Why Arrogant "New Atheists" Annoy Me

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Augustus said:
Never let the facts get in the way of a comforting bit of prejudice though.

Train up the child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it.
Proverbs 22:6

Let me control the textbooks and I will control Germany.
Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945)

By the time of Jesus, the Greeks had long realized the value of free inquiry. As the philosopher-Emperor Marcus Aurelius put it:

Suppose a man can convince me of error and bring home to me that I am mistaken in thought or deed; I shall be glad to alter, for the truth is what I pursue, and no one was ever injured by the truth, whereas he is injured who continues in his own self-deception and ignorance.
Meditations, VI.2

This was NOT the view taken by Christians in the Western Roman Empire, who claimed to enjoy privileged access to absolute and immutable truths. These truths meant that the prime purpose of education was NOT learning, enlightenment, or discovery, but indoctrination. Indoctrination is the Church's own word for what it sought to achieve. To prevent free inquiry it was necessary for the Church to maintain a monopoly in the field of education, and to ensure that the only brand of education available was indoctrination.

Pre-Christian Greeks had understood the importance of education, and primary schools were provided for both boys and girls. Rich citizens would donate funds for public schools for the children of their fellow citizens. Such philanthropy was part of an accepted public duty of the rich and powerful in the classical world. This could not continue under the new Christian hegemony.

As soon as the Christian Church was in a position to do so, it established a monopoly over reading and writing. The whole system of public education in Western Christendom disappeared during the course of the fifth and sixth centuries. With a few small exceptions, education was now a monopoly of the Church.

In English this is reflected in the development of the word cleric. Etymologically it is the same word as clerk. For many centuries all clerks were clerics, since clerics were the only ones permitted to learn to read and write. The only universities permitted in the Middle "Dark" Ages were those within powerful abbeys. Schools of philosophy were closed down. Scholars were driven eastwards to the protection of the Persian Church, and later the protection of Islam. The free exchange of opinions simply could not be tolerated in Christendom. Only those who had themselves been properly indoctrinated were licensed to teach others.

Pope Gregory I, who reigned from 590 to 604, wrote to one of his bishops a letter beginning

"A report has reached us which we cannot mention without a blush, that you expound grammar to certain friends".

Naturally, the bishop was compelled to stop his wicked practices. When the Western crusaders sacked Constantinople in 1204, some of them were to be seen around the city pretending to write. They thought it so absurd, so ridiculous, that ordinary citizens should be educated that they were mocking literate locals simply for being literate.

For the Western Church the danger with genuine education was that it might have led people to dispute approved Church teachings. All manner of education thus had to be controlled. Every academic discipline became a Church monopoly, from astronomy to herbalism. In 1565 Pope Pius IV decreed that medical doctorates could be conferred only on Roman Catholics. Surgery was also closely controlled, as was philosophy, and much law, as well as most proto-sciences and the teaching of them. At this time no distinction existed between chemistry and alchemy, and similarly no distinction was made between astronomy and astrology.

The Church consistently tried to suppress the spread of new ideas in western Europe, whether they were developed by heretics within Christendom or leaked in from other cultures. All manner of rational enquiry was considered a potential threat. At best it amounted to interfering with God's works without invitation, at worst it was blasphemy.

The Roman Church insisted that the Vulgate was divinely inspired and this therefore was the only acceptable version. The fact that it was in Latin was convenient, because congregations throughout Europe could not understand a word when it was read in Church, and they could not therefore identify the many inconsistencies that it contained. Referring to the dangers of printing, Cardinal Wolsey wrote to Pope Clement VII in 1523:

This new invention has produced various results, of which Your Holiness cannot be ignorant. If it has restored books and learning, it has also been the daily cause of sectarianism and schism. People are beginning to call into question the Church's present faith and doctrines. Lay people are reading the Bible, and praying in their own language... The mysteries of religion MUST BE KEPT IN THE HANDS OF THE PRIESTS.

The Church had scholars burned at the stake for daring to translate the scriptures into living languages so that people could understand them. William Tyndale wanted to translate the New Testament into English so that every plough-boy might read it. Sir Thomas More, then Lord Chancellor, now a saint, opposed him, holding the traditional line that bishops should have the right to decide who should and who should not be allowed to read the Bible. As More put it in 1530:

It is not necessary that the Bible be in the English tongue and in the hands of the common people. The distribution of the Bible, and the permitting or denying it, is totally in the hands of superiors.

Tyndale fled for his life. He was later captured in Antwerp, tried for heresy, convicted, strangled and burned.

 

[Augustus]

This was NOT the view taken by Christians in the Western Roman Empire, who claimed to enjoy privileged access to absolute and immutable truths. These truths meant that the prime purpose of education was NOT learning, enlightenment, or discovery, but indoctrination. Indoctrination is the Church's own word for what it sought to achieve. To prevent free inquiry it was necessary for the Church to maintain a monopoly in the field of education, and to ensure that the only brand of education available was indoctrination.

Pre-Christian Greeks had understood the importance of education, and primary schools were provided for both boys and girls. Rich citizens would donate funds for public schools for the children of their fellow citizens. Such philanthropy was part of an accepted public duty of the rich and powerful in the classical world. This could not continue under the new Christian hegemony.

Education was for the rich. If you could pay for it, you got it. Same as in the Christian world. Also remember nearly half of the people in these societies were slaves, so education was for the wealthy free citizens only (Greeks forbade slaves form being educated).

The Pagan Romans/Greeks didn't have free education for the masses and the education in the Christian Byzantine Roman Empire was pretty much the same as it was in the pagan one.

"The education system in Byzantium [c.330-1453A.D.] was in all major respects the ancient educational format inherited from its Hellenistic and Roman past" (p. 785), as Markopoulos (2008) tells us. Byzantine Education had three stages (Markopoulos, 2008; Rautman, 2006; Mango, 1980). Primary school began at age 6-8 with small groups of students taught by a hired tutor called a grammatistes, or daskalos (Markopoulos, 2008; Rautman, 2006). Education focused on arithmetic and basic literacy skills: letters and sounds, vowel and consonant combinations, vocabulary words, and eventually texts, along with basic counting (Markopoulos, 2008). The main texts were the Psalter, Gospel miracles, and classical mythology (Markopoulos, 2008; Rautman, 2006). Secondary schooling consisted of the trivium of grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic/logic, and the quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music (Markopoulos, 2008; Rautman, 2006; Geanakoplos, 1984; White, 1981). This was taught by a teacher called a grammatikos. Homer, classical tragedies and comedies, works of rhetoric and philosophy, the Psalms, and some Christian authors, made up the trivium curriculum. Thequadrivium was taught using Euclid and Ptolemy, but supplemented by Byzantine authors (Markopoulos, 2008). Higher education was only available in certain large cities. These schools specialized in subjects such as philosophy in Athens, law in Gaza and Berytus, Greek (and Latin for a time), philosophy and theology in Constantinople, etc. (Markopoulos, 2008; Cameron, 2006; Rautman, 2006; Mango, 1980). Producing state functionaries was always a goal of Byzantine education, and not only mental or spiritual formation (Markopoulos, 2008; Cameron, 2006; Treadgold, 2001; Mango, 1980, Anastasiou, 1966).


In the west it depended where you lived after the Roman Empire fell (which was a very big shock to the system), it's hardly all doom and gloom though:

Carolingian Renaissance - Wikipedia

The Church consistently tried to suppress the spread of new ideas in western Europe, whether they were developed by heretics within Christendom or leaked in from other cultures. All manner of rational enquiry was considered a potential threat. At best it amounted to interfering with God's works without invitation, at worst it was blasphemy.

Those pesky Christians, always repressing science as this story clearly illustrates:

Raymond of Toledo, Archbishop of Toledo from 1126 to 1151, started the first translation efforts at the library of the Cathedral of Toledo, where he led a team of translators who included Mozarabic Toledans, Jewish scholars, Madrasah teachers, and monks from the Order of Cluny. They translated many works, usually from Arabic into Castilian, and then from Castilian into Latin, as it was the official church language. In some cases, the translator could work directly from Arabic into Latin or Greek. The work of these scholars made available very important texts from Arabic and Hebrew philosophers, whom the Archbishop deemed important for an understanding of several classical authors, specially Aristotle.[6] As a result, the library of the cathedral, which had been refitted under Raymond's orders, became a translations center of a scale and importance not matched in the history of western culture.[7]

This also explains the role of Christians in preserving, to suppressing, ancient learning

The Archimedes Palimpsest - History for Atheists

What you are confusing is the views of individual figures within the church, and the entirety of church activity across Western Christendom. Such people generally had very limited jurisdiction.

Of course some were intolerant, narrow minded bigots, but the church was a 'broad church'.

What they did do during the Middle 'Dark' Ages: the vast majority of preservation, copying, translation and creating availability of texts; creation of the university; promotion of natural philosophy within these; spending education to more of the population; creating prestige for studying impractical and unproductive natural philosophy (theological reasons); pioneering the modern experimental approach to science; advanced the use of mathematics in science (Oxford Calculators) etc.

As a result, by the end of the Middle 'Dark' Ages, science was much more advanced than it had been before this period, and the groundwork for later scientific advances had been laid.

The mathematical physicist and historian of science Clifford Truesdell, wrote regarding the Oxford Calculators (one of whom was Archbishop of Canterbury for a time):

The now published sources prove to us, beyond contention, that the main kinematical properties of uniformly accelerated motions, still attributed to Galileo by the physics texts, were discovered and proved by scholars of Merton college.... In principle, the qualities of Greek physics were replaced, at least for motions, by the numerical quantities that have ruled Western science ever since. The work was quickly diffused into France, Italy, and other parts of Europe. Almost immediately, Giovanni di Casale and Nicole Oresme found how to represent the results by geometrical graphs, introducing the connection between geometry and the physical world that became a second characteristic habit of Western thought ...

Tyndale fled for his life. He was later captured in Antwerp, tried for heresy, convicted, strangled and burned.

Nothing to do with science though. Theology was a dangerous ground, science not so much.

Can you name a single person persecuted for their scientific beliefs in the Middle 'Dark' Ages btw? (Galileo was Renaissance)

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Look, I get that the church has had 2000 years to rewrite history to it's liking, and that the religious have tried to sugar coat what happened in Europe during the early, middle, and late Middle Ages.

The reality is that in the beginning, the church wanted to keep people dumb and uneducated, to indoctrinate the people into their way of thinking. In the middle Middle Ages, now that they had had long enough to get the majority indoctrinated, they began to let up a little bit on learning due to social pressures from the laity. In the late Middle Ages, with the advent of the printing press, the cat was out of the bag and they lost all control, as the quote from Cardinal Wolsey showed... The revival of learning during the Middle Ages was largely attributable to men powerful enough to circumvent the Church's monopoly of learning.

It was only after 1400 years of suppression that the church was finally put in its place and made to get out of the way of real academic achievement.

Now that we are where we are; the church, and its apologists, have done all they can to reframe the history to their liking and make it out as if the church was beneficently preserving history and knowledge, etc. Certainly, the translating of documents took place, but the church kept these translated and scribed documents out of the hands of the average everyday people so as to keep them down and pliant.

You call yourself an atheist, and you give the air of someone trying to be impartial, but this is just ridiculous.

There is just way too much evidence in my favor.

 

[Augustus]

Look, I get that the church has had 2000 years to rewrite history to it's liking, and that the religious have tried to sugar coat what happened in Europe during the early, middle, and late Middle Ages.

Modern academic scholarship from experts from diverse religious/non-religious backgrounds is not 'the church and religious apologetics'.

Your view reflects Gibbon, White, Draper, etc. and reflects 18th/19th C polemic, rather than unbiased scholarship.

The revival of learning during the Middle Ages was largely attributable to men powerful enough to circumvent the Church's monopoly of learning.

Yes the Church ferociously prohibited learning by setting up modern universities, installing the Greek natural philosophy in the curricula and translating and spreading knowledge of natural philosophical texts.

They so brutally repressed scientists that many of the most important figures in Western science were churchmen.

You call yourself an atheist, and you give the air of someone trying to be impartial, but this is just ridiculous.

I don't see why being an atheist should lead me to an irrational hatred of religion and a wilful ignorance regarding the evidence that I have seen.

I used to think exactly like you, until I actually read up on modern scholarship of the issue. Again, not 'apologetics'; modern, academic scholarship from people of diverse religious/non-religious backgrounds.

You can even simply read wikipedia to see that my view is not 'ridiculous'.

The "conflict thesis" is a historiographical approach in the history of science which maintains that there is an intrinsic intellectual conflict between religion and science and that the relationship between religion and science inevitably leads to public hostility. The thesis retains support among some scientists and in the public,[1] while most historians of science do not support the thesis, especially in its original strict form.[2][3][4][5]

There is just way too much evidence in my favor.

I can only remember one of us quoting contemporary academic scholarship on this issue, and it wasn't you. Could have used a far wider range of sources, but it's generally fruitless so I just went with what was easiest.

Strange that people with an emotionally based hostility towards religion think the majority of modern scholars are buffoonish apologists simply because they argue against your outdated opinions.

Cognitive dissonance is a wonderful thing.

You literally argued that the church copied, preserved and translated texts in large numbers in order to stop people reading them and prevent the spread of such 'forbidden' knowledge.

Found many scientists who were persecuted in the Middle 'Dark' Ages yet btw?

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

It's like talking to a brick wall that can't absorb what's been said...

Yes the Church ferociously prohibited learning by setting up modern universities, installing the Greek natural philosophy in the curricula and translating and spreading knowledge of natural philosophical texts.

Yes, they first established monasteries and Abbeys in the early Middle Ages where they taught the clergy already established knowledge they collected from the Greeks so as to inculcate the masses who they kept in the dark from all this accrued knowledge.

Why not open the schools to everyone? Why only men? Why only little boys (I think we know why)

I doubt you're even an atheist.

I've come across many so called atheists over the years who do what you do trying to apologize for the church's actions throughout the Middle Ages.

To wit, just look at how fast academics and knowledge has built up in the last two hundred plus years. I'm not suggesting that the same could have been done in the year 300CE, but if the church had truly instituted and fostered learning in it's adherents right from the get go, think where we would be academically today...

Anyway, I'm done with you... Keep on apologizing...

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Found many scientists who were persecuted in the Middle 'Dark' Ages yet btw?

And no, I don't have a list of those the church killed or prosecuted during the Middle "Dark" Ages, because the only people who could read and write in those times (for the most part) were the clergy, and I doubt they kept a book on those they killed for blasphemous and contradictory to the bible teachings... But the movie I referenced earlier is probably how most deaths happened.

The killer in that movie put poison on the pages of books he deemed inappropriate for consumption by other people, so that when someone picked up the book and read it, as they touched each page and lick their lips to get a better grip on the pages so as to turn them, they would be poisoned.

 

[Augustus]

Why not open the schools to everyone? Why only men? Why only little boys (I think we know why)

Unsurprisingly, they were a product of their time.

Most people were agricultural labourers, or if lucky, artisans who couldn't afford to pay and didn't want to as they were too busy trying to scrape out a meagre living and there wasn't much demand for a literate farmhand.

Mass, free education didn't exist anywhere. It wasn't a modern urbanised knowledge economy.

I doubt you're even an atheist.

Well, your opinions on other things don't seem to be based on reason either...

Its strange that people think disbelieving in god also makes you ignorant on completely unrelated matters, but both the religious and non-religious promote the same vapid 'logic'.

To wit, just look at how fast academics and knowledge has built up in the last two hundred plus years. I'm not suggesting that the same could have been done in the year 300CE, but if the church had truly instituted and fostered learning in it's adherents right from the get go, think where we would be academically today...

You do realise that the wealthy post-industrial revolution, urbanised West was very different from the feudal Middle Ages dealing with the collapse of the Roman Empire don't you?

Anyway, I'm done with you... Keep on apologizing...

So you referred to absolutely no academic scholarship, and couldn't name a single scientist who was persecuted.

Only the truly irrational could have failed to be persuaded by such an overwhelming amount of evidence

Anyway, thanks for the discussion. It's just entertainment after all.

 

[Curious George]

...
I doubt you're even an atheist.

I've come across many so called atheists over the years who do what you do trying to apologize for the church's actions throughout the Middle Ages...
Anyway, I'm done with you... Keep on apologizing...

I don't think he is apologizing for anything. He is pointing out that the subject is more complicated and nuanced than the religion is bad/anti-intellectual diatribe likes to acknowledge.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Unsurprisingly, they were a product of their time.

Most people were agricultural labourers, or if lucky, artisans who couldn't afford to pay and didn't want to as they were too busy trying to scrape out a meagre living and there wasn't much demand for a literate farmhand.

Mass, free education didn't exist anywhere. It wasn't a modern urbanised knowledge economy.



Well, your opinions on other things don't seem to be based on reason either...

Its strange that people think disbelieving in god also makes you ignorant on completely unrelated matters, but both the religious and non-religious promote the same vapid 'logic'.



You do realise that the wealthy post-industrial revolution, urbanised West was very different from the feudal Middle Ages dealing with the collapse of the Roman Empire don't you?



So you referred to absolutely no academic scholarship, and couldn't name a single scientist who was persecuted.

Only the truly irrational could have failed to be persuaded by such an overwhelming amount of evidence

Anyway, thanks for the discussion. It's just entertainment after all.

LOL! More apologia... I don't want apologies, I want you to be like Marcus Aurelius, who I quoted earlier.

Sweetheart, the clergy work for the church for free basically... They got a roof over their heads and food on their plates, et al...

One of the hallmarks of religion is the "volunteering" that it does, and the free services it provides. The church survives entirely off the donations it receives from people in the pews on Sunday, it taxed people to pay for it's extravagant buildings and whatnot.

How hard would it be to freely educate the masses like they freely educated their clergy? The fact is they didn't do that because they wanted a dumb and pliable laity.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

I don't think he is apologizing for anything. He is pointing out that the subject is more complicated and nuanced than the religion is bad/anti-intellectual diatribe likes to acknowledge.

It is a fact that the church actively and willingly held knowledge back from people in the early Middle Ages. Plenty of evidence in communications of the church indicating that this was going on.

As I outlined above, we have a letter from Pope Gregory where he is admonishing one of his Bishops for teaching grammar (oh the horror!) to people...

 

[Augustus]

I don't think he is apologizing for anything. He is pointing out that the subject is more complicated and nuanced than the religion is bad/anti-intellectual diatribe likes to acknowledge.

Pffft, only the religious hold to dogmatic, black/white thinking without a shred of nuance don't you know...

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Pffft, only the religious hold to dogmatic, black/white thinking without a shred of nuance don't you know...

I have no religion...

 

[Curious George]

It is a fact that the church actively and willingly held [some] knowledge back from [some] people in the early Middle Ages. Plenty of evidence in communications of the church indicating that this was going on.

As I outlined above, we have a letter from Pope Gregory where he is admonishing one of his Bishops for teaching grammar (oh the horror!) to people...

Bold qualifications mine.

The church (one of many representatives of a religion) did in fact control the flow of some knowledge. Is that your point? Or are you trying to argue that religions repress knowledge and are anti-intellectual? I do not think anyone doubts we can point to instances where religious leaders have in fact done some pretty f***** up s****. That is well documented. But that isn't the whole history is it? Some religion did in fact do some things that preserved and enhanced knowledge as well.

It is okay to emphasize the negative when one is trying to bring the truth to light. But do not forget to acknowledge the positive as well. If you are making the honest point that some religious leaders have at times used religion to oppress both truth and man, then the exceptions do not destroy your point. Not everyone who disagrees is an apologist.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Bold qualifications mine.

The church (one of many representatives of a religion) did in fact control the flow of some knowledge. Is that your point? Or are you trying to argue that religions repress knowledge and are anti-intellectual? I do not think anyone doubts we can point to instances where religious leaders have in fact done some pretty f***** up s****. That is well documented. But that isn't the whole history is it? Some religion did in fact do some things that preserved and enhanced knowledge as well.

It is okay to emphasize the negative when one is trying to bring the truth to light. But do not forget to acknowledge the positive as well. If you are making the honest point that some religious leaders have at times used religion to oppress both truth and man, then the exceptions do not destroy your point. Not everyone who disagrees is an apologist.

The problem with this nuanced argument is that if the church had, right from the get go, gone about educating everyone, they could claim that they were a force for good in the world trying to lift people out of poverty and suffering via education (as education is the only thing in this world that does this effectively)

They didn't do this, which to me means that they, at least initially, were a bad influence on society.

What they, in fact, did was to in the beginning withhold education from the masses and only teach people willing to enter the service of the church, and those people who did enter the service of the church as clergy weren't educated, they were inculcated with knowledge and understanding that the church wanted them to learn, and taught how to bring more people into the church.

 

[Curious George]

The problem with this nuanced argument is that if the church had, right from the get go, gone about educating everyone, they could claim that they were a force for good in the world trying to lift people out of poverty and suffering via education (as education is the only thing in this world that does this effectively)

They didn't do this, which to me means that they, at least initially, were a bad influence on society.

What they, in fact, did was to in the beginning withhold education from the masses and only teach people willing to enter the service of the church, and those people who did enter the service of the church as clergy weren't educated, they were inculcated with knowledge and understanding that the church wanted them to learn, and taught how to bring more people into the church.

That is simple thinking. Can you name one person that is wholly good or bad, let alone a whole organization?

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

That is simple thinking. Can you name one person that is wholly good or bad, let alone a whole organization?

Most of the time, according to William of Ockham, the simplest explanation is often the correct one. Nuance is anything but simple...

The church is ostensibly a channel to wisdom and truth from god. One truth that wise men know is that education is the key to lifting people up out of poverty and needless suffering. If the church had access to this wisdom, why didn't they immediately implement it in practice?

Because that wasn't their goal.

Their goal was power and dominion over all people so that they could control them while enriching their own status in life. One of the ways you can control people is by keeping them dumb and pliable to your suggestions, so they didn't educate ALL people, just those they let into the club.

 

[Curious George]

Most of the time, according to William of Ockham, the simplest explanation is often the correct one.

While that hardly even attempts to answer my question.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

While that hardly even attempts to answer my question.

It's not an answer to your question because the question is pointless. Of course nobody is wholly good or bad, let alone organizations made up of good and bad people, so I got back to my point.

Is the church not a channel to the wisdom and truth of god, and an organization dedicated to the betterment of mankind by espousing the morals and ethics of it's founder?

Is it not truth that wise men know education to be the best way to alleviate the stresses of poverty and needless suffering?

So if the church is a channel to god, and his wisdom is available to them, why didn't they implement education practices for all people? Why only for those willing to serve the church?

 

[Curious George]

It's not an answer to your question because the question is pointless.

I disagree

Of course nobody is wholly good or bad, let alone organizations made up of good and bad people, so I got back to my point.

And that is an important fact to note.

Is the church not a channel to the wisdom and truth of god, and an organization dedicated to the betterment of mankind by espousing the morals and ethics of it's founder?

No.

Is it not truth that wise men know education to be the best way to alleviate the stresses of poverty and needless suffering?

No

So if the church is a channel to god, and his wisdom is available to them, why didn't they implement education practices for all people?

Well given my answer to the first two questions this question really puts me in a tough spot. I do not think I can answer it.

Why only for those willing the serve the church?

Ooh, this one is easier. The church controlled the flow of some knowledge because knowledge is power. People dedicated to organizations often try to gain power in order to benefit their selves or the organization.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

Is the church not a channel to the wisdom and truth of god, and an organization dedicated to the betterment of mankind by espousing the morals and ethics of it's founder?

NO

Well, that's interesting, because I was brought up to believe otherwise (I was a Christian for 34 years of my life).

Is it not truth that wise men know education to be the best way to alleviate the stresses of poverty and needless suffering?

No

Hmmm, that's funny because a quick google search for "how to end poverty" shows about 33 million hits saying that education is the biggest key.

So if the church is a channel to god, and his wisdom is available to them, why didn't they implement education practices for all people?

Well given my answer to the first two questions this question really puts me in a tough spot. I do not think I can answer it.