It occurs to me that Dawkins could, in a perfect world, have saved us this argument by just using “simple ignorance” instead of unadorned “ignorance”. But then, The God Delusion is annoyingly philosophically unsophisticated. Its main virtue is that it appears to work.
The book pretty much states as its explicit purpose making as many people as possible aware that being religious is a choice and that there can be alternatives. Watertight philosophical rigor would probably harm that goal.
Getting smart people to think that religion deserves seriously thought out counterarguments might just be a way for theists to keep winning anyway.
It occurs to me that Dawkins could, in a perfect world, have saved us this argument by just using “simple ignorance” instead of unadorned “ignorance”. But then, The God Delusion is annoyingly philosophically unsophisticated. Its main virtue is that it appears to work.
The book pretty much states as its explicit purpose making as many people as possible aware that being religious is a choice and that there can be alternatives. Watertight philosophical rigor would probably harm that goal.
Getting smart people to think that religion deserves seriously thought out counterarguments might just be a way for theists to keep winning anyway.
Fully watertight philosophical rigour is probably optimising the wrong thing, yes. c.f. Mencken on one horse-laugh versus ten thousand syllogisms.