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Introduction To
Activistic Atheism
by Cliff Walker
(revised October 2, 2000)
Table of Contents
Index: Frequently Asked Questions
Index: Atheism and Awareness (Clues)
Home to Positive Atheism
Continued from Previous File
3. Discussing Atheism with Others.
e. Sophistry: Logical and Rhetorical Fallacies; Faulty Reasoning.
ii. Irrelevant Premises.
(1) Ad Verecundiam (Appeal to Respect; Overreliance on Authorities).
"We often try to support views by citing experts. This appeal to authority is perfectly
valid -- provided that the person cited really is an expert in the field in question.
If not,
it is fallacious." [99] "In other words, who is making the claim makes a difference."
[100] "Authorities, by virtue of their expertise in a field, may have a better chance
of
being right in that field, but correctness is certainly not guaranteed, and their
expertise does not necessarily qualify them to draw conclusions in other areas." [101]
"While expertise is useful for separating the wheat from the chaff, it is dangerous in
that we might either (1) accept a wrong idea just because it was supported by
someone we respect (false positive) or (2) reject a right idea just because it was
supported by someone we disrespect (false negative)." [102] "Arguments from
authority carry little weight -- 'authorities' have made mistakes in the past. They
will
do so again in the future. Perhaps a better way to say it is that in science there are
no authorities; at most, there are experts." [103]
(2) Appeal To Tradition.
"We appeal to tradition when we argue something must be true (or good) because it
is part of an established tradition." [104] Moralistic Christians often tell Americans
they need to return to our "Christian roots." The unconstitutional "National Bible
Week" and "America's Christian Heritage Week" celebrations, usually held in late
November across the United States, are said to be "designed to remind people of the
real roots of this country and help America return to her spiritual foundation." [105]
Never mind the fact that the United States is much more churchgoing today than it
ever has been in the past, as I write this section (August 12, 1999), these crusaders
are posting (some version of) the Ten Commandments on the schoolroom walls in
Kentucky. By practicing this modern-day manifestation of animism, "officials in this
eastern Kentucky school district hope that ... they can prevent violence and other
problems that have plagued schools nationwide." [106]
Never mind that the framers of United States Constitution insisted that upon the
complete separation of church and State, as I write this portion (August 12, 1999),
these self-appointed Harbingers of Truth take us back to the stone age by severely
limiting the teaching of evolution in public schools across Kansas. The policy
"excludes mention of the age of the Earth or universe, suggesting the standards
allow schools leeway to teach a young Earth and universe of 10,000 years old." [107]
This is not 1925 when John Scopes was convicted of teaching evolution in a
Tennessee school and the entire civilized world had a good belly-laugh, [108] we are
on the brink of a new millennium.
The fallacy of an Appeal To Tradition "becomes obvious when you consider that
slavery was once an established tradition. The fact that people have always done or
believed something is no reason for believing that we should continue to do or
believe something." [109]
(3) Ad Populum (Appeal to Popularity; Appeal to the Masses).
"If everyone jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?"
-- Mom
"100,000,000,000,000 Flies Can't Be Wrong: Eat Shit!"
-- bumper sticker seen in California in the 1970s
A remarkably common fallacy is the appeal to the masses. If the vast majority of the
world's population believes something to be true, that's a pretty good indication that
it's true, isn't it? Not necessarily. Nevertheless, this is a common argument for the
existence of God in Positive Atheism's Letters Section. "The majority of humans
believe in a god" (to which one could respond, "but the majority of those people
believe that your god is a false god").
For over 1300 years, most Europeans thought the world was flat. Magellan said,
"The church says the earth is flat, but I know that it is round, for I have seen the
shadow on the moon, and I have more faith in a shadow than in the church." [110]
Throughout history, people have thought that it is right for men to subjugate women.
This practice is alive today in the Islamic Taliban militia which now desolates
Afghanistan. [111] Hints of the same have arisen from the Southern Baptist Church
in the United States. [112]
At one point, most Americans thought slavery was a good idea -- ordained by God
through his Bible. Paul allegedly said, "All who are under the yoke of slavery should
consider their masters worthy of full respect, so that God's name and our teaching
may not be slandered. Those who have believing masters are not to show less
respect for them because they are brothers. Instead, they are to serve them even
better, because those who benefit from their service are believers, and dear to them.
These are the things you are to teach and urge on them." [113] Only a handful of
people today take that passage at face value.
(4) Ad Hominem (Appeal To the Person).
"Even an ignorant man will not blunder in a true story -- nor can an artful man keep a
false story straight."
-- Thomas Paine [114]
An ad hominem ("to the man") attack challenges the validity of an argument by
criticizing or denigrating the person presenting the argument rather than by dealing
with the argument itself. Carl Sagan gives this example: "The Reverend Dr. Smith is
a known Biblical fundamentalist, so her objections to evolution need not be taken
seriously." [115] However, Michael Shermer cautions that "it might be helpful to know
whether someone is of a particular religion or holds a particular ideology, in case
this
has in some way biased the research, but refuting claims must be done directly, not
indirectly." [116]
This fallacy has even been institutionalized and justified in the name of party unity.
The ancient Pharisees scorned any individual who went against the consensus of the
community -- that is, who thought for himself. One shocking tale from the Mishnah
tells of a leader, Eliezer ben Hyrkanus (a Pharisee whose career spanned the
destruction of the temple). The assembly rejected his opinions and excommunicated
him even in the face of (allegedly) miraculous signs and heavenly voices expressing
God's displeasure. Robert M. Price notes:
"How can the Mishnah possibly record all this and yet still hold that Eliezer was in
the
wrong? ... The problem was not so much with the specific opinions of Eliezer, many
of which were in fact accepted. Nor was Eliezer deemed a heretic or even wrong!
Just the reverse! God himself agreed with him! The opposition is between the
consensus of the sages and the 'loose cannons' of charismatic authority, of which
Eliezer serves as a symbol....
"This is precisely why we can never be sure if the Mishnah is accurately attributing
the right opinion to the right sage. One story has Akeba falsely attribute Eliezer's
sayings to others after his excommunication, so that either the sayings may be
allowed to continue without being disqualified by association with the heretic, or they
may win their way on their own merit, not riding on the coattails of the charismatic
authority." [117]
Madalyn Murray-O'Hair was seen by many as a very angry woman. Theists often
used this to discredit atheism. Charles Darwin's personality quirks have been used in
attempts to discredit the theory of evolution. More than once, theists have even tried
to detect anger or bitterness in our responses in Positive Atheism's Letters Section!
(How does one react to the underhanded use of dishonesty in attempts to discredit
that person?) Nevertheless, you do not discover the truth or error of a proposition by
appealing to the person making the argument.
Some atheists, in attempting to discredit theism, point out how often clergymen (and
other outspoken theists) are convicted of criminal behavior. This would be an ad
hominem were it not for the fact that most theists portray religion as an effective
method for making people act morally (often calling it the only method), and that
without religion, people will act immorally. This point is particularly poignant when
the
"black-collar criminal" is himself a staunch moralist -- as was the case when the Rev.
Jimmy Swaggert was caught patronizing a prostitute and the Rev. Jim Bakker was
imprisoned for defrauding his flock. [118] Since so many religionists point to
America's "abandoning its faith" as the cause of a "decay in morals," it is proper to
give examples of religion's failure to make people moral. The context of theism's
claim to make people moral is probably the only proper use of this argument style; in
any other context, we're most likely dealing with an ad hominem attack.
(5) Genetic Fallacy.
"To argue that a claim is true or false on the basis of its origin is to commit the
genetic fallacy.... Some of our greatest advances have originated in unusual ways.
For example, the chemist August Kekul� discovered the benzine ring while staring at
a fire and seeing the image of a serpent biting its tail. The theory of evolution came
to
British naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace while in a delirium. Archimedes supposedly
arrived at the principle of displacement while taking a bath, from which he leapt
shouting, 'Eureka!'" [119]
Some very unpopular groups originate great ideas: "The Communist Party USA was
the first political party to call for complete racial equality in this country." [120]
Meanwhile, the science (particularly biology) is being written off as falsehood by
post-
modernist intellectuals because "the experimental method is the brainchild of white
Victorian males." [121] Schick and Vaughn summarize: "The truth or falsity of an idea
is determined not by where it came from, but by the evidence supporting it." [122]
To say that human reason is fallible, therefore reason cannot be trusted, hints of the
genetic fallacy. Human reason, according to many Christians, is tainted by "Original
Sin"; thus (they say to us),"God's ways" are higher than man's ways. "Trust in the
Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding." [123] To say
that reason is fallible is one thing, but to say it should be distrusted because it
comes
from humans (even if we were tainted by "Original Sin") is to commit the genetic
fallacy.
However fallible reason may be, it is our only tool for distinguishing true from
false. It
is not one of many tools," it is the entire toolbox. "I admit that reason is a small
and
feeble flame, a flickering torch by stumblers carried in the star-less night, -- blown
and flared by passion's storm, -- and yet, it is the only light. Extinguish that, and
nought remains." [124]
(6) Appeal To Ignorance (Ad Ignorantiam).
The appeal to ignorance is "the claim that whatever has not been proved false must
be true, and vice versa." [125] "In science, belief should come from positive evidence
in support of a claim, not lack of evidence for or against a claim." [126]
Some appeals to ignorance use the opponent's inability to disprove a claim as proof
of the claim's accuracy. The most common form we atheists receive is the
accusation that since we cannot prove that no gods exist, therefore gods must exist.
However, nobody can "prove" the negative of any existential claim (a claim that a
thing exists), unless that claim is shown to be impossible (such as a square circle).
In
the case of existential claims, the one making the claim is responsible for proving
that the thing in question exists. In lieu of proof, it is reasonable to doubt a claim,
especially if it seems to contradict what we know about nature.
After admitting that he cannot disprove the claim that a god exists, Richard Dawkins
added: "the virtue of using evidence is precisely that we can come to an agreement
about it. But if you listen to two people who are arguing about something, and they
each of them have passionate faith that they're right, but they believe different
things
-- they belong to different religions, different faiths, there is nothing they can do
to
settle their disagreement short of shooting each other, which is what they very often
actually do." [127]
Other appeals to ignorance use the opponent's inability to prove a conclusion as
proof of its incorrectness. Creationists claim that scientists cannot "prove"
evolution,
therefore it must be false. However, evolution has been firmly established to the point
where it is now used to make predictions in developing hybrid plants and
vaccinations. One wonders what the creationists mean when they tell us that we
cannot "prove" evolution.
Any time the appeal to ignorance is used, it can be turned upon the one using it, as
Michael Shermer explains: "The absurdity of this argument comes into focus if one
argues that if you cannot prove that Santa Claus does not exist, then he must exist.
You can argue the opposite in a similar manner. If you cannot prove Santa Claus
exists, then he must not exist." [128]
(7) Argument from Adverse Consequences (Appeal to Fear).
"To use the threat of harm to advance one's position is to commit the fallacy of the
appeal to fear. It is also known as swinging the big stick. For example: 'If you do not
convict this criminal, one of you may be her next victim.' This is fallacious because
what a defendant might do in the future is irrelevant to determining whether she is
responsible for a crime committed in the past. Or: 'You should believe in God
because if you don't you'll go to hell.' Such an argument is fallacious because it
gives
us no reason for believing that God exists." [129] "A God meting out punishment and
reward must exist, because if He didn't, society would be much more lawless and
dangerous -- perhaps even ungovernable." [130]
"A more cynical formulation by the Roman historian Polybius: 'Since the masses of
the people are inconstant, full of unruly desires, passionate, and reckless of
consequences, they must be filled with fears to keep them in order. The ancients did
well, therefore, to invent gods, and the belief in punishment after death.'" [131]
The inversion of this fallacy posits believing a proposition because doing so will make
one happier: "Life would certainly be depressing and meaningless if there was no
hereafter. I feel so sorry for those with no hope, who thinks life ends at death, how
hollow of a belief I remember that being." [132]
Believers seem to be telling us that we should believe their propositions simply
because believing so makes people happy. This has nothing to do with whether a
given proposition is true. George Bernard Shaw said, "The fact that a believer is
happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is
happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous
quality." [133]
(8) Special Pleading.
Special pleading is sometimes used as an attempt to rescue a proposition that is in
deep rhetorical trouble. In law, it is the "assertion of new or special matter to
offset
the opposing party's allegations, as an alternative to direct denial." [134]
Elsewhere, it
is a "misleading argument that presents one point or phrase as if it covered the entire
question at issue." [135]
Carl Sagan gives the following examples of special pleading: "'How can a merciful
God condemn future generations to torment because, against orders, one woman
induced one man to eat an apple?' Special plead: 'You don't understand the subtle
Doctrine of Free Will.' Or: 'How can there be an equally godlike Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost in the same Person?' Special plead: 'You don't understand the Divine
Mystery of the Trinity.' Or: 'How could God permit the followers of Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam -- each in their own way enjoined to heroic measures of loving
kindness and compassion -- to have perpetrated so much cruelty for so long?'
Special plead: 'You don't understand Free Will again. And anyway, God moves in
mysterious ways.'" [136]
(9) Weasel Words; Oxymoronic Language.
"An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old
names have become odious to the public."
-- Charles Maurice de Talleyrand [137]
Carl Sagan calls these new words "weasel words." He gives an example: "The
separation of powers of the U.S. Constitution specifies that the United States may
not conduct a war without a declaration by Congress. On the other hand, Presidents
are given control of foreign policy and the conduct of wars, which are potentially
powerful tools for getting themselves re- elected. Presidents of either political party
may therefore be tempted to arrange wars while waving the flag and calling the wars
something else -- 'police actions,' 'armed incursions,' 'protective reaction strikes,'
'pacification,' 'safeguarding American interests,' and a wide variety of 'operations,'
such as 'Operation Just Cause.' Euphemisms for war are one of a broad class of
reinventions of language for political purposes." [138]
Some people argue that we ought to do just this with the word atheist. Since the
terms atheist and atheism evoke the ire of so many people, perhaps we ought to
start calling ourselves something else: Michael Shermer suggests "nontheists." [139]
The questions we raise are: How close is this move to what Sagan calls "weasel
words"? Is not an atheist an atheist by any other name? And would it not be better to
popularize the fact that most people have a misguided understanding of what
atheism even is?
A variant of the weasel words ruse is oxymoronic language, which merges two
different terms or concepts to form a self-contradictory phrase. The dictionaries give
some poetic examples of oxymoronic language: "deafening silence"; "mournful
optimist"' [140] "cruel kindness"; [141] "faith unfaithfully kept him falsely true."
[142]
Rap stars The Disposable Heroes of Hiphopricy (also known as The Beatnigs) give
examples of how television uses oxymoronic language in an exploitive way: "virtually
spotless"; "fresh frozen"; "light yet filling"; "military intelligence." [143]
(10) Strange Loops and Meaningless Questions.
Can God make a rock so big he cannot roll it? Very few theologians teach that
omnipotence includes the logically impossible. "If there is such a thing as an
irresistible force there can be no immovable objects, and vice versa." [144] Robert
Anton Wilson cites, as "the classic Strange Loop," [145] a passage from the Bible:
"Even one of their own prophets has said, 'Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy
gluttons.' This testimony is true." [146] Wilson comments: "If the egregious Cretan is
telling the truth, he is lying." [147] Unfortunately for Bible believers, Paul concurs
that
"this testimony is true."
Wilson points out a variation of the strange loop by examining the claim that the
Nazis killed 6,000,000 Jews: "it is believed by almost everybody and rejected by a
vehement minority called Holocaust Revisionists. The case for Holocaust
Revisionism is that there is a Vast Worldwide Conspiracy that has faked all the
evidence which the rest of us naively accept.
"Holocaust Revisionism or HR can hardly be called 'false' in a historical sense
because it is not part of the History Game; it rejects the rules of evidence that
historians play by. This can be seen by comparing it with the thesis that President
Richard Nixon never existed and all evidence of such a man was faked by another
Vast Worldwide Conspiracy. One cannot disprove either HR or NR (Nixon
Revisionism) since all historical evidence relevant to the dispute is defined as
tainted.
"I think it is safest to regard HR as another Strange Loop. By assuming all
inconvenient evidence is faked, one opens an infinite regress, and one can logically
ask next if the evidence that Holocaust Revisionists exist might have been faked (i.e.
did the ethnomethodologists or other sociologists interested in 'breaching
experiments' on reality-tunnels manufacture the books and pamphlets of HR as an
experiment, to see if we would believe people would write such documents
seriously?)
"I leave it an open question whether Creationism (which alleges the evidence for
evolution has been faked) is another Strange Loop." [148]
iii. Misuse of Statistics.
(1) Observational Selection (Representativeness).
"Philosopher Francis Bacon called this counting the hits and forgetting the misses."
[149] "We forget most of the insignificant coincidences and remember the
meaningful ones. Our tendency to remember hits and ignore misses is the bread and
butter of the psychics, prophets, and soothsayers who make hundreds of predictions
each January 1. First they increase the probability of a hit by predicting mostly
generalized sure bets like "There will be a major earthquake in southern California"
or "I see trouble for the Royal Family." Then, next January, they publish their hits
and
ignore the misses, and hope no one bothers to keep track." [150]
Bible believers do this with Bible passages, ignoring those statements that don't
make sense or are patently false. To see this, one need only to open any book on
biblical end-times prophesy that is more than a few years old. If any predictions
actually came true, the likelihood is that anyone could have seen this event as
inevitable.
(2) Statistics of Small Numbers.
This is the act of observing a small number and concluding that your observations
apply to all. Carl Sagan gives these examples: "They say 1 out of every 5 people is
Chinese. How is this possible? I know hundreds of people, and none of them is
Chinese." Or: "I've thrown three sevens in a row. Tonight I can't lose." [151] Finally,
"Christians do not believe that a newborn child that dies will go to hell. I just
wanted
to clarify that. I don't know any Christians who believe that." [152]
(3) Composition and Division.
"Composition is assuming that what is true for one is true for all.... This argument is
fallacious because a whole may be greater than the sum of its parts; that is, it may
have properties not possessed by its parts. A property had by a whole but not by its
parts is called an emergent property. Wetness, for example, is an emergent property.
No individual water molecule is wet, but get enough of them together and wetness
emerges...." [153]
This fallacy is particularly insidious when it is used to generalize about groups of
people based upon the acts on a few individuals in that group. This is the primary
rationalization behind all bigotry.
"Not all arguments from part to whole are fallacious, for there are properties that the
parts and wholes share. The fallacy lies in assuming that what's true of the parts is
true of the whole." [154]
"Division is assuming that what is true for all is true for a given individual." [155]
Not
everybody in a group acts like the "typical" member of that group. There are always
exceptions, and we must be careful not to judge an individual based on what we
think the group is like.
(4) Misunderstanding of the Nature of Statistics.
Carl Sagan relates the case of "President Dwight Eisenhower expressing
astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans have below
average intelligence." [156] Creationists use this fallacy when they describe the
"astronomical chances" that make life unlikely. In doing this, they ignore just how
vast the universe is, and how long it has been around. They also forget that "the
chance of life occurring somewhere in this universe is exactly one: life has occurred
in this universe, and we cannot compare this universe with any others to determine
how unlikely it would be for life to occur in this universe." [157]
iv. Problems in Pseudoscientific Thinking. [158]
(1) Anecdotes Do Not Make a Science.
"Anecdotes -- stories recounted in support of a claim -- do not make a science.
Without corroborative evidence from other sources, or physical proof of some sort,
ten anecdotes are no better than one, and a hundred anecdotes are no better than
ten." [159]
"Most of us wouldn't pour a newfangled alcohol solution into our gas tanks, unless it
had been widely tested, widely publicized, and widely accepted. But what kinds of
herbs and chemicals do many of us put into our bodies -- not knowing what they do
or don't do -- simply because a book made lofty claims and gave glowing
testimonials about the alleged health benefits? This is especially shocking when we
note that such remedies often admit, right on the label, that the health claims are
folkloric: 'Such and so tribe used this.' But we would never treat our TV sets that
way." [160]
(2) Scientific Language Does Not Make a Science.
"Dressing up a belief system in the trappings of science by using scientific language
and jargon, as in 'creation-science,' means nothing without evidence, experimental
testing, and corroboration. Because science has such a powerful mystique in our
society, those who wish to gain respectability but do not have evidence try to do an
end run around the missing evidence by looking and sounding 'scientific.'" [161] Like
"creation science," the New Age movement is guilty of using lots of scientific
terminology to say absolutely nothing.
In the ultimate commentary on this and similar problems, Physicist Alan Sokal
decided to try an unorthodox experiment: "submit to a fashionable American cultural-
studies journal, Social Text, a parody of the type of work that has proliferated in
recent years, to see whether they would publish it. The article, entitled
'Transgressing
the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity', is
chock-full of absurdities and blatant non-sequiturs.... By a series of stunning leaps
of
logic, it arrives at the conclusion that 'the p [pi] of Euclid and the G of Newton,
formerly thought to be constant and universal, are now perceived in their ineluctable
historicity; and the putative observer becomes fatally de-centered, disconnected from
any epistemic link to a space-time point that can no longer be defined by geometry
alone'. The rest is in the same vein.
"And yet, the article was accepted and published. Worse, it was published in a
special issue of Social Text devoted to rebutting the criticisms leveled against
postmodernism and social constructivism by several distinguished scientists. For the
editors of Social Text, it was hard to imagine a more radical way of shooting
themselves in the foot." [162]
(3) Bold Statements Do Not Make Claims True.
"Something is probably pseudoscientific if enormous claims are made for its power
and veracity but supportive evidence is scarce as hen's teeth." [163] Here are some
examples of bold statements that contribute nothing to proving the accompanying
theories true: "The creation of Dianetics is a milestone for man comparable to his
discovery of fire and superior to his invention of the wheel and arch." [164] Wilhelm
Reich called his theory of Orgonomy "a revolution in biology and psychology
comparable to the Copernican Revolution." [165]
American politician Rep. Scarborough of Florida boldly asserted that American
Founding Father James Madison stated, "We have staked the future of the American
civilization not on the power of government, but on the capacity of Americans to
abide by the Ten Commandments of God." [166] No such quote can be found in the
archives of James Madison's known writings. [167] The man responsible for
popularizing this bogus quote, David Barton of the WallBuilders organization, had, at
least a year earlier, issued a statement admitting that this and several other popular
quotes are "false." [168]
Nevertheless, on the floor of the United States House of Representatives, in
introducing this false "quote" into his argument in favor of allowing Judge Roy Moore
to prominently post the Ten Commandments in his courtroom, Rep. Scarborough of
Florida said, "it is humorous watching people doing historical cartwheels, trying to
rewrite history as radical revisionists have been doing for the past 30 years, trying
to
tell us that the Ten Commandments is some political gimmick." [169]
Does Scarborough here appear to think that using bold claims about "historical
cartwheels" and "radical revisionists" to introduce the false Madison quote will
somehow magically change the fact that Madison never said this? Probably not.
Through repetition, people who don't know any better (like most members of
Congress) will come to believe a false statement to be true. Scarborough appears to
be using the bold claim about "radical revisionists" as a bluff, to distract from the
fact
that Madison never made the statement the Representative from Florida has put into
the former President's mouth. Some politicians resort to this and other bluffs when
the special-interest position they are elected to uphold cannot be defended through
reasoned argument.
(4) Heresy Does Not Equal Correctness.
Nineteenth-century German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer said,"All truth passes
through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third,
it is
accepted as self-evident." [170] However, not all truth goes through these states.
Also, many propositions that go through the first and second stages never become
"accepted as self-evident."
Robert Anton Wilson tells of the persecution of Dr. Wilhelm Reich: "In October 1957,
agents of the U.S. government went to the Orgone Institute Press in New York City;
they seized all the books; they loaded the books into a comandeered garbage truck;
they drove to the Vandivoort Street incinerator; they burned the books.
"This was not 'back in the dark ages'; it was only a few years ago. It did not happen
in a fascist or Marxist dictatorship but in a nation whose constitution specifically
forbids that pyromaniac way of disposing of unpopular ideas. And it was not
instigated by religious fanatics but by those 'scientific' fanatics whom J.B. Priestly
dubbed the Citadel.
"The books were by Dr. Wilhelm Reich, a former student of Freud and a political
radical....
"Members of the American Medical Association and American Psychoanalytical
Association pressured the government to prosecute Reich as a crank or a
'charlatan.' Dr. Reich, either out of delusions of grandeur or out of principled
commitment to libertarian ideals -- take your choice -- refused to admit that the
government had any right to pass judgment on scientific theories, and as a result
was convicted, only of contempt of court. Nonetheless, the government followed this
with the book-burning, and with the destruction by ax of equipment in Dr. Reich's
research laboratory, and then threw him in prison, where he died of a heart attack
after a few months. Reich's co- worker, Dr. Michael Silvert, subsequently committed
suicide." [171]
The injudicious and reprehensible treatment of Dr. Reich in no way proves that he
was not a quack. That cannot be done until after other scientists repeat his
experiments. "I have no idea how much of that 30- some years of work was sound,
how much unsound." [172] None of Reich's detractors admit to having repeated his
experiments before this modern Inquisition took place. Nobody could repeat his
experiments afterwards, because "none of Dr. Reich's books could legally be printed
in the U.S. until 1967. Those who would have liked to have formed an independent
opinion of the scientific issues were legally unable to see or touch or even smell the
verboten pages." [173]
(5) Rumors Do Not Equal Reality.
You've surely heard that Madalyn Murray O'Hair (of American Atheists) has
petitioned the FCC to ban all religious broadcasting. Not only that, there is a
proposal
before the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that, if passed, would result
in a surcharge for the use of computer modems on the telephone network, and the
United States Postal Service plans to place a charge on e-mail. Proctor and
Gamble's logo is a satanic symbol. There is a scene in Disney's "Aladdin" where the
title character murmurs,"All good teenagers take off your clothes." Gay men kill
gerbils for sexual pleasure.
Each one of these stories is pure fiction. Nevertheless, they have severely impacted
the individuals, groups, businesses, and agencies in question. The amount of
resources used by the FCC to counter the Madalyn O'Hair petitions staggers the
imagination. Proctor and Gamble bowed to pressure and removed its logo from
products, and has sued Amway over its role in spreading the rumors. Here are the
truths regarding these rumors as far as we can tell.
Neither Madalyn Murray O'Hair nor American Atheists has ever had anything to do
with an unsuccessful petition filed on December 5, 1974, by Jeremy Lansman and
Lorenzo Milam. The men were helping minority groups set up non-commercial FM
stations, and were frustrated with the relative ease that religious groups have in
setting up stations. Lansman and Milam, by the way, were described by Madalyn
Murray O'Hair as "both religious young men." [174] The petition (RM-2493) said, in
part, "Request for 'Freeze' on all Applications by Religious 'Bible', 'Christian', and
other Sectarian Schools, Colleges, and Institutes for Reserved Educational FM and
TV Channels." [175]
By summer, 1975, the FCC received half a million letters protesting O'Hair's non-
existent petition. [176] In April 1977, the Senate of Illinois, at the goading of Sen.
LeRoy Lemke, passed a resolution condemning O'Hair for the petition. [177] The
largest number of letters registered in one day is 60,000, in 1980, prompting the FCC
to ask the U.S. Congress for a appropriation of $250,000 to help cope with the flood.
[178] In total, over 20 million letters have been received by the FCC, denouncing
Madalyn Murray O'Hair for something she never did. [179] "The important outcome
of all this is that the religious community used those letters, which they had incited
by
a calculated lie, to bring pressure upon the FCC to permit them to have unlimited
access to the media." [180] The sad part is that the rest of us, the nonreligious, do
not enjoy the advantages that these powerful religious groups have when it comes to
obtaining and using Reserved Educational FM and TV Channels.
Not two weeks before the original writing of this section, Positive Atheism received a
warning about an internet tax -- from one of our colleagues, no less. In February,
1999, The Federal Communications Commission issued the fact sheet, "No
Consumer Per-Minute Charges to Access ISPs" [181] denying any proposed
changes in the way people access the Internet. On May 21, 1999, the United States
Postal Service issued a press release called, "E-Mail Rumor Completely Untrue"
[182] which calls the rumor "completely false." Positive Atheism once placed links to
these releases toward the top of its front page.
During the nineteenth century, Proctor and Gamble would ship candles down the
Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans, where jobbers would unload the river
barges and ship the candles worldwide. Crate makers invented their own marks that
they would carve or burn into the crate. Some crate makers waxed artistic, until one
of the bosses ordered the crate makers to stop marking boxes. When the shipments
hit New Orleans, the jobbers refuse to accept them thinking they were counterfeit
product -- not having the familiar marks. Once P&G heard about this, they decided to
allow the crate makers to mark their work, but wanted them to choose just one
symbol that everybody would use. A contest was held, and the moon-and-stars
symbol used by one guy was chosen as the winner. This crate maker's mark
eventually became an internationally famous trademark. [183]
In an October 24, 1995, article in The Wall Street Journal, staff reporter Lisa Bannon
exposed the sources of the various Disney cartoon rumors. Tracing a long line of
sources from various Christian publications, she finally came upon one Matthew
Ford, a college senior at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls, Iowa. He told
Bannon, "We watch movies to try to find mistakes all the time. Like, there's a car in
the background of 'Maverick' when Mel Gibson is talking to the Indians.... We were
all sitting around the dorm back in January watching 'Aladdin' and I couldn't figure
out
something he was saying.... I said, 'Rewind that,' and then we heard it.... My friends
think it's funny because it's a Disney movie." When the "Aladdin" rumor eventually
landed on the national news, Ford never imagined he helped start it all. [184]
Cecil Adams, in his "Straight Dope" column says that all attempts to track down a
real case of "gerbilling" have been unsuccessful. Jan Harold Brunvand agrees that
this rumor is false in his book on urban legends, The Mexican Pet. Chuck Shepherd
of "News of the Weird" published a list of objects found "up the down staircase"
which included a rodent. On being asked for a source, he admitted mistaking his
original query for such a cite as being a cite. [185] Nothing has been published in the
medical literature, according to Medline. [186] Requests on various medical
newsgroups have turned up no eyewitness accounts, although the topic of rectal
objects abounds in medical literature. "After a while the lack of positive evidence
becomes pretty strong negative evidence in itself." [187] Still, religious bigots
continue to spread this rumor and thus paint an entire group with this filthy and
despicable broad brush.
[End of "Introduction To Activistic Atheism"]
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