This is a book that I found out about while reading the book "Signature in the Cell". Of course I'd heard of the amazing conversion of Dr. Antony Flew, a world famous atheist to theism as he describes it. Not Christianity, but theism. However, he does say that if you have to choose a religion you can't go too far wrong with a religion that has such a charismatic figure as Jesus and a world class intellect such a Paul as your founders.
Much of this book went completely over my head. Even though this book was probably written for a general audience, only parts of it could I completely understand. The reason was because Dr. Flew is talking about very precise philosophy arguments, and the books that make them. However, the parts that I could understand well were well worth reading.
Roy Abraham Varghese, who is the co-author, also wrote the introduction, and the first appendix. He takes apart the so called new atheism which he says isn't new and doesn't even rise to the level of logical positivism, and ignores all the arguments being made for theism today. Basically they just rail against organized religion of any kind and are trumpeted by the media as something new, although they are not. The whole book was worth reading for the way that he took apart Richard Dawkin's, my favorite atheist to despise. After Dr. Flew, an eminent philosopher and proponent for atheism for many years, Richard Dawkin's apparently went ballistic, and went for the "ad hominem" attack. Dawkins first said that Bertrand Russel "was an exaggeratedly fair-minded atheist, over-eager to be disillusioned if logic seemed to require it," He added in a footnote "We might be seeing something similar today in the over-publicized tergiversation of the philosopher Antony Flew, who announced in his old age that he had been converted to belief in some sort of deity (triggering a frenzy of eager repetition all around the Internet). On the other hand, Russell was a great philosopher. Russell won the Nobel Prize."
Varghese writes
"The puerile petulance of the contrast with the "great philosopher" Russell and the contemptible reference to Flew's "old age" are par for the course in Dawkins's epistles to the enlightened. But what is interesting here is Dawkins's choice of words, one by which he unwittingly reveals the way his mind works.
"Tergiversation means "apostasy." So Flew's principle sin was that of apostatizing from the faith of the fathers."
"Tergiversation means "apostasy." So Flew's principle sin was that of apostatizing from the faith of the fathers."
That's funny writing as far as I'm concerned and it only gets better.
He related a statement made by Dr. John Barrows an English cosmologist, theoretical physicist,and mathematician who is a Research Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Cambridge University, said, regarding Dr. Dawkins disregarding the fine tuning of the Universe, "You have a problem with these ideas Richard, because your not really a scientist. You're a biologist." Julia Vitullo-Martin says that Dr. Barrow feels that biology is little more than a branch of natural history. Dr. Barrow has said; "Biologists have a limited intuitive understanding of complexity. They're stuck with an inherited conflict from the nineteenth century, and are only interested in outcomes, in what wins out over others. But outcomes tell you almost nothing about the laws that govern the universe."
Just reading those parts of the book were worth reading the entire book.
Dr. Flew wrote and presented a paper called "Theology and Falsification" and presented it at the Socratic Club, that was sponsored by C.S.Lewis at Oxford university, in 1950. This has been one of the most quoted articles about atheism of the last half of the 20th century. It's a short article and it can be found on the web if you would like to read it. This article supposedly changed the entire dynamic of the argument against God. I didn't really see how it changed the argument, but that may be because the argument that he presented is now so well known that I've heard it before in other forms.
One of the things that Dr. Flew points out is that when he became and atheist in the middle of the 20th Century much of the evidence that he now considers important as evidence of a deity was not known. One example is that the DNA molecule shape was not determined until 1953, and it was after that that it was possible to determine how it worked. Also, a lot of the discoveries of the fine tuning of the Universe were not known at that time. After taking all of these new discoveries into consideration Dr. Flew decided that the best explanation of the Universe is that it is designed, and if it is designed then there must be a designer.
He also addressed the comments by the idiot Dr. Dawkins by saying that some people had accused him of getting old and changing his views because he was worried about the afterlife. However, Dr. Flew said that he has not changed his ideas of humans having an immortal soul. He doesn't think we do have a soul so he doesn't think anything will happen after he dies. He also said that he has always been willing to follow where the evidence leads and has changed his ideas in the past. He said that many people are supprised when they learn at one time he was a Marxist, and that he later became a supporter of capitolism.
Another interesting part of the book are the two appendices. One is by Roy Abraham Varghese who also wrote the forward. Dr. Flew says that he has recommended the book "The Wonder of the World" and that anyone who argues against theism "would need to take into account [The Wonder of the World] which provides an extremely extensive argument of the inductive argument from the order of nature." He appendix is a paper called "The 'New Athiesm': A Critical Appraisal of Dawkins, Dennett, Wolpert, Harris and Stenger". He basically says that their arguments are not new and that they are very shallow, but that the popular press is giving them a lot of press and attention. One of the great things he says is that the atheists are trying to say that if you sit at a marble table, the argument is that if you sit there long enough the table will start talking to you. He points out that the atheists are making that somehow inanimate matter became animate and then progressed until we are the results.
The second appendix is by Bishop N. T. Wright. Bishop Wright is one of my favorite Christian writers. Dr. Flew writes
"Appendix B concerns the claim that there is a self-revelation of God in human history in the person of Jesus Christ. The claim is defended by one of today's premier New Testament scholars, Bishop N. T. Wright. In my view, Wright's responses to my previous critiques of divine self-revelation, both in the present volume and in his books, comprise the most powerful case for Christianity that I have ever seen."
"Appendix B concerns the claim that there is a self-revelation of God in human history in the person of Jesus Christ. The claim is defended by one of today's premier New Testament scholars, Bishop N. T. Wright. In my view, Wright's responses to my previous critiques of divine self-revelation, both in the present volume and in his books, comprise the most powerful case for Christianity that I have ever seen."
Dr. Flew apparently is not convinced by Bishop but thinks his arguments are good. I concure. Of course I always like it when someone really smart agrees with my opinion. Still I think that's high praise for Bishop Wright. I didn't realize how good his arguments were. His appendix is excellent. It caused me to go and see if Bishop Wright has written anything new that I might read since I enjoyed the appendix so much.
