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Entry: Hitchens' Hubris Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/hitchens_hubris#2738 Post contents: Hitchens, like other intellectual atheists who preceeded him, notably Bertrand Russell, whose polemics on religion, in my view, were much more persuasively argued, have a blind spot when it comes to the topic of God- a blind spot only seen from the perspective of the believer. Hitchens, like Russell before him, fell into the trap of conflating the actions of purported Christians, Buddhists or Muslims with the tenets of the respective faiths. That is, according to Hitchens, if you say you believe in whatever, your actions are evidence of faith in the respective tenets. Moreover, Hitchens, who needs to rely on empirical evidence to make his claims, as he has dispensed with the super (that is above or beyond) natural, has no counter factuals to support his claims about the corrosive effects or religion. For his claim to be "proved" Hitchens would need to point to an advanced and growing culture without religion, of which there are none. He might just as well have argued that breathing air poisons everything. Sent at: 2008 07 06