The Four Horsemen, The Conversation: That Sparked An Atheist Revolution

Copyright © the Centre for Inquiry 2019 All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House, an imprint and division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. First published in Great Britain in 2019 by Bantam Press, an imprint of Transworld Publishers. RANDOM HOUSE and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Names: Hitchens, Christopher, author. | Dawkins, Richard, author. | Harris, Sam, author. | Dennett, D. C. (Daniel Clement), author. | Fry, Stephen, writer of foreword. Title: The four horsemen : the conversation that sparked an atheist revolution / Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris, Dennett ; foreword by Stephen Fry. Description: First U.S. edition. | New York : Random House, [2019] Identifiers: LCCN 2019004626 | ISBN 9780525511953 (hardback) | ISBN 9780525511960 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Atheism. | Hitchens, Christopher. | Dawkins, Richard | Harris, Sam | Dennett, D. C. (Daniel Clement) Classification: LCC BL2747.3 .H58 2019 | DDC 211/.8--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019004626 Hardback ISBN 9780525511953 Ebook ISBN  9780525511960 randomhousebooks.com Cover design: Rachel Ake CONTENTS COVER TITLE PAGE COPYRIGHT FOREWORD STEPHEN FRY THE HUBRIS OF RELIGION, THE HUMILITY OF SCIENCE, AND THE INTELLECTUAL AND MORAL COURAGE OF ATHEISM RICHARD DAWKINS Science is often accused of arrogantly claiming to know everything, but the barb is capaciously wide of the mark. LETTING THE NEIGHBOURS KNOW DANIEL C. DENNETT Any who search the transcription of our discussion for either a monolithic shared creed or a contradiction suppressed for political reasons will come up empty-handed. IN GOOD COMPANY SAM HARRIS Is there a distinction between believing things for good reasons and believing them for bad ones? THE FOUR HORSEMEN: A DISCUSSION RICHARD DAWKINS, DANIEL C. DENNETT, SAM HARRIS, CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS DEDICATION ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS FOREWORD STEPHEN FRY ‘Do you believe in God?’ ‘A question of little value. Which god? Ganesh? Osiris? Jove? Jehovah? Or one of the tens of thousands of animist gods worshipped every day around the globe?’ ‘Oh, very well then, if you’re going to get clever – any god.’ ‘Do I believe in “any god”?’ ‘Look, there’s a creation, isn’t there? Therefore there must be a Creator. Nothing comes from nothing. Something must have started it all.’ ‘I’ll overlook your reckless use of “therefore” and go along with you, out of interest. Just to see where it gets us.’ ‘Well then.’ ‘Well then, what?’ ‘You’ve agreed there’s a Creator.’ ‘Well, I haven’t agreed, but I’ve come along with you to see where it’s going. Who is this Creator you have conjured up on the grounds that they “must” exist?’ ‘Well, we can’t say.’ ‘And more important, who created this Creator?’ ‘That’s just silly.’ ‘But you’ve just told me that nothing comes from nothing and that something must have started it all. Why am I not allowed to use this principle to wonder where your Creator comes from?’ ‘Well, you must admit that Love and Beauty can’t be explained by science. That there’s something other…’ — We have all had heated, sophomoric and ultimately futile conversations like this as students – quibbling and quarrelling earnestly about turtles-all-the-way-down regress and challenging each other to prove the unprovable, long into the wine-fuelled night. We have all listened to those of faith stating their position, first by adducing half-understood scientific thinking and discovery— ‘Quantum physics itself shows that we can’t be certain of anything.’ —then dropping them contemptuously: ‘Science doesn’t have