Evangelizing Atheists

I read an interesting article at the Salon website the other day entitled: "Atheism's radical new heroes: Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and an evolving new moral view."  The article referenced several books by the named authors together with several other books whose avowed purpose is to "mount[] a spirited attack on the basic dimensions of religion..." One of the books reviewed in the article was
Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon (2006) authored by Daniel Dennett, a philosopher at Tufts University.  Relating to this book the author of the article informs us  

 In writing his book, he [Dennett] said, he had come across one widespread opinion, albeit expressed in a variety of ways: in essence, this was that “man” has a “deep need” for spirituality. “What fascinates me about this delightfully versatile craving for ‘spirituality’ is that people think they know what they are talking about, even though—or perhaps because—nobody bothers to explain what they mean.”

Dennett had three things to say about how we should live. The secret to spirituality had nothing to do with the soul, or anything supernatural—it was this: let your self go. “If you can approach the world’s complexities, both its glories and its horrors, with an attitude of humble curiosity, acknowledging that however deeply you have seen, you have only just scratched the surface, you will find worlds within worlds, beauties you could not heretofore imagine, and your own mundane preoccupations will shrink to proper size, not all that important in the great scheme of things. Keeping that awestruck vision of the world ready to hand while dealing with the demands of daily living is no easy exercise, but it is definitely worth the effort, for if you can stay centered, and engaged, you will find the hard choices easier, the right words will come to you when you need them, and you will indeed be a better person [italics in original].”

It was a matter of urgency, he thought, that people understand and accept evolutionary theory. “I believe that their salvation may depend on it! How so? By opening their eyes to the dangers of pandemics, degradation of the environment, and loss of biodiversity, and by informing them about some of the foibles of human nature. So isn’t my belief that belief in evolution is the path to salvation a religion? No. . . . We who love evolution do not honor those whose love of evolution prevents them from thinking clearly and rationally about it! … In our view there is no safe haven for mystery or incomprehensibility. … I feel a moral imperative to spread the word of evolution, but evolution is not my religion. I don’t have a religion.  (emphasis mine)

 Hmmm.  While he says that evolution is not his religion I wonder if we can perhaps divine another religion from his comments.  So let's unpack what he has to say a bit.  Dennett 1) expresses a belief in a proposition the truth or falsity of which cannot be determined by rational means; 2) testifies that his belief provides him a way of living that allows him to live life to its fullest and guides him towards being a better person; 3) avers that he feels a moral imperative to "spread the word" of a central tenant of his belief because 4) in his view a person's "salvation" may depend on accepting this central tenant as a truth.

The belief I refer to in my first point is his belief that God does not exist.  Although he does not express his atheism in the quoted language, I think it safe to assume that in expressing belief in evolution he refers to evolution undirected by a larger intelligence and that his fundamental belief of which evolution is part is that God does not exist and the universe and everything in it is a result of random chance.

Dennett's atheism appears to me to be functionally indistinguishable from any other religion from the manner in which he describes his beliefs to the function his beliefs play in his life and the necessity of gathering others into the fold for their own good and the good of all humanity.  I am pretty sure atheism is his religion.  But some of his theology is less than well thought out.  

His explanation of the widely perceived need for spirituality and the way to fulfill that need without reference to God or any higher power, for example, seems completely garbled.  According to Dennett, spirituality has nothing to do with the soul or anything supernatural; the secret to spirituality is to let your self go.  I can agree with part of that statement.  I understand that most religions associate a belief in God with foregoing self in favor of others.  A belief in God encourages sacrifice of our own desires in favor of accomplishing the will of God which is to serve his children.  But the sacrifice of self in relation to God fulfills our need for spirituality because it allows us to participate in something greater than ourselves.  We are enlarged by our sacrifice because through our sacrifice we become part of larger whole with a divine purpose.

By contrast the letting go of self Dennett imagines has only the effect and purpose of leading us to understand that we are even smaller than we appear to be.  We will understand essentially that we are nothing compared to the world around us.  This letting go of self would it seems to me result in making "hard choices easier" because the result of such choices are completely unimportant in an unimaginably large uncaring cosmos.  Dennett avers that this is not true, that his view will lead people to be better.  I can't imagine that he is right.  We  have only been conducting this particular experiment in a godless society for a very short period of time and that preliminary results don't appear to be all that encouraging.