A Marxist literary theorists telling a biological atheist that he's attacking a straw man (god?)

Terry Eagleton critiquing Richard Dawkins:

"Imagine someone holding forth on biology whose only knowledge of the subject is the Book of British Birds, and you have a rough idea of what it feels like to read Richard Dawkins on theology. Card-carrying rationalists like Dawkins, who is the nearest thing to a professional atheist we have had since Bertrand Russell, are in one sense the least well-equipped to understand what they castigate, since they don’t believe there is anything there to be understood, or at least anything worth understanding. This is why they invariably come up with vulgar caricatures of religious faith that would make a first-year theology student wince. The more they detest religion, the more ill-informed their criticisms of it tend to be. If they were asked to pass judgment on phenomenology or the geopolitics of South Asia, they would no doubt bone up on the question as assiduously as they could. When it comes to theology, however, any shoddy old travesty will pass muster. These days, theology is the queen of the sciences in a rather less august sense of the word than in its medieval heyday."



http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n20/eagl01_.html

He made it all the way to Ad-Hominem.
http://www.acceleratingfuture.com/mi...-hierarchy.jpg
disagreement-hierarchy

If 'eating fruit of knowledge of good/evil' is a metaphor for being out of sync with a 'higher' process, then it's not a decision that the thinking animal is qualified to make. The problem then becomes that religious prescriptions are generally delivered via the interpretation of hierarchically equal thinking animals and might not be trustworthy or applicable.

As an example of the precondition, a current state is that the animals try to actuate that they, their faction, or whatnot will win favor and success in the future, and conceive that 'what they do now' has purpose toward that future which they may or may not be able to participate in.

Their thought process looks for patterns through observation. Looking back through the patterns of the past, they see species becoming extinct, nations being sundered, cities disappearing, families dieing of diseases, being eaten by wild animals, poisoning, starvation, incineration... Since we can never know now the out come of all our subsequent actions, we look for clues and indications about the possibilities that lie in the distant future (beyond the realm of the minds predictive abilities) that some process is unfolding and can be allied with. This is quite normal animal life thus far.

That some potential outcomes are viewed as evil and others as good places the animal in a relative position to the flowing structure of reality. Some outcomes are good some are evil but relevance to the real structure is the only possibility of 'salvation' or success. So it doesn't matter if the animal thinks it's model is appropriate or not. It's success will be determined by obedience to the real structure.

How effectively it can align itself with the real structure, beyond predictability, is another question entirely that I don't pretend to address. But it is potentially appropriate to bow to supreme being with structure that encompasses ones own if that process is fulfilling of the animals model and that model can't be perfected beyond that through the available process.

Or perhaps where you say "Conceding absolute moral authority to someone else " I would say, if you remove "to someone else", it can be a virtue.

More from Mr Eagleton:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mdt0GBQu6SY&feature=related

How fitting....Aka...Ship of fools!!!!!!!!.....Knock, knock ...Knocking on heavens door..............................

Mat 7:23... And then will I (Jesus) profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity..........:eek::o:(

With all due respect,
 

You want to try that again, this time using comprehensible English language?

What I am seeing sounds like some crazy religious rant that makes utterly no sense whatsoever!!!

Hey Matt using the bible to try and "prove" gods existence is whats known as circular reasoning and is a hallmark of a poor argument or someone who has no real evidence to offer. In this case it seems both fit nicely.

I post a lecture supporting your point of view and you call me a worker of iniquity???

Wait kerry are you telling me someone who is very religious will judge someone else while knowing nothing of their situation or their person?? OUTRAGEOUS I SAY!!!

What a load of drivvle. Eagleton actually earns a living writing this tosh. Oh to be a "marxist literrary critic" and get paid for it too,

- Peter.

That is.... NOT MY POINT OF VIEW!!.......:eek::rolleyes::eek:

And the scripture was pointed at the nut-job in the video.......

He was defending Christianity. Is my assumption incorrect that you are a Christian? Are you a Muslim or a Hindu?

Matt is Confused.....

How is it drivel?

I think the Eagleton is defending a view of God and religion which Dawkins/Hitchens are not attacking. Eagleton is defending the God of the philosophers whereas they are attacking the God of the non-philosophically religious.
By the way, Eagleton agrees with you about writing literary criticism. He thinks it's unbelieveable that he gets paid to do it, and worries that some day the secret might get out.