I noticed that Vox made what I think is a rather telling comment in one of his blog posts, he said:

“That being said, my experience in the response to my last novel has taught me that from the writer’s perspective, it’s more important to create the illusion of brilliance than to create something genuinely brilliant* on a wavelength that no reader can reasonably be expected to detect. I expect the more alert regulars will understand the implications of this lesson…. ”

I think this sums up Vox Day’s entire approach to atheism. He’s more concerned with what’s popular than with what’s correct. He can’t actually rebut the new atheists central argument, but he thinks religion is terribly important to society, so he goes and creates the illusion of an argument. This would explain his ability to repeatedly shoot himself in the foot by completely disregarding core Christian concepts.

http://www.newbanner.com/SecHumSCM/WhereAmI.html

Where am I? I read this years ago and I’ve never been sure I’m the sort of thing that *is* anywhere ever since.

I haven’t read Dennett’s book but I’d guess that Dennett is not talking about the ‘religious elite’ , but rather referring to the secular elites who run society. If so, these elites do indeed benefit from religion as you point out Deacon, at least from a historical perspective: religion, if one believes Vox’s statistics, is a relatively cheap way to control the undesireable behaviors of the masses.

VD : “How, one wonders, does Dennett fail to grasp that a creed (from the Bible) that explicitly states “go
forth and multiply” is likely to be inordinately successful in evolutionary terms, be they genetic, or
memetric.”

Dennett doesn’t fail to grasp anything of the sort. This so called ‘creed’ is nothing more than an attempt
by ancient hebrews to explain their observation of the reproductive force of nature, driven by evolution
for eons.

VD: ” He (Dennett) has no problem with the fact that most people are content to accept this scientific
dogma (E = mc²) on faith and leave the burden of understanding the details to the priesthood of
scientific experts, then, 77 pages later, turns around and declares that it is personally immoral for the
religious faithful to practice this very same division of doxastic labor by placing trust in their
pastors, priests, rabbis, and imams to make their moral decisions for them.”

The difference, of course, is that Einstein’s E = MC² has withstood the test of time and survived the
most rigorous scientific scrutiny: it always produces consistant, repeatable results in our realm of the
universe. Religious dogma cannot be openly questioned within a given faith if one is to remain in
that faith. That’s why there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Protestant sects, each one
interpreting the same bible in different ways, convinced that ‘their interpretation’ is the one
uniquely favored by God. Vox may have major disagreements with his pastor on political matters without consequence, but not on religious ones.

VD: ” Theists have a perfectly logical and objective basis for the application of their god-based moralities
that even the most die-hard rational atheist cannot reject, given the theistic postulate that God actually
exists and created the universe.”

Since it has not been proven that God exists, let’s postulate the opposite, that God does not exist. Therefore,
the so called God given morality laws are nothing more than ancient hebrews putting their words into ‘God’s
mouth’, man-made laws based on common sense and evolutionary-driven instincts, enforced by fantasy-driven superstitious beliefs that promise eternal damnation for those who disobey, and eternal paradise for those who don’t.

VD: ” . . . but the Christian view, in particular, puts forth the disturbing notion that our present world is not
ruled by God, but by an evil supernatural being, one who long ago usurped humanity’s God-given sovereignty. This being, Satan, is not only self aware, but has been intelligent enough to fool the mind of
Man from the very start, beginning with the first temptation in the Garden of Eden. ”

Yeah, and the earth is 6000 years old and evolution never happened. I’ve never understood how Satan, arguably the 2nd most powerful and intelligent entity in the universe, isn’t smart enough to figure out
that his power, whatever its magnitude, is dwarfed by the creator god’s power and as a result, Satan,
at some point in time, is going to get his ass kicked. So why rebel in the first place? Sounds more and more like Greek mythology. Talking snakes aside, let’s look at the temptation: The creator god would surely know
that it was Satan and not the snake itself that was tempting Eve, so why punish all snakes for all eternity? Let’s
examine the punishment: that all snakes would crawl on their bellies and eat dust forever. How did these
creatures move about before God cursed them? There are many species of water snakes and snakes living in
tropical rainforests that have spent millenia never contacting dust, much less eating it. So much for the curse.

~David D.G.