledge – instead of playing roundabout word-games in an attempt to annul their burden of proof as some people tend to do. Maher’s conclusion that nobody knows is based on his life-long experience of nobody ever presenting him with any evidence. Griem’s knee-jerk counter that Maher does not know that nobody knows, is based on clutching at the straw that nobody knows anything for certain – which, I presume, was Maher’s point in the first place.

It is quite an amusing irony that I, as an atheist, with incredible frequency am accused by believers of being a Moral Relativist! ^[1] Yet, turn the table on these very same believers and they will be the first to back-pedal into murky depths of the most extreme sort of epistemological relativism. Religion, to me, inherently requires huge amounts of relativism to even function. You are simply not allowed to disbelieve openly in their tenets of faith – or their claimed knowledge thereof – without being construed as arrogant and intolerant.

Lest you think that I speak solely of reverend Bryan Griem I assure you that this sort of relativistic wishy-washiness is a very common mentality in religious circles. As a case in point I shall therefore provide one final example. The Atheist Test by Ray Comfort is something that a few of us have had the pleasure of being on the receiving end of.

The declaration “There is no God” is what is known as an absolute statement. For an absolute statement to be true, I must have absolute knowledge.

To say “There is no God,” and to be correct in the statement, I must be omniscient.

I remember one particularly friendly fellow, faithful in the righteousness of his cause, who attempted this underhanded tactic on me – although, I am fairly convinced that he did not realise the intellectual dishonesty of it.

‘Have you been saved? Do you believe in God?’ he asked me.

‘No,’ I told him ‘I am an atheist.’

Unperturbed he launched right into it, ‘Do you believe yourself to be omniscient, then?’

‘Funny you should mention that, in fact, I am omniscient.’

Slightly taken aback he said ‘Don’t be silly.’

‘I am not being silly. Why are you expressing disbelief? To say that I am not omniscient is an absolute statement, which requires absolute knowledge. Are you omniscient?’

What a frightful double-edged sword Fractal Uncertainty is. It looks very shiny and tempting but if you use it, you shall surely regret it in the morning.

Let me come straight off the bat and say that I resent what is inherently implicit in this question. As if it were a valid ethical discussion in the first place. Why are we even debating this? Is there a single valid argument as to why they should not be allowed to enjoy these same rights as everyone else? This question invariably impinges just as grindingly upon my psyche’s Humbug-detector as any question would, were it to question the extent heterosexuals, socialists, ethnic immigrants etc. should be allowed the same. Throughout all the pompous babble of those who would blush with indignation by the mere thought of two people, who by happenstance were born the same sex and enjoy the company of each other – carnal and otherwise – being allowed to raise a child in a loving and nurturing environment, I have yet to sort out any cogent justification for their “righteous” fury. I assure you that I have attempted such a feat on many occasions but apparently it is beyond my humble capabilities.

As much of their self-perceived moral high-ground is hinged upon the idea of homosexuality as a morally repulsive sin, I have on numerous times proposed the following challenge: name just one reason why homosexuality is wrong and I will, by my word, join your crusade. I can picture the fervent leafing through the Bible and subsequent clattering of keyboard-keys already. However, there are two rules that you must adhere to in this challenge: firstly, no religious references are allowed. The reasoning behind this is quite simple; the Bible’s say-so is no more a valid argument for homosexuality being immoral than it is for the existence of unicorns. (Yes, it does purport both.) Secondly, there are to be no appeals to nature. The fact that homosexuality does indeed occur quite frequently amongst nature’s species aside, morality can never be inferred simply from what is natural. If you are reading this it is because I wrote it on an unnatural medium and presumably you are also reading it on one such.

I will grant, though, that homosexuality not being wrong does not automatically exempt homosexuals from scrutiny in regards to their child-raising qualifications. Still, you should have given up by now. The only arguments left stand on rickety ground indeed. I am almost embarrassed to even treat the following seriously, as any intelligent person will see it for what it is. But for the sake of a complete whole I shall include this moronic line of thought. It is the notion that a child raised by homosexuals will develop a skewed world-view and be at considerable risk of growing up to be a homosexual itself. “Heavens, no!” one is tempted to retort sarcastically “Just as heterosexual clearly beget solely heterosexual children. And woe be us if people grow up to consider homosexuality as something commonplace!” Another such argument, albeit not quite so devoid of common sense, is that a child has a need of both a male and a female role model in order to develop a healthy mental state.

It might be the case that such classical role models would be preferable, still many people throughout history have been raised by a single parent or, for instance, by a mother and her mother, (the latter being exactly equivalent) and, to my knowledge, no more of them grew up with an unhealthy psyche than is statistically probable for everyone. Besides, try asking any orphaned, little girl living in poverty, hunger and misery, which she would prefer; staying parentless or be raised by no more than two loving fathers who happen to be homosexual, providing her with a secure home and all the necessities of life. The presumed missing female role model (presumed because most likely at least one of the men would have a mother, a sister, a friend etc.) could always be found elsewhere or one of her foster-fathers could be effeminate.

The question really is not if homosexuals should be allowed to adopt. The question is rather why they currently are not. It is a case of the homophobic opposition having failed miserably to present any reason whatsoever as to their immature foot-stomping and putting-fingers-in-ears in hope that everyone will simply forget the issue if they alternately repeat incoherent bigotry ad nauseam and completely ignore any mention of a factually sober rebuttal of their holier-than-thou rhetoric.

The age of enlightenment was a long time ago. It is time you grew up and gave everyone equal rights. Allow gay marriage and adoption already. And while we are at it, elect a black, lesbian, atheist woman in a wheel-chair president, prime minister – or whichever political post of prominence is equivalent in your country – the next time around.