And I’ll give the same reply as i gave to Tim Tyler. :)
Hitchens did not mention entropy or complexity. He mentioned exactly and only the why-regress, the exact same why-regress that all scientific hypotheses are subject to. Perhaps the objection you raise to theism would have been good for Hitchens to give, but it is not the objection Hitchens gave.
It looks to me like people are trying to make Hitchens look good by putting smarter words in his mouth than the ones he actually spoke.
It looks to me like people are trying to make Hitchens look good by putting smarter words in his mouth than the ones he actually spoke.
I think it’s more the principle of charity. Unless the other person has been mentally designated as an enemy, people tend to look for the most charitable plausible interpretation of his words. People are pointing out that what you gave as an example is a poor example to give, because your wording doesn’t do enough to exclude the most charitable interpretation of Hitchens’ words from the set of plausible interpretations. Therefore people will, upon hearing your example, automatically assume that this is actually what Hitchens was trying to say.
(I’ve been known to take this even further. Sometimes I’ll point an article to a friend, have the friend ruthlessly criticize the article, and then I’ll go “oh, of course the thing that the author is actually saying is pretty dreadful, but why would you care about that? If you read it as being about [this semi-related insightful thing he could have been saying instead if he’d thought about it a bit more], then it’s a great article!”)
If Hitchens meant what people are charitably attributing to him, why didn’t he make those points in the following rebuttal periods or during the Q&A? Craig gave the exact rebuttal that I just gave, so if Hitchens had intended to make a point about complexity or entropy rather than the point about infinite regress he explicitly made, he had plenty of opportunity to do so.
You are welcome to say that there are interesting objections to theism related to the question “Who designed the designer?” What confuses me is when people say I gave a bad example of non-scholarship because I represented Hitchens for what he actually said, rather than for what he did not say, not even when he had an opportunity to respond to Craig’s rebuttal.
The argument people here are attributing to Hitchens is not the argument he gave. Hitchens gave an objection concerning an infinite regress of explanations. The argument being attributed to Hitchens is a different argument that was given in one form by Richard Dawkins as The Ultimate Boeing 747 Gambit. Dawkins’ argument is unfortunately vague, though it has been reformulated with more precision (for example, Kolmogorov complexity) over here.
I didn’t suggest that he meant that, I suggested that what you said didn’t do enough to exclude it from the class of reasonable interpretations of what he might have meant.
Suppose someone says to me, like you did, “there’s this guy Hitchens, he said the following: “Who designed the Designer? Don’t you run the risk… of asking ‘Well, where does that come from? And where does that come from?’ and running into an infinite regress?‘”. The very first thing that comes to mind, and which came to my mind even before I’d read the next sentence, is “oh, I’ve used that argument myself, when some religious person was telling me ‘but the Big Bang had to come from somewhere’, that must be what Hitchens meant”. That’s the default interpretation that will come to the mind of anyone who’s willing to give Hitchens the slightest benefit of doubt.
Yes, if people click on the links you provided they will see that the interpretation is wrong, but most people aren’t going to do that. And people shouldn’t need to click on a link to see that the most plausible-seeming interpretation of what they’ve read is, in fact, incorrect. If it’s important for conveying your message correctly, then you should state it outright. If you give an example about a person’s non-scholarship and people start saying “oh, but that doesn’t need to be an example of non-scholarship”, then it’s a much worse example than one that doesn’t prompt that response.
You are technically correct. Your initial remarks misled me, for the reasons given by Kaj Sotala below. But it’s a good example, if I read it carefully and literally, so don’t take that as a criticism.
PhilGoetz,
And I’ll give the same reply as i gave to Tim Tyler. :)
Hitchens did not mention entropy or complexity. He mentioned exactly and only the why-regress, the exact same why-regress that all scientific hypotheses are subject to. Perhaps the objection you raise to theism would have been good for Hitchens to give, but it is not the objection Hitchens gave.
It looks to me like people are trying to make Hitchens look good by putting smarter words in his mouth than the ones he actually spoke.
I think it’s more the principle of charity. Unless the other person has been mentally designated as an enemy, people tend to look for the most charitable plausible interpretation of his words. People are pointing out that what you gave as an example is a poor example to give, because your wording doesn’t do enough to exclude the most charitable interpretation of Hitchens’ words from the set of plausible interpretations. Therefore people will, upon hearing your example, automatically assume that this is actually what Hitchens was trying to say.
(I’ve been known to take this even further. Sometimes I’ll point an article to a friend, have the friend ruthlessly criticize the article, and then I’ll go “oh, of course the thing that the author is actually saying is pretty dreadful, but why would you care about that? If you read it as being about [this semi-related insightful thing he could have been saying instead if he’d thought about it a bit more], then it’s a great article!”)
Kaj_Sotala,
If Hitchens meant what people are charitably attributing to him, why didn’t he make those points in the following rebuttal periods or during the Q&A? Craig gave the exact rebuttal that I just gave, so if Hitchens had intended to make a point about complexity or entropy rather than the point about infinite regress he explicitly made, he had plenty of opportunity to do so.
You are welcome to say that there are interesting objections to theism related to the question “Who designed the designer?” What confuses me is when people say I gave a bad example of non-scholarship because I represented Hitchens for what he actually said, rather than for what he did not say, not even when he had an opportunity to respond to Craig’s rebuttal.
The argument people here are attributing to Hitchens is not the argument he gave. Hitchens gave an objection concerning an infinite regress of explanations. The argument being attributed to Hitchens is a different argument that was given in one form by Richard Dawkins as The Ultimate Boeing 747 Gambit. Dawkins’ argument is unfortunately vague, though it has been reformulated with more precision (for example, Kolmogorov complexity) over here.
I didn’t suggest that he meant that, I suggested that what you said didn’t do enough to exclude it from the class of reasonable interpretations of what he might have meant.
Suppose someone says to me, like you did, “there’s this guy Hitchens, he said the following: “Who designed the Designer? Don’t you run the risk… of asking ‘Well, where does that come from? And where does that come from?’ and running into an infinite regress?‘”. The very first thing that comes to mind, and which came to my mind even before I’d read the next sentence, is “oh, I’ve used that argument myself, when some religious person was telling me ‘but the Big Bang had to come from somewhere’, that must be what Hitchens meant”. That’s the default interpretation that will come to the mind of anyone who’s willing to give Hitchens the slightest benefit of doubt.
Yes, if people click on the links you provided they will see that the interpretation is wrong, but most people aren’t going to do that. And people shouldn’t need to click on a link to see that the most plausible-seeming interpretation of what they’ve read is, in fact, incorrect. If it’s important for conveying your message correctly, then you should state it outright. If you give an example about a person’s non-scholarship and people start saying “oh, but that doesn’t need to be an example of non-scholarship”, then it’s a much worse example than one that doesn’t prompt that response.
Another thing to think about was that Hitchens was in a debate. The Christians in the audience that he is trying to convince will not be charitable.
You are technically correct. Your initial remarks misled me, for the reasons given by Kaj Sotala below. But it’s a good example, if I read it carefully and literally, so don’t take that as a criticism.
Thanks.