Rebuttal to Zakir Naik – I

by Awais Masood

I always believed that there are limits to credulity and ignorance but I was proven wrong when I watched Zakir Naik presenting ‘arguments’ against evolution. [1]

It was difficult for me to digest that a large number of people present in the live audience and watching on screens could buy into such third grade arguments. Moreover one can raise strong questions regarding the credibility of such a (pseudo) scholar. It is understandable – in the context of low literacy rates, much lower rates of scientific education and suppression of rational inquiry in our region – that general public could misunderstand science and take things for granted but it is criminally ignorant to let people like Zakir Naik churn out rubbish in the name of science.

In this series of rebuttals, I intend to take on Naik’s arguments, statement by statement and debunk those claims and expose what I perceive as either abject ignorance or criminal trickery.

Argument : Zakir Naik claims that evolution is a theory and not a fact [1]

It is perhaps the most popular and actually the most ridiculous argument presented by creationists. It actually exhibits a complete ignorance of science and scientific method and raises serious questions regarding the academic credentials of Naik who claims to be a doctor of medicine.

Anybody who has gone through elementary courses in science knows that there are other ‘theories’ of science such as ‘Theory of Gravitation’ and ‘Electromagnetic Theory’ but nobody declares gravity to be theory and jumps of a thirty storey building in a hope that he/she will start floating in mid-air rather than falling downwards.

The reality is that in scientific jargon, the terms ‘theory’ and ‘fact’ carry very different meanings. The colloquial usage of term ‘theory’ which stands for unsubstantiated claims is not valid for the scientific theories of Evolution, Electromagnetism and Gravity.

What is then a scientific theory? Biochemist, Science Fiction writer and popularizer of science, Isaac Asimov explains:

Creationists frequently stress the fact that evolution is “only a theory,” giving the impression that a theory is an idle guess. A scientist, one gathers, arising one morning with nothing particular to do, decided that perhaps the moon is made of Roquefort cheese and instantly advances the Roquefort-cheese theory.

A theory (as the word is used by scientists) is a detailed description of some facet of the universe’s workings that is based on long observation and, where possible, experiment. It is the result of careful reasoning from these observations and experiments that has survived the critical study of scientists generally.

For example, we have the description of the cellular nature of living organisms (the “cell theory”); of objects attracting each other according to fixed rule (the “theory of gravitation”); of energy behaving in discrete bits (the “quantum theory”); of light traveling through a vacuum at a fixed measurable velocity (the “theory of relativity”), and so on.
All are theories; all are firmly founded; all are accepted as valid descriptions of this or that aspect of the universe. They are neither guesses nor speculations. And no theory is better founded, more closely examined, more critically argued and more thoroughly accepted, than the theory of evolution. If it is “only” a theory, that is all it has to be. [2]

Similarly, Paleontologist Stephen J. Gould states:

If the vernacular word FACT has any currency in science, it can only be defined as “confirmed to so high a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.”   By this definition, evolution – the observation that all organisms are connected by unbroken ties of genealogy – is as much a fact as anything discovered by science – as well confirmed as Copernicus’s claim that the Earth moves around the sun.[3]

Gould states at another place:

Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world’s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts do not go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein’s theory of gravitation replaced Newton’s, but apples did not suspend themselves in mid-air, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from apelike ancestors whether they did so by Darwin’s proposed mechanism or by some other, yet to be discovered.

Moreover, “fact” does not mean “absolute certainty.” The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science, “fact” can only mean “confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.” I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms. [4]

Skeptic, Psychologist and historian of science Michael Shermer comment on scientific thinking:

Scientists agree that the following elements are involved in thinking scientifically:

Induction: Forming a hypothesis by drawing general conclusions from existing data.

Deduction: Making specific predictions based on the hypotheses.

Observation: Gathering data, driven by hypotheses that tell us what to
look for in nature.

Verification: Testing the predictions against further observations to confirm or falsify the initial hypotheses.

Science, of course, is not this rigid; and no scientist consciously goes through “steps.” The process is a constant interaction of making observations, drawing conclusions, making predictions, and checking them against evidence. [5]

Shermer further explains:

Through the scientific method, we may form the following generalizations:

Hypothesis: A testable statement accounting for a set of observations.

Theory: A well-supported and well-tested hypothesis or set of
hypotheses.

Fact: A conclusion confirmed to such an extent that it would be
reasonable to offer provisional agreement.

A theory may be contrasted with a construct: a nontestable statement to
account for a set of observations.The living organisms on Earth may be
accounted for by the statement “God made them” or the statement “They evolved.” The first statement is a construct, the second a theory. Most biologists would even call evolution a fact.

Through the scientific method, we aim for objectivity: basing conclusions on external validation. And we avoid mysticism: basing conclusions on personal insights that elude external validation.[5]

Conclusion

I consider the above arguments enough to explain why Naik’s statement holds no ground. It may seem wasteful to spend so much time refuting a single statement (rest of them will be refuted too in future) but I find it important as it leads us to another important question. Is he totally ignorant of the scientific method or he deliberately uses false statements  in front of his audience. In first scenario he comes out to be a totally ignorant speaker who holds no credibility to take part in debates regarding science. His shameless arrogance is appalling in this regard. How could he stand in front of millions of people in audience and argue regarding things, he is totally ignorant of? Is such a man worth listening to? If he is deliberately lying, the case becomes more severe. He is charlatan who cheats and deceives his audience with verbal trickery and false arguments and all that in the name of religion!

References

1. Zakir Naik on Evolution, Video

2. Asimov, Isaac, The “Threat of Creationism”, New York Times Magazine, 14 June 1981

3. Gould, Stephen J,  ‘Creation Science ‘ is an Oxymoron, Skeptical Inquirer Vol. XI, no. 2 / Winter 1986-87

4. Gould, Stephen J, Evolution as Fact and Theory, Discover 2 (May 1981): 34-37

5. Shermer, Michael, Why people believe weird things: pseudoscience, superstition, and other confusions of our time, 2002

Roots of Fundamentalism

by Karen Armstrong

Excerpt from The Battle for God (published 2000) by Karen Armstrong.

Evangelical Christianity, Zionism and Radical Islam

There have always been people, in every age and in each tradition, who have fought the modernity of their day. But the fundamentalism that we shall be considering is an essentially twentieth-century movement. It is a reaction against the scientific and secular culture that first appeared in the West, but which has since taken root in other parts of the world. The West has developed an entirely unprecedented and wholly different type of civilization, so the religious response to it has been unique. The fundamentalist movements that have evolved in our own day have a symbiotic relationship with modernity. They may reject the scientific rationalism of the West, but they cannot escape it. Western civilization has changed the world. Nothing — including religion — can ever be the same again. All over the globe, people have been struggling with these new conditions and have been forced to reassess their religious traditions, which were designed for an entirely different type of society.

There was a similar transitional period in the ancient world, lasting roughly from 700 to 200 BCE, which historians have called the Axial Age because it was pivotal to the spiritual development of humanity. This age was itself the product and fruition of thousands of years of economic, and therefore social and cultural, evolution, beginning in Sumer in what is now Iraq, and in ancient Egypt. People in the fourth and third millennia BCE, instead of simply growing enough crops to satisfy their immediate needs, became capable of producing an agricultural surplus with which they could trade and thereby acquire additional income. This enabled them to build the first civilizations, develop the arts, and create increasingly powerful polities: cities, city-states, and, eventually, empires. In agrarian society, power no longer lay exclusively with the local king or priest; its locus shifted at least partly to the marketplace, the source of each culture’s wealth. In these altered circumstances, people ultimately began to find that the old paganism, which had served their ancestors well, no longer spoke fully to their condition.

In the cities and empires of the Axial Age, citizens were acquiring a wider perspective and broader horizons, which made the old local cults seem limited and parochial. Instead of seeing the divine as embodied in a number of different deities, people increasingly began to worship a single, universal transcendence and source of sacredness. They had more leisure and were thus able to develop a richer interior life; accordingly, they came to desire a spirituality which did not depend entirely upon external forms. The most sensitive were troubled by the social injustice that seemed built into this agrarian society, depending as it did on the labor of peasants who never had the chance to benefit from the high culture. Consequently, prophets and reformers arose who insisted that the virtue of compassion was crucial to the spiritual life: an ability to see sacredness in every single human being, and a willingness to take practical care of the more vulnerable members of society, became the test of authentic piety. In this way, during the Axial Age, the great confessional faiths that have continued to guide human beings sprang up in the civilized world: Buddhism and Hinduism in India, Confucianism and Taoism in the Far East; monotheism in the Middle East; and rationalism in Europe. Despite their major differences, these Axial Age religions had much in common: they all built on the old traditions to evolve the idea of a single, universal transcendence; they cultivated an internalized spirituality, and stressed the importance of practical compassion.

Today, as noted, we are undergoing a similar period of transition.Its roots lie in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries of the modern era, when the people of Western Europe began to evolve a different type of society, one based not on an agricultural surplus but on a technology that enabled them to reproduce their resources indefinitely. The economic changes over the last four hundred years have been accompanied by immense social, political, and intellectual revolutions, with the development of an entirely different, scientific and rational, concept of the nature of truth; and, once again, a radical religious change has become necessary. All over the world, people are finding that in their dramatically transformed circumstances, the old forms of faith no longer work for them: they cannot provide the enlightenment and consolation that human beings seem to need. As a result, men and women are trying to find new ways of being religious; like the reformers and prophets of the Axial Age, they are attempting to build upon the insights of the past in a way that will take human beings forward into the new world they have created for themselves. One of these modern experiments — however paradoxical it may superficially seem to say so — is fundamentalism.

AN OPEN LETTER REGARDING THE ZARINA MARRI CASE

AN OPEN LETTER REGARDING THE ZARINA MARRI CASE

By Alia Amirali

After the horrifying story of the forced sex slavery of Zarina Marri, a young Baloch schoolteacher, at the hands of Pakistani military agencies was brought to light, many people – including members of ‘civil society’ and otherwise vocal defenders of human rights – have requested ‘verification’ of the story, which they assert needs to come from ‘multiple sources’ since it is a ‘very serious charge’ that is being leveled. (As a side, I wonder if they deem this charge ‘very serious’ because of the identity of the accused or because of the heinousness of the crime?) For anyone who does not know Zarina Marri’s story, take a look at the documents attached to this message.

The charges being leveled in this case are indeed serious, as were the charges in the Naseerabad ‘burying alive’ incident, the Mukhataran Mai case, the Shazia Marri case, and scores of others. Like the other cases, in the Zarina Marri case too, the story has been broken by a witness (who is also a victim) of the crime (Mr. Munir Mengal) – which is usually the way such incidents come to light in the first place. In politically sensitive cases, especially those which involve state-perpetrated atrocities, verification is a particularly thorny matter and anyone with the slightest experience in trying to investigate such cases would know that access to information is enormously difficult. Thus, one can hardly expect the accused in this case to tolerate – let alone co-operate- with the investigations in this regard. Regarding the need for ‘multiple sources’ then, I certainly hope nobody is expecting the military to ‘verify’ this story, or expecting that the victim herself (whose whereabouts are unknown) will magically appear before them to ‘verify’ that she has indeed been abused. Zarina’s family has apparently fled their hometown (understandably perhaps) so local human rights agencies have not been able to confirm details about the woman.

However, in this (not unusual) situation of scarce sources and incomplete information, it becomes significant that the Zarina Marri case is based not on informal ‘rumour’ , but rather on a report released by the AHRC (Asian Human Rights Commission) which is considered both nationally and internationally to be a credible organization. (Human Rights Commission of Pakistan is a member of AHRC as well.) Additionally, the story was reported by Reporters Sans Frontiers, and there is an ICRC (International Committee for the Red Cross) report verifying sections of Munir Mengal’s testimony, which he has also given before a court in London. Anyone who wants further information about the source of these organizations’ information, their verification mechanisms etc. may contact them directly.

However, what struck me upon reading various people’s messages regarding the issue was not any inherent ‘unreasonable-ness’ in their demand for further verification. Rather, what struck me was the realization that we are partial in our choice of questioning the authenticity of certain charges. Take the ‘burying alive’ case, for example. Was our first response to request ‘further verification’ of the incident? If the story was in fact ‘verified’, by whose seal was it deemed authentic/true, were those sources considered trustworthy, and if so on what basis did we trust them? (To prevent my words from being misconstrued, let me make it clear that by raising these questions I am not trying to justify the act of burying women alive). A question thus arises: are we questioning the authenticity of the Zarina story because we are not convinced of the witness’s or RSF’s/ICRC’s/AHRC’s intentions? Did we wait until charges against Afia Siddiqui were proven/disproven before protesting for her rights? Examples abound. The fact is, there is no such thing as ‘perfect information’. It’s just about what we choose to accept, and what we choose to question.

Furthermore, it appears that we accept those charges (without asking for ‘further verification’) which fit with our mental image of the supposed perpetrator; we accept that which appears ‘believable’, and suspect that which does not corroborate with our world-view. For example, (in accordance with a certain world-view) those who are ‘backward’ are likely to bury their women alive or abuse them, sell them, etc. America “hates Muslims” hence Afia Siddiqui must be an innocent woman whose release we must fight for. (I am quoting examples from common perception, i’m sure some of you must hold contrary views but it is a general Pakistani middle-class mind-set I am talking about). Thus, because certain charges appears ‘probable’ to us, we generally don’t make the same request for ‘verification’ in those cases, and certainly ‘verification’ is not our first response upon hearing of such incidents. And that’s okay I suppose. We all do it, we’re human, we make assumptions, we believe what we want to believe, we see what we want to see…

As far as people’s image of the Pakistan military goes, I’m not sure what you all have in mind, but I’ve witnessed this Army shooting a man on sight for putting up a flag they don’t like, I’ve met scores of people have been picked up and tortured by them and their intelligence agencies for no fault of theirs… Just read for yourself about what they did in Bangladesh during the 1971 war, about the 1973-77 operation in Balochistan, about Zia-ul-Haq’s era … and then perhaps the fact that they have picked up a young baloch woman and are using her as a sex-slave wont appear to you as extraordinary and your first reaction upon hearing about this case wont be one of disbelief nor will your first demand be that of ‘verification’.

I firmly believe that this case needs to be highlighted, not only because it is a humanitarian issue regarding the unspeakable abuse of an individual, but because it is a case of systematic state oppression. She is not the only woman whose whereabouts are unknown and is reportedly being abused by military agencies in Balochistan. Its not ten or twenty, or even fifty or hundred we’re talking about, thousands are missing in Balochistan. Its not just me saying this. Read HRCP’s, HRW’s, ICG’s, AHRC’s reports, and you’ll get a sense.

In conclusion, I’d like to assure you that I am strongly in favour of ‘verification’ of the facts in Zarina’s case – but not so that a rubber-stamp of ‘authenticity’ can be placed on it but so that the perpetrators of this savagery can be brought to justice. To refrain from protests on this issue- which is essentially a means of highlighting it- until ‘further verification’ amounts to invisibilizing it and appears to me to be an excuse for inaction. On the contrary, we should certainly organize protests on this issue and launch a sustained campaign to bring this matter into the public eye, pressure the government to take action, and demand justice for this young woman and the thousands like her.

regards,

Alia Amirali.

The related AHRC press-release:

http://www.ahrchk.net/ahrc-in-news/mainfile.php/2009ahrcinnews/2434/

War and Non-Resistance

( This 1915, World War I era,  essay by Bertrand Russell is perhaps the best way to slap war-mongers of current age. )

The principle that it is always wrong to employ force against another human being has been held in its extreme form by Quakers and by Tolstoï, but has been rejected by the great majority of mankind as inconsistent with the existence of civilized society. But I think that the occasions where forcible resistance is the best course are much fewer than is generally believed, and that some very great and important advances in civilization might be made if this were more widely recognized. The so-called right of self-defense, in particular, seems to have only a very limited sphere of application, and to be often supported by arguments involving both mistakes as to political questions and a wrong conception of the best type of character. 

Profile of the Religious Right

(Profile of the Religious Right by Eqbal Ahmad, published March 7, 1999)

IN two earlier essays I had argued one, that all religio-political movements are products of the shift from the agrarian/pastoral to the capitalist/industrial mode of production and the many forms of dislocations that it entails and two, that the religious tradition they invoke is more imagined than real, outcome of political opportunism and contemporary compulsions rather than of a return to sources and fundamentals.

Given their shared roots, the so-called ‘fundamentalist’ movements bear remarkable similarities which are outlined in the following paragraphs: