We continue considering that Sam Harris and Jerry Coyne deny free will: find the entire series here.
But now to a deeper issue which is to actually wonder whether there is something deeper going on here? As previously noted, it is rather odd that on, Jerry Coyne’s view, we cannot affect change in our brains but environment, “the words and deeds of other people are simply environmental influences that can affect our brain molecules.” This means that the individual, literally, cannot help themselves but others can, family can, society can, government can—why not think big?
But, what are the Atheists thinking? Or, what are they being forced to “think” by thermodynamically controlled bio-sensory input?
Consider some examples of some of the goals of some of the celebrity Atheists.
Here is an example from Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins:
Daniel Dennett: I think it may be easier than we’re supposing to shake peoples’ faith. There’s been a moratorium on this for a long time. We’re just the beginning of a new wave of explicit attempts to shake peoples’ faith. And it’s bearing fruit…
I think it’s a good thing to encourage and I don’t think we should assume that we can’t do this. I think we can.
Richard Dawkins: Yes, it’s almost patronising to suggest that we couldn’t and to suggest that it shouldn’t…
Daniel Dennett: …I would love to do is to invent a memorable catchphrase or term that would rise unbidden in their minds when they caught themselves doing it, and then they would think oh, this is one of those cosmic shifts that Dennett and Dawkins and Harris and Hitchens are talking about. Oh! right! and they think this is somehow illicit, just to create a little more awareness in them of what a strange thing it is that they’re doing.
This ties in with the concept of memes. See the essay “Inception” the movie and the meme – the New Atheist cover is blown for background.
Consider also that Dawkins stated:
It’s one thing to say people should be free to believe whatever they like, but should they be free to impose their beliefs on their children? Is there something to be said for society stepping in?
And what is the goal of having society stepping in? As Dawkins put it, it is that this “might lead children to choose no religion at all.”
Sam Harris looks forward to a time when “making religious certitude look stupid will be exploited, and we’ll start laughing at people who believe…We’ll laugh at them in a way that will be synonymous with excluding them from our halls of power.”
The point being that this is “A Clockwork Orange” all over again. The book A Clockwork Orange (if you are so inclined, do yourself a favor: read the book but do not, do not watch the movie) was originally printed in a censored form (the form after which the movie was made). The last chapter was censored out by the European country whence it came. Succinctly stated, the story revolves around a violent gang of teenage hoodlums. One is arrested and undergoes an experimental treatment which would cause a negative association with violence. Thereafter, when he even thought of engaging in violent actions he would instantly become physically sick. After attempting suicide the state apologizes, detoxes him of the treatment and he goes right back to violent ways. End of story.
Well, that was the end of the censored version. The actual end of the book is simply that he grows up and is done with his childish riotous living. End of story.
The issue is that the real life state, the European country, did not want the story to end with self-reformation but with state sponsored reformation without which there was no reformation at all.
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