{"id":16855,"date":"2012-07-10T16:25:33","date_gmt":"2012-07-10T20:25:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/?p=16855"},"modified":"2012-07-10T16:25:33","modified_gmt":"2012-07-10T20:25:33","slug":"you-dont-need-richard-dawkins-to-be-wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/you-dont-need-richard-dawkins-to-be-wrong\/","title":{"rendered":"You don\u2019t need Richard Dawkins to be wrong"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You can do it all on your own, but Richard is able and willing to help.<\/p>\n<p>Richard Dawkins is fond of saying \u201cyou don\u2019t need God in order to be good\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>If God does not exist, then the above is a meaningless proposition because it&#8217;s impossible for a need to be met by something that isn\u2019t there.<\/p>\n<p>If God <em>does<\/em> exist then not only do you need God in order to be good, you need God in order to be <em>anything:<\/em> nothing would exist without him.<\/p>\n<p>Since Dawkins is of the former opinion, his tiresome repetition of this phrase appears to be an attempt to divert attention from what is really bothering him. Without God, goodness is subjective and changeable.  In practice, no-one of moderately sound mind lives as if right and wrong are determined by the whim of genetic mutation: everyone instinctively <em>knows<\/em> that some things are objectively wrong and others objectively right, a knowledge that, without God, is quite irrational.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than face up to this, Dawkins keeps repeating \u201cyou don\u2019t need God in order to be good\u201d, a shibboleth so profoundly fatuous that one wonders how he gets away with it.<\/p>\n<p>From <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/guest-voices\/post\/dawkins-dont-need-god-to-be-good--or-generous\/2012\/07\/06\/gJQA4fvLSW_blog.html\">here<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>Dawkins: Don\u2019t need God to be good \u2026 or generous.<\/strong><br \/>\nFreethinkers, atheists, agnostics, secular humanists \u2013 whatever name non-believers go under, are not America\u2019s most popular minority. They are also, not a small minority. According to Gallup, in 2011, and Pew in 2012, they comfortably outnumber Mormons, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists all put together. One reason for our unpopularity is the widespread belief that you need God in order to be good.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You can do it all on your own, but Richard is able and willing to help. Richard Dawkins is fond of saying \u201cyou don\u2019t need God in order to be good\u201d. If God does not exist, then the above is &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/you-dont-need-richard-dawkins-to-be-wrong\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":5,"footnotes":""},"categories":[274],"tags":[2238],"class_list":["post-16855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-richard-dawkins","tag-richard-dawkins"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16855"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16855\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}