Episode 16 The Big Questions

Today on The Big Questions, atheism.

Good morning. I am Nicky to The Big Questions. We are back at the Church

of England Academy in York. Is it rational to believe in God?

Welcome, everyone, to The Big Questions this morning. Pascal, the

physicist and inventor, became a Christian philosopher later in his

life. He combined the mathematics of probability with religious belief,

in his famous wager, arguing that as you can either prove or disprove

God's existence, you must wager that if God exists and you are a

believer, you gain everything. If God does not exist, you lose

nothing. So he reasoned that you should believe in God. So, would he

say the same today, when the faithful are often pilloried as

idiots and science continues to look for rational expeditions for the

mysteries of life. Is it more rational to believe in God? We have

a distinguished line-up of theologians, scientists, people of

faith and people that have lost faith. You can have your say on

Twitter, log onto the website where you will find links to continue the

discussion. Lots of contributions from our very lively audience. Is it

more rational to believe in God? There are people who say it is far

more rational to believe in God than not to. You will not be surprised to

hear they are sitting in the studio. What do you say to them? Well, I

think you have got to look at what is rational, you have to look at

what reasons give us reason to believe, on balance. I don't think

it's helpful to say religious believers are irrational, as though

they are just stupid. There is a balance of evidence and you have to

ask, where does Italy and most heavily? If you were to ask, what

would happen if some buddy came into this debate without prior knowledge,

without an upbringing in one particular religion or another? I

think if they look that the evidence they would conclude this is a

natural universe without any supernatural guidance. The religions

we have in this culture are eight product of different cultures, which

is why there are different religions in different societies. That is a

very broad brushed version of the Ottoman. Just on balance, that is

what seems to be where the reasoned points. There is no natural,

inherent... There is no God within us that means we have to believe in

God? Or we are led to believe in God? It seems to be a natural

instinct towards looking for purpose in the universe. It seems to be a

natural human instinct to try and find reasons for things happening

that are to do with motivations and desires. The fact that it is

something we have evolved to have does not tell us anything about

whether there is something they're doing that. The instinct is just an

instinct, which you could say evolved because we need to look to

how things work. We need to understand how things work and for

other people, it is helpful to see them as having motives. That general

instinct, when we apply it to the universe as a whole, is misapplied.

Because the universe is not another person, something we need to

understand the motivations of. So, that last point about how we have

evolved to seek patterns and explanations, Professor Alister

McGrath, we are basically primates, we are pattern seeking mammals? Of

course we seek an explanation and also we seek comfort? Of course we

are looking for explanations. That is what intelligent people do. It is

about trying to work out what is going on in the world. Julian is

also right to say that is part of who we are. But that does not deny

the validity of looking for meaning, and its many why we think something

does not invalidate the quest. I am a scientist, I began as an atheist

and became a Christian, one of the enormously exciting things about

discovering the Christian faith is not to be that it helped me be a

better scientist, it really opened up this question of meaning. Many

are watching this programme today precisely because of this question

of meaning, that it really matters. It is not something you can reel off

from just looking at the universe, it is about deep reflection. Maybe

it is about the deepest instincts in us. Was your life lacking in meaning

before? I think I had meaning, but it was a meaning I had just

constructed. Is there something there I am meant to be walking into?

A bigger picture that I could be part of? That seemed to me to be a

very important question to ask. A lot of people point to certain

precepts of religion and they see them as being irrational. Some

people say, how can it be rational to take your religion, to accept

that we are born sinful, that unless we get better we are threatened with

hell, that the God that created as created. You can CYP Bull might

think that is baloney? I can see why people would think that, with

respect I don't think that. Many of your faith do? Exactly. You have to

accept that Christianity is a rich religion and there are different

perspectives. To say it is baloney, I want to say that Christianity is

rich, exciting, enormously intellectually stimuli can. But it

is a broad church and I belong to a depth that I think is great. He is

exactly right, there are different forms of religion. Anybody that

tries to say that religion is a rational because of X, you are never

going to get to the bottom of it. We have this debate in these very

polite ways and talk about how, of course, you don't have to believe in

hell, when it comes down to it, it is true that the majority of

religious people will believe at least one thing which to an atheist,

to somebody that will take a purely scientific view, is kind of

outrageous. In terms of Christianity, the bottom line for a

lot of people is the resurrection. lot of people is the resurrection.

They made out to certain things happened in the old Testament, but I

have yet to find... Very few Christians I meet will be prepared

to say, no, that boom was not empty because there was a resurrection of

Christ. That is a because there was a resurrection of

believe if you People do believe it. I'm not saying

are going against, I think, a scientific worldview in that

are going against, I think, a particular part. Vince, you want to

come in? It's a really good point. I think sometimes there is an

assumption that Christianity, or belief in God generally, is the more

extraordinary belief, it is the more miraculous belief. Therefore, it has

the burden of proof. I thought that for a long time. The more I reasoned

about it, I thought, what other possible big picture explanations

for the universe? There are only three primary ones. One might be

that God made it. I might just put my hand up and say that is pretty

extraordinary, it is remarkable. But if I look up the other two, the

universe just popped into existence from nothing with explanation, it's

a very odd option as well. Physical stuff normally doesn't pop in and

out of existence. If it does not now, why would it then? Or we say

that the universe has existed infinitely, stretching back in time.

And I think that pushes the oddness one step back. Or universes? If

there is a succession going back infinitely in time, still with no

explanation for why that is the case. I come to the conclusion that

we live in a miraculous world. If you are an atheist, theist or

agnostic, I don't think there is any getting around that fact. Once I

came to see that, I think I was more open to seeing that

came to see that, I think I was more could take place. But it's

impossible for us to conceptualise that stuff. 13.5 billion years, it

is no more likely we are going to do it and a raft is going to explain

what the London Underground is about? Whatever the truth is, it is

extraordinary. It is extraordinarily hard to fathom. But I don't think

anyone should think that the solution to come up with, whether

they are atheist or theist is the final account. There are the

mysteries that we don't understand, and there are deep mysteries for the

more scientifically inclined people. Many religious people are

scientifically inclined? Some of them are. A lot of them are. Some of

them are? A lot of them are? It is a question of which extraordinary

explanation fits the most. That is where I think the rationality points

to the natural one. There are fascinating areas in signs to

discuss. You touched on this, Julian, what about the cultural

reasons? Different religions in different parts of the world,

different cultural histories, different anthropological basis for

those. Dr Lois Lee, this is quite interesting, recent studies have

shown that societies with a stronger belief in heaven and hell have

higher crime rates? This multi-fact , as they say. Societies with a

welfare state, a big comfort blanket, lots of security for people

within, they have lower religious belief. What can we extrapolate, if

anything? And, goodness me, it is very compensated. It is. I think it

gets to... You said, if we leave the religious backgrounds at the door,

then we can work with evidence. That is a really big if. We can't leave

our backgrounds at the door. Most people we find that you are

religious or nonreligious according to the norm in your locale. It can

be as local as the borough that you live in, it can be as local as your

family, but it also works on the national level. When we are thinking

about rationality, weighing up the evidence, we are putting to one side

a big part of the picture, this cultural inclination towards one

belief or another. As you said, there are many factors. The larger

the welfare state, the less likely you are to be religious. The

religious history of a country as well? Absolutely. What we can find

is a general trend, the larger the welfare state and how relatively

affluent it is, that can allow us to predict how religious it is or how

atheist it is. Then we find we get pushed in different directions by

the cultural backgrounds. State atheism have a big impact, we saw a

big rise in atheism within that cultural context. So we have to

consider those cultural factors and not say, because there is a big

welfare state, therefore I can say that religion is all about comfort

and so on. There isn't going to be an easy explanation like that.

Certainly we need to take us into account. What about Sweden? Famously

cited as an example of quite an atheist, agnostic or not very

religious place. Are they a rational? Or are they very rational?

-- irrational. If you do focus exclusively on rationality in these

kinds of debates, you end up having to say the Swedish are more rational

than the Brits, that you may wish to say. We are 13th highest in terms of

the amount of atheism, in a shorter list. Are we the 13th most rational

or 13th most irrational? So we would have to accept that we are less

rational than the French, the Latvians, more rational than 27

other countries. It's like the Eurovision Song Contest, we are

never going to win anything! Is there a tipping point, perhaps,

where it becomes... A lot of people are feeling at the moment that they

think it is becoming unacceptable to express your religious belief. Is

there a tipping point where I had become socially more acceptable and

expected that you are not a believer? It's self-perpetuating, in

a sense? Absolutely. The creation of a new culture, in which it is normal

to be X or Y. That's important in terms of rational claims. You want

to see that they back it up by their action. You see a transformation of

rationality, which is very informed by these different cultural norms. I

think Britain is quite an interesting country because there is

a balance between religious cultures, Christian culture

especially, and atheists and nonreligious cultures. They are the

two, both sitting at 40% or 50%. It's an interesting space for

discussion. Discussion matters, because that is what creates the

cultures. The cultures influence what we then take on. There's no

reason to say we have a deterministic view and there is no

point even having the concession, but if we start to say someone is

being irrational, we have to accept that we are all pretty irrational

and accept that as a starting point. We are, I do this show a lot!

Professor Alister McGrath, you are a very great scientist, but that is

nothing to do with your religion, great scientist, great academic,

highly respected. You are an evolutionary theist, you accept

that. You said Adam and Eve were symbolic. We come into the science

later on. You have already hinted at this, you can understand very well

how some people point out aspects of religion and belief and think that

is, if you'll pardon the expression, bonkers. The other accusation to you

would be that you have moulded religion to fit into your

rationality? And that is all you have done? Everyone who thinks about

these questions has to say, do I buy into something that is already

there? Do I think this through in a freethinking way? This is what I

believe to be right. I would want to affirm the importance of

rationality. The real problem we are facing is that only shallow truths

can be proved. All of us are in a situation where there are deep

questions like what is life all about? Is rape wrong? What has that

got to do with it? In many ways we have to realise we are in a

situation where to answer the big question is, we have to go beyond

what reason is able to say. It is not a problem but it is an emphasis

on the need to try to understand each other and allow these

discussions to take place. I think that is what is missing at the

moment. I have no problem with Julian but there are other atheists

who are downright nasty. Religion doesn't have a clean record. Of

course it doesn't. We will have a situation where we need to have a

good conversation. Ridiculing, whether you ridicule faith or

non-faith, makes things worse. We need to have an intelligent

conversation, I think that is what we are having now.

APPLAUSE Ollie Killingback is a former vicar,

he is not one any more. There has to be discussion and balance and

generosity. It seems to me, sitting among us, we have a group of

rational people with widely different opinions. Those opinions

are motivated by something. It seems he was on to something when he said

the reason can only be the slave of the emotions. It seems religion is

about an emotional commitment. I for one had reached the end of

intellectual belief, long before I could make the actual move out of

the church. It took me 20 years to get to the position where

emotionally I was ready. What was the mindset when you were in the

church? When you are a believer? I wish it was as clear as that but it

is not. I started asking questions about my family's religious beliefs

when I was five or six. The whole thing followed through through

college and so on, there were always more questions than there were good

answers. There were answers but often not good enough. I was on the

way out not long after I was ordained, intellectual. People were

saying that religion is a man-made phenomenon. Nonetheless, it is a

good thing. I bought that. I lived hard with

good thing. I bought that. I lived good thing. Those two don't sit

together very well. good thing. Those two don't sit

odd years to make the break and say, I can now take off this dirty

garment and walk away from it. APPLAUSE

garment and walk away from it. Julian on what Alistair has said

about the big question is, to address the big question is, the

profound questions about, why is rape wrong, I think that was how you

put it. We somehow need to be religious beings.

put it. We somehow need to be that... I didn't make my point,

put it. We somehow need to be was saying we had to go beyond pure

reason. You may raise religious questions along the way. It is that

term pure reason. It is an important one. I think sometimes people on the

atheist side of the debates overstate the extent how far

rationality can take us. They think if you just follow reason and

rationality, you can make sense of everything and nothing us is needed.

Even great philosophers were not that optimistic about rationality.

The point about rationality is pushing it as far as you can, being

as rational as possible, applying as much reason as can be applied both

but it is never pure and who claims that it is is onto a hiding to

nothing and they will be guilty of that accusation, that rationality

leaves lots of things undecided. You can always push rationales and

justifications and as much as possible, and you only then have to

put the other things in when those things have to fill a gap. You don't

bring in rationality in before it is necessary.

David Hume is one of the greatest of before suffers, gets mentioned in

every book written by atheists against religion. This quote gets

mentioned. To paraphrase, he asks, which is more likely, the

supernatural explanation or people believing we supernatural

explanation are mistaken? He comes up with that although the time. That

is a good example. You can't prove one way or another. It is more

likely people are mistaken? That is always more likely. There are

possible circumstances where the evidence was so overwhelming,

something could happen in front of the cameras so miraculous that we

had to believe it was a genuine miracle and there was not a natural

explanation. We haven't seen anything so far end history that was

so commencing. -- in history that was so convincing. It is a question

worth asking, would we believe it is a miracle or would we explain it

away in some way? It depends what it was. If we saw a vision. For

instance. Some of us might explain it away. It can be a matter of where

your emotions are, where your heart is, how we perceive different

situations. I think it is interesting, we talk about miracles.

If we are going to say miracles don't happen, we are speaking

against the vast majority of people throughout history, and globally

still today. That doesn't prove that miracles do happen, but I do think

we should be wary of being quick to say the vast majority historically

and globally have been wrong. I think majorities in this case are

not necessarily always right. APPLAUSE

The other thing which is important is that once you force a crack in

the laws of nature, once you say that for a moment the Earth is not

going around the sun, relativity doesn't apply, Gravity doesn't

apply, once you say that, you open up the entire universe to

intervention. That is the important thing, that there is strong evidence

on the other side. If we were on a grain -- game show and did not know

the answer, I might poll the audience. If 98% said one thing and

I went with another, people would say I was not rational, unless I had

strong evidence. You raise this idea of the God of the gaps and

intervention. Is it rational for you, Margaret, to have your belief?

Yes, I think so. To believe in God seems entirely rational. If you will

only believe what science has proven, whatever discovery is made,

the same thing applied the day before it was made. Isn't it

irrational to think that because you can't prove the existence of God,

you either -- he therefore can't exist. Which is your God, the old

Testament, the new Testament, Jesus? Jesus, yes. I have been researching

a mystic called Julian who lived in the 14th century. He had a series of

visions of the crucifixion. The image of God which he presents is

totally in contrast to what we think of as the old Testament God. The God

who went out smiting every day. Julian's theology which is very

benign, he says God looks upon us in pity, not with blame and he doesn't

condemn us for any wrong doing, and all wrongdoing has been forgiven,

even before we ask for forgiveness. This is from somebody's visions.

This is your point, if somebody had visions like that now, we would be

extremely sceptical. The thing about Julian, she is accepted by the

church, she is a blessing which means she is being beatified, she is

on the way to being a saint. She is accepted as a great theologian. Are

we accepting she really did have visions? Oh, yes, she wrote a book

about it and she is accepted as a great theologian. The great Catholic

20 century writer and mystic Thomas Merton describes as a true

theologian in that she has the true image of God, this benign, loving

image who never condemns us and is full of only compassionate love for

us. Another idea of God. Moving on from the visions. This might even

play to what Lois Lee was saying, of different cultures. This may even

compromise the whole nation of the debate that we are having. We have a

saying that reason and devotion are two wings of the same bird. And that

both of them have a place. We also have an understanding that for some

people, their attitude is such that pure rational explanation is what

satisfies and gives them a sense of tranquillity. And for others, a

divine experience or devoted worshipper gives them a sense of

tranquillity. Our approach is that it seems to be a sense of

tranquillity gives a person and experience which the mystics have

always tried to communicate in some sort of a deficient blend which. Our

focus is on -- deficient language. Our focus is how do you become

eternally tranquil? In that state, there are no beliefs. I would even

suggest that having a belief is unreasonable. I think that is right,

there is a space for the rational... Everyone is agreeing

beyond the rational. There is a slightly false dichotomy between

rationality and religion that we therefore think atheists are all

about rationality, which is not what we are trying to say. I interview

atheists about their day-to-day lives and so on. I have a strong

sense of the meaning systems, the aesthetics, the opportunities for

devotion, if not the divine, full communion with out to tranquillity

and so on, which not every atheist is interested in, in the same way

that religious people are not all about those spaces. There are

relaxed list religious cultures as well as .

If you take it to a lot go conclusion, having a belief in the

existence of some god figure, I would say is equally as irrational

as having a belief in the nonexistence. Because they are both

beliefs. APPLAUSE

I absolutely agree. People have belief systems, mindsets, ways of

getting through the night, basically. As a Muslim, you have had

a bit of flak recently. You took part in a music video, showing... It

wasn't my bad dancing. It was the tune, Happy. Showing Muslims being

happy and dancing. You have had a lot of flak. People point to things

like that, some people will believe you are wrong to do that, they are

entitled to have that belief. It is about the rules and red delicious,

what sort of God is this question I I think many rudest people do a

disservice to religion. -- many religious people do a disservice. It

does not represent the actual faith itself. Going back to Ollie's point

about believing in God is based on emotion, I think that statement is

based on emotion. There are volumes of books in the British library,

King 's College library, discussing religious philosophy, using

philosophy, argument, logic. There are books like that on both sides.

Of course, I am not saying atheism is irrational but I would say that

the overwhelming evidence, especially now, is on the side of

God. The last 40 or 50 years, when scientists examined the universe, we

are pretty much convinced that the explanation of the universe is not

contained within the universe will stop it points to outside or beyond

the universe. To categorise believing in God is emotional is

rather juvenile. It is very outdated. It is very much

enlightenment, outdated claptrap. There is a lot of outdated claptrap

in religion, which you haven't acknowledged. We are comparing

atheism to the irrationality of religion, let's say. There are

irrational aspects within religion. That is a false comparison. Even if

religion is false, it would not prove that atheism is true. God can

still exist even if religion is false. There is a false comparison

so far. If we look at the evidence on the side of God and atheism, the

overwhelming evidence is on the side of God. One thing we can talk about

is the extent to which people who have religious belief, if any

bonuses on them at to show their belief is rational. There is an onus

to show that your belief is not contrary to what we know about

science, but there is a long tradition in religion of actually

thinking that the basis of faith is not a deductive argument, it is not

rationality, it is an encounter with the divine, an emotional thing.

Doubting Thomas is held up as a counterexample. He says, I'm going

to give belief when I see that wound. The people praised those ones

that make the leap of faith beforehand. There can be too much

wanting to claim rationality. I think you are redefining my

position. My position is that I believe in God on a rational basis.

It's all very well saying that the leap of faith is what religious

people should be involved in, but that is a convenient redefining of

Mike position. I wasn't talking about your position personally, I

was talking generally. The majority of religious people don't believe

because they think it is and emotional position, it's because

they think it makes sense to believe in God, especially in a world where

we are discovering more about the origin of the universe. People would

say we have evolved because of that fine June in. -- shooting. --

tuning. Bbc.co.uk/thebigquestions would you say you are an emotional

atheist? Let us say we have two professors of biology at our great

universities. Both of them, leading scientists. One, from what he sees

in biology, says he is convinced that religion cannot be the case.

The other one comes to exactly the opposite conclusion, that the

evidence, their reason, each one's individual rationality leads them to

their own opinion. What drives that opinion is the inclinations they

were born with, the education they have had, the emotional experiences

they have had. The whole personalities. That is what forms

at. The crux of the demented as this. Shall we believe that the

entire argument to leg universe can come from nothing? Let's talk about

where the entire universe came from. We mentioned it earlier on, the

whole idea of the scientists, the God of the gaps. Where there is an

apparent gap in scientific knowledge, historically, there has

been an explanation that God did it. And the gaps are, it is said by

some people, the habitat is shrinking. When there are stunned,

we know that God is not angry. -- thunder. We know how rainbows are

made. Is that a problem for religious people? I think the God of

the gaps argument is an interesting one. I would actually say that it is

probably quite poor theology to revert to the God of the gaps. What

you're doing his inserting a into day-to-day phenomena. Here's a

hostage to science explaining something? I would explain the point

in terms of the validity of truth. I will never stand outside of this

universe. I think we need to recognise that that kind of meta-

causal process, we will potentially never know. Science will never fill

that gap? Then we cannot claim that God does not exist. The reverse of

that claim also has to be the case. I entirely agree. But we have people

on the side of the atheist saying that God doesn't exist. Not all

atheists. We say that atheist 's experience God not existing in the

same way that the rest is experienced the divine. How can you

experience thing that is not there? I thought we have the irrationality!

Let's put Julian into the gap. Keen to fill the gaps. Some gaps will

never be filled. Let's talk about that first cause, has raised by

Adam. This is where the brain started to hurt. What caused it?

What caused the cause of the first cause? It is infinite regression.

Does that not make you think, hang on a minute, something is going on?

Bbc.co.uk/thebigquestions it is extreme the puzzling. It's true. But

what you come up with is an answer on a very abstract level. This is

the point. Even if, by rationality and reason, you are convinced, which

most philosophers are, that there must have been an original first

cause, and uncaused first cause. That gives you a general concept.

People who are religious do not believe in an abstract concept like

that. They believe in a specific God, created in the shape of the

particular religion, whatever it might be. So if you are going to

talk about trying to build things on reason alone, I think the problem

with that is that you're going to be left with a very abstract idea,

which does not have a lot of connection with the very ritually

rounded, often personality driven gods of religion. I am interested in

this uncaused first cause. No proper reputable scientist thinks that God

created like Walt Disney designing mice. Let's go back to the Big Bang.

If you think God was responsible for the Big Bang, is it a credible

argument to say, was there a cause of the first cause, all was the

first cause, necessarily, uncaused? Supposing we had been meeting here a

century ago, we would not be having this conversation. At that time,

science thought that the universe had always been here. One thing that

we make absolutely clear is that science is on a journey, it changes

its mind. These massive, exciting discussions we are having... Because

it knows more and more? Absolutely. I agree what was said about the God

of the gaps, I think it is silly, really. What is much more

interesting is why we explain things at all, why does science raise these

wonderful questions it can't actually answer? For me, it is not

looking at gaps, it is standing back and trying to say, is there a big

picture of things that makes sense of what we see, fits things in,

brings meaning and joy to life. That is a much more interesting question.

It's not about digging around for gaps, it is saying, there is a big

picture here, let's figure out what it is and whether we are part of it.

An experience I had when I was a young clergyman, simply asked me

outside the church on a Sunday morning, why it was that I believed

in God. I trotted out the answer I had given before, it seems to me

that the universe reflects the kind of thing is that Christianity says

are at the basis of everything. The warmth, for example, that Julian

talks about. I heard myself saying my head, you know what, that isn't

true. The universe is not warm, it is not forgiving, it is a cold,

empty, nasty place. Which we could not survive in. For me, that was a

turning point. For some people it is exactly how you would expect it to

be if it had exactly how you would expect it to

from nowhere. For other people, it exactly as you would expect if

had been a creator. We had some had been a creator. We had some

hands up. Three guys at the back? Glasses, first of all. The point has

made that science is changing over time, but religion is as well. But

it's never held to the same account. For example, religion was opposed to

evolution, now they are slowly accepting that maybe

evolution, now they are slowly churches preach we are the only

evolution, now they are slowly planet with life on it because we

are God's chosen people. I think when we discover life on

are God's chosen people. I think planet, maybe, religion

are God's chosen people. I think its spots, but will never be held to

the same account as a scientist would be if he had disagreed with

that. I was good to say the same thing. I was going to develop on

that. It becomes an issue of falsification. If you say God did

it, there is no way an atheist can disprove you. Then the fact that

science keeps developing, and that religion is very stoic in its

approach, it's... I think religion does change. Surely religion has

approach, it's... I think religion changed to accommodate itself to

scientific discovery? Is rather saying, let's see if we have

interpreted these text is right. John Paul II, one of the things he

did during his papacy was say that actually, Darwin was right. Was that

not a case of the church changing actually, Darwin was right. Was that

because of inescapable evidence? No, if you look at Catholics over the

last century, if you look at Augustus saying that the universe

came to be in an instant and then developed over a long period of

time. I think it was great for the discussion the other day, you know,

maybe science and religion need each other. Science is rightly saying,

maybe science and religion need each why do you think that is right? Very

good question. Religion is saying, what is the deeper meaning of

things? These things can go together to give a full view of things. I

just wanted to come back on the point about evolution and religion

being in a kind of clash. We have to be very careful with the history

here. It's not as clearly defined as was just implied by that question.

That clash does not necessarily exist in the publication of The

Origin Of The Species onwards. It's quite recent, it's a political and

ideological construction and a product of the 20th century. One of

the things that we have to recognise is that the majority of people do

not necessarily see there being a necessary conflict between science

and religion. We have to really, really step away from communicating

science and atheism as one thing. There are a couple of points where

we have been doing that, where we have conflated science and atheism

together and they are two very different things. You have tried

Mormonism, you tried Islam. Now you have tried atheism. How is it going?

Well, I'm not really keen on the personal account type of approach.

But I did want to pick up on... I forgot your name? Professor Alister

McGrath. About the meaning of religion. If we take religion to be

a general theory of how the world works, perhaps we can also is

deliberately think that the have developed in response to what is

going wrong in the world. I think this is missed by militant atheists

who criticise people for being religious. They don't recognise and

understand the great comfort that religion brings to people. The

explanations of the world. That is one of the reason why I am

completely against... They are at liberty to say, as Christopher

Hitchens did, that it is a false consolation, that is a perfectly

valid argument? One of the things this concession is showing us that

there can be reasons on both sides of debate. I think we all agree,

words like track quality and peace were used earlier, we can all agree

that those are valuable things. From a Christian perspective, the place

where I find peace is in knowing that you are loved, unconditionally,

by someone that will never forsake you, by somebody that would even

suffer for you, give his life for you. Given that, rationally, we can

think about these questions and say... It's comforting? We had to

ask the question, is it the mind that keeps us from belief in God or

something else? Father? I have sinned! Albert Einstein, who was

once asked, did he ever think we would come up with an explanation

for the origin of the universe. He said, no, but when he thought the

answer would be found will be two things, beautiful and simple. My

faith is not about understanding how the world works or anything like

that. What I hope my faith is is a lifelong exploration of truth and

beauty, which I hope is what good science and philosophy is as well.

Serenity? Well, that is the product of finding the truth and the beauty.

I find that in the Christian message and I've got to try and deepen my

understanding and faith in that. The last point I would want to make is

that faith, actually, I just want to say in this context, the context of

this argument, certainty, in a sense, is the opposite of faith.

Doubt is not the opposite of faith. That is where I see the coming

together of faith and reason. It's an explanation. This century, we

have become good at throwing stones at each other. We have always been

very good at throwing stones. Adam, what is the biggest problem that

science poses for religion? If you were an atheist and were saying that

science had blown it out of the argument, what is the best argument

that they have? Against God? I don't figured would be a scientific

argument, it would be a philosophical and moral argument,

the problem of evil. That is one of the biggest contention is that exist

against theism. It has generally Billy Bragg wrote genuinely just

occurred to me, God knows everything that is going to happen. If he knows

everything that is going to happen, what is the point? What is the point

of converting? Does that not invalidate three will? There is

salacious reasoning. Just because knows -- just because God knows

something, it does not cause him to act. Does the Christian God in

everything that is going to happen? Yes, I believe so. If I watch my

goddaughter from across the room, I know how she is going to act before

she does so. If it is true that God knows every hair on our heads, if he

knows are so much more than I know my goddaughter, it is not surprising

he would note how we might act. It doesn't mean he is causing it or

controlling it. Julian, do you have a view? I don't think it is a

problem. Why isn't God's foreknowledge a problem? Because you

can know what somebody wants to do of their own free will. The fact you

can see it in advance doesn't mean it wasn't their own free will that

caused it. I really don't think it is a problem. Coming in on this

notion of free will, this isn't just a problem for theological discourse,

it is a problem for atheist discourse as well. We risk losing an

atheist conception of free will, which ties us back into the play to

call, ideological... It is a side step too far? If we believe in a

naturalistic world, a material world, the self is lost. We lose

personal identity, we lose what makes us human. OK... It is

overstating it. There are challenges, there is a kind of

strand of overconfident atheism which thinks science will lead us to

the promised land. But it certainly does raise questions about our

inherent ability to even know the truth, our ability to have free will

and so forth. I don't think these things blow it out of the water,

they are not unanswerable, I don't think it makes the self and illusion

but I think honest atheism needs to accept that the scientific world

view is not entirely comfortable for everything that atheists believe

either. Satish Sharma, is the Hindu conception of a greater power more

in your mind compatible with science? It is a completely

integrated experience. It is of no consolation to me to be convinced

that yes, God exists intellectually. That is of no value

to me whatsoever. They believe changes from moment to moment as you

learn things. The only consolation, the only thing that would satisfy

would satisfy would-be and experience. If you take the mystics

out of the picture, the whole God argument becomes intellectual

cogitation. The mystics had experiences. Our approach is what we

do to recreate our experience in our awareness. The teaching is that when

that experience happens, suddenly there is an expanded connectivity

with all of life and all of creation. It becomes a knowing

rather than a computational deduction. There are some hands in

the audience. We have touched a few times on evidence. Don't we go a lot

on things that we simply know? How do you know that your nearest and

terraced love you? It is because you do know it, you can't put that in a

test tube and you can't intellectualise that. To a certain

extent, we can expect behaviour but it is a knowing. That is what people

of faith have. I don't think it makes any difference whether you are

Hindu or must limp or Christian, it is that knowing, that intimacy, that

knowledge of God. You simply can't intellectualise it. We could argue

all day and it would never make any difference. I actually don't believe

in miracles. I went to Lourdes and I found it ever so depressing. I do

have a fate and I believe part of having a faith is leaving. I don't

believe, with respect, atheism, so I feel that faith is very important.

Is atheism a belief system as much as any? Going back to our earlier

discussion, I would argue that atheism is a belief system. I am an

atheist, a lifelong atheist, I grew up in a scientific household.

Atheism and science are not linked, necessarily. Touche! I say that

because I work on communicating evolutionary science I have to be

quite careful. I am concerned about what agendas I have. The point I

would like to make about whether or not we need religion is, there are a

couple of ways we can cut this up. We could argue there is an

evolutionary reason for having religious beliefs. There are two

ways way could look at it. We could think of religion as a by-product of

other processes. As there is an evolutionary reason for love. It is

for breeding and security... What Julian was referring to is religion

as an evolutionary by-product, it could be an adaptive advantage,

being able to work in social groups. It doesn't tell us anything about

whether God exists or not. All it tells us is that there is religion

in society which has existed for quite a long time. That is the fact

we deal with. From when? Did the Neanderthals have a God

consciousness? There is evidence of early prehistory, miso payer

we know it has played a part of human society from early human

history, all the way through recorded history. The other thing we

know is that it is one of the defining categories of worldview for

most people on the planet now. We have to deal with that, whether we

are atheists or not. We have to accept we live in a world of

difference, a pluralistic society and we have defined ways to engage

with each other so we can communicate with an open dialogue.

There are some hands up. The microphone is coming. In relation to

the freedom of will, God in the Koran mentioned that people liked

the atheists would come out and say things, let them prove it. This has

been predicted, that people will come, very clever. The other thing,

the revelation of the Koran will challenge science. That is in the

Koran, 1400 years ago. The miraculous birth of Christ will

believe it and also the Koran, it is the Graces miracle throughout

history and atheists cannot challenge that because they can't

discuss it in Arabic -- it is the greatest miracle. Game over, let's

go home. It is the God of the gaps again. It is. This is what we need

to be careful about. In my field of interest around evolutionary theory,

we have to recognise it is not often a conversation about science but a

conversation about theological debates, literalist interpretations

of texts. It is nothing to do would be science. I don't have to talk

about evidence to do with evolutionary theory because your

conversation is intra to your own faith perspective. Other people from

your own faith perspective would probably challenge or stance. The

gentleman at the edge. A lot of the discussion that has taken religious

group or context but the gentleman said you don't have to belong to a

religious group to believe in God. The thought system from the

Enlightenment didn't necessarily block to Christianity, Islam

Judaism, it acknowledged the fact that God is an entity. I believe in

God but I'd don't... I am a Christian but I see the two as

separate and I think that is a big heart of the debate. We need to take

the idea of God away from... I thought you were going to say I am a

Christian but I don't believe in God. New Church of England people

got not being serious! -- you Church of England people got not being

in terms of practice, I am not very religious. The fact that we are

alighting believing in God and religion, we need to keep it at some

distance. It makes a much better discussion. We are the 13th most

atheistic out of 40 countries in the world, what is driving people, what

does drive people to atheism? Is it the examples of religion that you

would describe as extreme? I think the rise of religious fundamentalism

is the biggest driver of atheism in the world. I want to put my hand up

and say maybe I'm contributing to that. You're not a religious

fundamentalist. We need to think carefully and saying in effect, we

are causing this problem. Secondly, there is also the question of the

cultural authority of science which we have talked about quite a lot. I

think scientists do need to make it clear that science is neutral. I

don't say it is anti-religious but it is science. Science is science,

it is great. When it starts behaving as if it has answers on religious

things, it actually damages its self. I think that needs to be said.

We need to purify science and rescue it from being used as a weapon from

either religious or religious fundamentalists. Thomas Huxley made

the point. He said science commits suicide once it adopts a creed. I am

asking, can we purify science and get back to what we used to be? Can

you purify religion of these ideological elements, people say it

is ridiculous, the world was not created in... The ideological

element 's most people are worried about is the propensity towards

violence. That is a big one we have to face up to. My old theology

teacher started out with something which echoed what you said. She

began her first lecture by saying, if we believe that God is truth,

theology is a journey into truth and it is -- there is no for no question

which cannot be asked, no difficult question which may be ducked. I

followed that teaching and it led me away from the church. She wouldn't

like where I have gone to but she would approve the methods. That

journey into light and truth is the way to go. Do you think it is a

genuine threat to religions of mainstream views? Speaking as a

Muslim I have seen my own faith, Islam, being hijacked by

extremists. I don't know if it justifies Muslims becoming atheist,

but certainly they contribute in becoming apostates. The abandonment

of faith? Yes, and in some cases they are justified. They are not

rejecting Islam but a perverted version of Islam. Very much so, I

would agree that religious people, extremists, are contributing to

anti-religious sentiments and atheists. What I would also say, I

would support religious front -- what supports religious

fundamentalism is extreme militant atheism. That is a problem as well.

You have made a very balanced point, we have to leave it there,

thank you for watching, we will see you next ample stock thank you all

for taking part. -- see you next time. Thank you all for taking part.

Does anybody know exactly what they're eating?