"History for Atheists"

[timoneill]

The kind folks on Quora keep asking me when I'm going to write a book. I've always replied "When I think of a book worth writing">

I think I may have.

I'm thinking of writing a series of blog posts on Armarium Magnum entitled "History for Atheists", with each one addressing some of the common misconceptions about ancient and medieval history, the origins of Christianity, the history of early science etc. And then use each of these as a chapter in a (probably self-published) book by the same name.

Thoughts?

And any suggestions for topics/chapters?

[ignorantianescia]

That sounds like an excellent idea, it would be good if there's a single reference book to refer interested punters to.

As for chapters, I guess I could suggest a few historical topics and they would mostly reflect the topics a Christian would think are important for atheists to know, but I think the crucial part is a lucid chapter/post on historical method. Ignorance about methodology is a gift to Mythicists and also to other pseudo-historical ranters. Of course, I have the criterion of embarrassment in mind here.

[Mike D]

Tim,

Sounds like an excellent idea!

Topics it would be worth covering, part I:

1. The existence of Jesus (obviously)
2. The early church - what it believed (particularly looking at the 'borrowing from paganism' idea)
3. The early church - agreement on canonicity and authority
4. The impact of Constantine I on the church - what he did do and what he didn't do

[merkavah12]

That'd be great!

I know some friends who have been starved for an early history of Humanism.

[timoneill]

Jun 4, 2013 10:39:35 GMT Mike D said:

Tim,

Sounds like an excellent idea!

Topics it would be worth covering, part I:

1. The existence of Jesus (obviously)
2. The early church - what it believed (particularly looking at the 'borrowing from paganism' idea)
3. The early church - agreement on canonicity and authority
4. The impact of Constantine I on the church - what he did do and what he didn't do

I'm going to have to be careful that this idea doesn't get too unweildy. I know I will have to cover the existence of Jesus, though there would be a temptation to try to counter all the Myther arguments about this, which would require a book in its own right. I'd probably be going for an expanded version of my summary of the subject that I posted on Quora.

At this stage I'm thinking of something along these lines:

1. An introduction on why I thought the book was required - including my credentials as an atheist and sceptic (since I'll be accused of closet apologetics) and my background (because I don't want to be accused of claiming to be an expert when I am simply an interested amateur).

2. A chapter on the historical method, why history can't be held to the same standards as empirical science, why it is still valid and not wishy-washy subjectivity despite this and how to sort history from pseudo historical crank theories. This is required because so many New Atheist fans come from the sciences and think "If it can't be proven definitively it can be totally rejected and we can believe whatever we want". Which we see from the Mythers all the time.

3. The Whig Fallacy and the dangers of Presentism. This will include something on the difficulties of value judgements about the remote past, given that they did not think like us, and the need for objective analysis of how and why.

4. An Idiot's Guide to the Historical Jesus - this is another chapter which could get out of control, because there is a whole book in there as well.

5. Why the Jesus Myth theory is considered a stinker by actual scholars - ditto.

6. Myths of early Christianity - no Constantine didn't create the Bible via committee, no, he didn't convert out of a cynical attempt to harness religion for his own wicked ends and no, the conversion of the Empire was not some kind of violent political coup where good wise pagans were exterminated in concentration camps (and yes, I've seen that claimed)

7. Christianity didn't cause the "Dark Ages" - Hypatia, Charlie Freeman, Greenblatt, "the stupidest thing on the internet" etc.

8. God and Reason in the Middle Ages - the "Gold of the Egyptians", the Twelfth Century Renaissance, the medieval foundations of science etc.

9. Galileo, Bruno and the associated myths and the Conflict Thesis generally.

10. Maybe something on the Papacy and the Holocaust, though that does feel like quite a jump from Galileo.

Maybe something on Darwin and myths associated with Biblical literalism between 9 and 10?

Comments?

Suggestions?

[unkleE]

Jun 4, 2013 20:14:09 GMT timoneill said:

Comments?

Suggestions?

That seems like quite an ambitious list, so I would think you'd have to have a lot of good references to cover the material that you just can't include. Perhaps at a similar level to Galileo Goes to Jail.

I do hope you devote several chapters to that most important of historical questions, whether Nazareth suddenly popped into existence some time between 35 CE and 70 CE!!

It is worth noting that empirical science doesn't offer "proof" either (only maths and logic do that), but probabilities - often statistical demonstration to a specified confidence limit. And this is especially true of origins science, as this quote from W. Ford Doolittle, Biochemistry Professor, Dalhousie University, Canada) illustrates:

Questions about the past - whether in cosmology, geology, paleontology, archaeology, or human cultural and political history - are different. We cannot do experiments in the past, so any attempt to reconstruct it must be based on indirect and inferential methods.

Evolutionary biologists who seek to reconstruct life's history have three such inferential methods: (1) comparisons of the properties of living species; (2) study of relics, such as biological and chemical fossils, or apparently primitive features retained by modern cells; and (3) feasibility experiments. The comparative approach can in principle take us back to the last common ancestor of all currently living things, and the fossil record (biological and chemical) may go a bit further, to something close to the first cells. For the origin of earthly life itself, and perhaps even up through the appearance of the earliest true cells, we must rely on feasibility experiments. In these experiments, hypotheses about what might have happened in the past are shown to be plausible by demonstration that similar events can be made to happen today, in the lab.

Certainty and completeness in reconstructing life's ancient history will never be possible, nor indeed are they possible even in reconstructing the very recent history of a nation or society. But it would be foolish to deny that we already know a tremendous amount, or that what we do know provides a compelling story of how past became present.

So the difference between science and history isn't qualitative but quantitative, and it is a little inconsistent (for christians or atheists) to accept one and not the other.

I wish you well. It would be hard work, but also fun, to write a book!

[sankari]

This sounds excellent Tim. I know some Christians who would benefit from it.

[timoneill]

Jun 5, 2013 8:35:53 GMT sankari said:

This sounds excellent Tim. I know some Christians who would benefit from it.

I have a horrible feeling they'll be the only ones who will buy it. I'm going to be self-publishing it because I doubt Prometheus or the American Atheist Press would touch it. Which is rather depressing.

[merkavah12]

Jun 5, 2013 10:30:25 GMT timoneill said:

Jun 5, 2013 8:35:53 GMT sankari said:

This sounds excellent Tim. I know some Christians who would benefit from it.

I have a horrible feeling they'll be the only ones who will buy it. I'm going to be self-publishing it because I doubt Prometheus or the American Atheist Press would touch it. Which is rather depressing.

Don't be so sure, Tim. In my dealings online, I've noted a growing number of Atheists and Agnostics who share your view: that spouting Gibbonian myths does a disservice to the quest for evidence.

[bullpeople]

Jun 4, 2013 20:14:09 GMT timoneill said:

Comments?

Suggestions?

The Crusades and the Inquisitions are common examples used to demonstrate how the Church held back society. The Early modern witch craze another, although the myths surrounding the witch craze have a tenancy to be spewed by the neo-pagan sphere of the internet.

[timoneill]

Jun 5, 2013 17:11:02 GMT bullpeople said:

Jun 4, 2013 20:14:09 GMT timoneill said:

Comments?

Suggestions?

The Crusades and the Inquisitions are common examples used to demonstrate how the Church held back society. The Early modern witch craze another, although the myths surrounding the witch craze have a tenancy to be spewed by the neo-pagan sphere of the internet.

I've had atheists use the "nine million witches" nonsense as evidence of the wickedness of Christianity, so it's not just the Wiccan Witches of the West who bungle that one. I think the Inquisition and the Witch Craze may have to be in there too.

[ignorantianescia]

Tim, though you're not short of any possible topics, have you considered including a topic that has appeal to atheists? Maybe a polemical epilogue or a chapter on the history of atheism. The advantage of that is that anybody who tries to discredit you by calling you a one-man hit squad for the Vatican, Biola, the Watchtower Society or the Branch Davidians ends up discrediting him/herself to most people.

[labarum]

If you are making a series of posts for atheists, it might be better not to tell them what to say about history as much as what NOT to say. Something along the lines of "Things Lots of Atheists Believe about History that are Complete BS." In other words, avoid areas where there are legitimate disagreement and concentrate on things that make you bang your head against the wall.

You might want to leave it an open ended series that you post to on occasion. Start with what annoys you the most and work your way from there. There is no reason to give a definite "x number of posts" since, just when you thought you had heard everything, along comes something even more annoying.

[timoneill]

Jun 5, 2013 20:19:50 GMT ignorantianescia said:

Tim, though you're not short of any possible topics, have you considered including a topic that has appeal to atheists? Maybe a polemical epilogue or a chapter on the history of atheism. The advantage of that is that anybody who tries to discredit you by calling you a one-man hit squad for the Vatican, Biola, the Watchtower Society or the Branch Davidians ends up discrediting him/herself to most people.

I don't want to get all "New Atheist" (because I'm not one). But I suppose I would finish with a epilogue on why it's as important to be historically literate as it is to be scientifically literate, especially if anyone (eg actual New Atheists) want to use history in debating religious people.

[timoneill]

I'm trying to keep this project/idea moving, so I've posted an outline of the book's possible contents on /r/badhistory:

History for Atheists: How New Atheism Gets History Wrong

1. Getting History Wrong

Atheists, History and Pseudo History
History vs Science
How is History Studied?
Signs of Pseudo History

2. The Historical Jesus

The Jesus of History vs the Jesus of Faith
Versions of Jesus
Pseudo Jesus

3. The Jesus Myth Fallacies

Did Jesus Exist?
The Kooky Fringe
The Problems with Mythicism
So Why the Scholarly Consensus?

4. The Bible and Early Christianity

Gospels Great and Small
The Formation of the Bible
The Conversion of Constantine
Pagan Persecution?

5. Dark Age Myths and Legends

Hypatia and the Great Library
Who Caused the Dark Ages?
The Age of Light
Crusades, Inquisitions and Witches

6. Christianity and Early Science

Was science "suppressed" in the Middle Ages?
The Church and Heliocentrism
Bruno and Galileo - the myths of "scientific martyrs"

7. Hitler's Pope?

The origins of the myth of "Hitler's Pope" Hitler and Religion The Concordat and the Third Reich
"Ally of the Jewish War Criminals"
The Vatican and the Holocaust

8. Reason, Faith and History