To be fair, you have to realize that Richard Dawkins is not a philosopher, he's a zoologist. So, Dawkins' response is completely out of his intellectual training and expertise.
What is astonishing to me is that Dawkins has not been able to recognize the fallacy of his answer (It suggests either intellectual dishonesty or simply stupidity on his part, or both). He seems to believe that has gotten a knock-down argument against the existence of God (or God as an explanatory hypothesis).
Oxford Atheist philosopher Daniel Came (being academically trained in philosophy) comments on Dawkins' main argument (which he repeats in the above video in a modified version in order to response the fundamental question of philosophy):
Dawkins maintains that we're not justified in inferring a designer as the best explanation of the appearance of design in the universe because then a new problem surfaces: who designed the designer? This argument is as old as the hills and as any reasonably competent first-year undergraduate could point out is patently invalid. For an explanation to be successful we do not need an explanation of the explanation. One might as well say that evolution by natural selection explains nothing because it does nothing to explain why there were living organisms on earth in the first place; or that the big bang fails to explain the cosmic background radiation because the big bang is itself inexplicable.
As Came's realizes, if Dawkins' argument were correct, then:
-Natural selection explains nothing because it doesn't explain why there were living organisms on earth in the first place.
-The big bang theory explains nothing because the big bang itself doesn't have any explanation.
I'd add the following couple of examples:
1-In 1983/84, when HIV was discoveried and the HIV theory of AIDS was formulated, the origin of HIV was unknown and hence unexplained. Therefore, the HIV theory of AIDS explains nothing! Or to use Dawkins' phraseology and stupid way of thinking: "Even if HIV were postulated to exist, it doesn't explains absolutely anything because you left without an explanation of HIV itself." (Is it a good scientific or philosophical objection to the HIV theory of AIDS? Do you need an explanation of HIV itself in order to conclude, if the evidence is good, that HIV is the "probable cause of AIDS" as Robert Gallo declared in 1984? Obviously not. Only atheists like Dawkins and his "fans" would accept such an intellectually ridiculous and spurious objection, what tell us something about the psychology of atheists and their intellectual powers).
2-After his debate with John Lennox, Dawkins was interviewed and asked about the origin of life on Earth. Dawkins reportedly said that "he was more receptive to the theory that life on earth had indeed been created by a governing intelligence – but one which had resided on another planet."
Now, using Dawkins' own assumptions in his argument against God, we could say "Dawkins, your alien creationist hypothesis doesn't explain absolutely anything because the aliens in question remain themselves unexplained"
Reflecting hard and in a charitable way about Dawkins' argument, I've concluded that Dawkins is stupid in the literal sense of the word (stupid = very dull in mind). He's simply incapable of sophisticated intellectual thinking and even of recognizing obvious fallacies. He's stupid. (And by extension, I assume until proved wrong that most of Dawkins' "fans" are stupid too, because it is irrational and stupid to be an intellectual fan of an intellectually stupid person).
I've found a similar stupidity in other atheists (remember the "What caused God" objection posed by some of them against the cosmological argument), and this "atheistic stupidity pattern" strongly suggest something about the psychology of hard-core atheists. This why currently I'm convinced that hard-core atheists have a kind of intellectual and cognitive impairment, which makes them incapable of thinking rationally.
Their intelligence only reach to the most superficial level on difficult topics.
I'll comment more on the psychology of atheists in future posts.
What is astonishing to me is that Dawkins has not been able to recognize the fallacy of his answer (It suggests either intellectual dishonesty or simply stupidity on his part, or both). He seems to believe that has gotten a knock-down argument against the existence of God (or God as an explanatory hypothesis).
Oxford Atheist philosopher Daniel Came (being academically trained in philosophy) comments on Dawkins' main argument (which he repeats in the above video in a modified version in order to response the fundamental question of philosophy):
Dawkins maintains that we're not justified in inferring a designer as the best explanation of the appearance of design in the universe because then a new problem surfaces: who designed the designer? This argument is as old as the hills and as any reasonably competent first-year undergraduate could point out is patently invalid. For an explanation to be successful we do not need an explanation of the explanation. One might as well say that evolution by natural selection explains nothing because it does nothing to explain why there were living organisms on earth in the first place; or that the big bang fails to explain the cosmic background radiation because the big bang is itself inexplicable.
As Came's realizes, if Dawkins' argument were correct, then:
-Natural selection explains nothing because it doesn't explain why there were living organisms on earth in the first place.
-The big bang theory explains nothing because the big bang itself doesn't have any explanation.
I'd add the following couple of examples:
1-In 1983/84, when HIV was discoveried and the HIV theory of AIDS was formulated, the origin of HIV was unknown and hence unexplained. Therefore, the HIV theory of AIDS explains nothing! Or to use Dawkins' phraseology and stupid way of thinking: "Even if HIV were postulated to exist, it doesn't explains absolutely anything because you left without an explanation of HIV itself." (Is it a good scientific or philosophical objection to the HIV theory of AIDS? Do you need an explanation of HIV itself in order to conclude, if the evidence is good, that HIV is the "probable cause of AIDS" as Robert Gallo declared in 1984? Obviously not. Only atheists like Dawkins and his "fans" would accept such an intellectually ridiculous and spurious objection, what tell us something about the psychology of atheists and their intellectual powers).
2-After his debate with John Lennox, Dawkins was interviewed and asked about the origin of life on Earth. Dawkins reportedly said that "he was more receptive to the theory that life on earth had indeed been created by a governing intelligence – but one which had resided on another planet."
Now, using Dawkins' own assumptions in his argument against God, we could say "Dawkins, your alien creationist hypothesis doesn't explain absolutely anything because the aliens in question remain themselves unexplained"
Reflecting hard and in a charitable way about Dawkins' argument, I've concluded that Dawkins is stupid in the literal sense of the word (stupid = very dull in mind). He's simply incapable of sophisticated intellectual thinking and even of recognizing obvious fallacies. He's stupid. (And by extension, I assume until proved wrong that most of Dawkins' "fans" are stupid too, because it is irrational and stupid to be an intellectual fan of an intellectually stupid person).
I've found a similar stupidity in other atheists (remember the "What caused God" objection posed by some of them against the cosmological argument), and this "atheistic stupidity pattern" strongly suggest something about the psychology of hard-core atheists. This why currently I'm convinced that hard-core atheists have a kind of intellectual and cognitive impairment, which makes them incapable of thinking rationally.
Their intelligence only reach to the most superficial level on difficult topics.
I'll comment more on the psychology of atheists in future posts.
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