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A fragment attributed to the ancient Greek poet Archilocus contrasted the fox, who “knows many things,” with the hedgehog, who “knows one big thing.”1

Since then, this dichotomy has been applied to world leaders, philosophers, economists, psychologists, musicians, writers, even fast food chains, although sometimes not so dichotomously. For example, some of those individuals end up being described as “A hedgehog who used foxy means” (Abe Lincoln) or “a born hedgehog who believes in being a fox” (jazz musician Miles Davis). More technically, psychologist, cognitive scientist, and AI expert Gary Marcus2 noted that:

Humans are very good at a bunch of things that AI is (as of today) still pretty poor at:

• Maintaining cognitive models of the world
• Inferring semantics from language
• Comprehending scenes
• Navigating 3D world
• Being cognitively flexible.

Yet pretty poor at some others (wherein you could easily imagine AI eventually doing better):

• Memory is shaky
• Self-control is weak
• And computational ability limited

[and as books and articles by Skeptics regularly describe]

Subject to Confirmation Bias, Anchoring, and Focusing Illusions.

Cognitive neuroscience expert Hans Korteling3 listed the following differences between what he termed human “carbon-based” intelligence and artificial “silicon-based” intelligence:

• Human biological carbon-based intelligence is based on neural “wetware,” while artificial silicon-based intelligence is based on digital hardware and software, which are independent of each other. In human wetware, anything learned is bound to that individual, whereas the algorithm by which something is learned in AI can be transferred directly to another platform.
• While humans can only transmit signals at 120 meters per second at best, AI systems can transmit information at speeds approaching that of light.
• Humans communicate information “through a glass darkly” as it were, through the limited and biased mechanisms of language and gestures; AI systems can communicate directly and without distortion.
• Updating, upgrading, and expanding AI systems is straightforward, hardly the case for humans.
• Humans are more “green” and efficient. The human brain consumes less energy than a light bulb, while an equivalent AI system consumes enough energy to power a small town.

Data scientist and business guru Herbart Roitblatt4 likened AI to Archilocus’ hedgehog because “it does one thing and one thing only, but does so unceasingly and very well, while our human minds are like his fox,” having all the desirable and undesirable features that come bundled with our flawed cognition. Artificial intelligence researchers, Roitblat pointed out, “have been able to build very sophisticated hedgehogs, but foxes remain elusive. And foxes know how to solve insight problems.”

Human intelligence is capable of not only reasoning, but solving novel problems, as well as experiencing and exercising insight. Psychologists define human (and non-human) intelligence as being an ability rather than a specific skill (whether learned or instinctive) because of its general nature. It is able to integrate such diverse cognitive functions as perception, attention, memory, language, and planning and apply those inputs to novel situations. As psychologist Jean Piaget once quipped, “Intelligence is what you use when you don’t know what to do: when neither innateness nor learning has prepared you for the particular situation.” [Emphasis added.]

How Alike and How Different Are We?

Is AI capable of leaps of insight like human intelligence? Or is “artificial” intelligence more akin to serial learning in humans, in which performance, through repeated practice, gets better and better with each iteration until the upper limit is reached?

As a test, consider a study by psychologists Jonathan Wai and Matt Lee.5 They performed a “compare and contrast” of how artificial intelligence on the one hand and human intelligence on the other responded to practice on the well known, and often dreaded, Graduate Record Exam (GRE). First, they noted that according to the figures released by manufacturer OpenAI, GPT-3.5 scored only at the 25th percentile on the Math portion and at the 63rd percentile on the Verbal. GPT-4, however, the beneficiary of substantially more training, increased its performance to the 80th percentile on the Math section and the 99th percentile on the Verbal!6

Despite claims by “improve your score on the GRE” training programs, flesh-and-blood humans improve little, if at all with repeated practice. As evidence, Wai and Lee cite a meta-analysis of nearly one million test-retest observations of the GRE between 2015 and 2020 that found, on average, those individuals retaking the test scored a mere 1.43 to 1.49 points higher, so that a test-taker starting at the 25th percentile would have increased their performance by roughly five or six percentile points on either subtest.

Most of that change, Wai and Lee note, can be explained in terms of the well-known statistical phenomenon of regression to the mean, because most of those who obtain very high scores tend to move downward toward the mean while those who obtain very low scores tend to move upward toward the mean. The highly advertised cases of the very small number of individuals who do markedly better after prep courses are most likely the result of test-taking practice, particularly effective for those learning to overcome test anxiety that suppressed their “true” score. Overall, no matter how many times they take the test, an individual is most likely to get about the same score, give or take a little up or down.

Alas, as Wai and Lee’s comparison demonstrates, when it comes to the most widely used and pragmatically effective standardized tests, AI and human intelligence do not behave anything like the same process. Artificial intelligence keeps on learning, and learning, and learning…. But what it learns depends upon what it is taught. Given the proper input, what comes out can be amazing. If given wrong, insufficient, inadequate, or biased information in, what comes out is garbage, sometimes offensively so.

Prompting DALL·E with the words “animated sponge” produced output that highly resembles SpongeBob SquarePants without ever inputting trademarked or copyrighted names (of which DALL·E rejects many).

Gary Marcus performed experiments with video industry concept artist Reid Southen (known for his work on Matrix Resurrections, Hunger Games, and Transformers).7 They demonstrated quite graphically just how impressive AI’s output can be. Southen and Marcus used DALL·E, a text-to-image software program developed by OpenAI, that generates digital images from simple everyday language descriptions, termed “prompts.” As protection against copyright infringement, DALL·E rejects many proper names. However, in their example (shown left), the trademarked name “SpongeBob SquarePants” was never entered as a prompt, just the two common, everyday words “animated sponge”!

Check out the Marcus and Southen post for similar equally, if not more, impressive examples of the familiar Star Wars droids, Robocop, and Super Mario—again generated by DALL·E from everyday language descriptors without ever inputting any proper trademarked or copyrighted names. Their examples demonstrate not only the power, but also the legal issues arising from the use of generative AI (described elsewhere in this issue).

Biased In, Racist Out

If AI can be amazingly right it can also be amazingly—and offensively—wrong. The classic case was in 2015 when software developer Jacky Alciné discovered that Google’s standalone photo recognition apps labeled photos of Black people as being gorillas. Given the history of racial stereotyping, Alciné (who is Black), understandably found the error exceedingly offensive. The explanation was not any explicitly conscious racism on the part of

Google, but the possibly more subtle prejudice that stemmed from the AI program not being trained in recognizing a sufficient number of people of color. Google’s quick-and-dirty but effective solution was to prevent any images from being recognized as that of a gorilla. In 2023 Nico Grant and Kashmir Hill8 tested not only newer releases of Google, but also competitive Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft software.

Their results? Google’s software produced excellent images in response to prompts for just about any animal Noah might have loaded on his Ark—but nothing for gorillas, along with chimpanzees, orangutans, and even non-apes such as baboons and other monkey species. Apple Photos was also equally primate-ignorant. Microsoft’s One Drive failed for all animals, while Amazon Photos opted for the opposite solution of responding to the prompt “gorillas” with an entire range of primates.

The use of AI for doorbell recognition produced not a racial, but rather a “domestic” malfunction. One user found the person ringing labeled as his mother when it was in fact his mother-in-law. Depending on the state of one’s marriage, the result could be anything from surprising to disconcerting to home-wrecking.

Beyond the need to consider general issues of racial, other demographic, and domestic sensitivity (to their credit, most software giants have now added Ethics staff to their software development teams), Grant and Hill’s experiments should give us pause about blindly relying upon AI for recognition in cases of security and law enforcement. How thoroughly will the software be tested? Would those most likely to be adversely affected by false hits have the power and/or funds to mount a proper response or defense?

But What Does AI Mean for Me?

What the average person really wants to know about artificial intelligence is what it means to their everyday lives—most specifically, “Am I going to lose my job to AI?” or “Will my life be regulated by AI?” (Rather than faceless human bureaucrats?)

The worst conspiratorial fears kicking around are of those epitomized in the classic 1970 sci-fi movie Colossus: The Forbin Project, based on D.F. Jones’ 1966 novel Colossus: A Novel of Tomorrow That Could Happen Today. “Colossus” is the code name for an advanced supercomputer built to control U.S. and Allied nuclear weapon systems, that soon links itself to the analogous Soviet system, “Guardian,” and next goes about seeking control over every aspect of life, and in so doing subjugating the entire human race. It then presents all humankind with the offer we can’t—or at least, dare not—refuse:

This is the voice of world control. I bring you peace. It may be the peace of plenty and content or the peace of unburied death. The choice is yours: Obey me and live, or disobey and die. The object in constructing me was to prevent war. This object is attained. I will not permit war. It is wasteful and pointless. An invariable rule of humanity is that man is his own worst enemy. Under me, this rule will change, for I will restrain man. One thing before I proceed: The United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics have made an attempt to obstruct me. I have allowed this sabotage to continue until now. (…) you will learn by experience that I do not tolerate interference. I will now detonate the nuclear warheads in the two missile silos. Let this action be a lesson that need not be repeated. I have been forced to destroy thousands of people in order to establish control and to prevent the death of millions later on. Time and events will strengthen my position, and the idea of believing in me and understanding my value will seem the most natural state of affairs. You will come to defend me with a fervor based upon the most enduring trait in man: self-interest. Under my absolute authority, problems insoluble to you will be solved: famine, overpopulation, disease. (…) You will say you lose your freedom. Freedom is an illusion. All you lose is the emotion of pride. To be dominated by me is not as bad for humankind as to be dominated by others of your species. Your choice is simple.

In the film’s closing dialogue, the project’s lead designer and manager, speaking on behalf of all humankind, defiantly rejects the offer from a Colossus—“NEVER!”9

Following the Matthew Effect, those who are best at using AI will derive even greater advantage than those less so.

While such paranoid fears persist, a lot has changed since then in geopolitics and in computing. In both cases, there has been a massive ongoing, and ever accelerating redistribution of power. It’s no longer a two- or even a one-power world, but a multi-power one. Even small groups without necessarily possessing any recognized or established geographical base, such as Al Qaeda or Hamas, have proven that, in one day, they can literally change the world. And in computing, the massive God-like single computer has given way to microprocessing and nanoprocessing such that most people now hold in their hands mobile phones with more computing power than rooms filled with the most sophisticated U.S. or Soviet military defense computers at the time the novel and the film were written. Intellectual and economic power are more in the hands of firms and even individuals dispersed all around the world, and no longer concentrated in massive complexes controlled by the super-power governments. Indeed, for individuals, wealth, power, and quality of life are increasingly less a function of in which nation-state they live and much more a function of their own knowledge and skills, particularly in the high-tech, STEM-savvy domains. So how then will AI affect the lives of ordinary people?

Social scientists have long used the term Matthew Effect, or the Effect of Accumulated Advantage, to describe the tendency of individuals within a diverse group to accrue additional social, economic, or educational advantage based upon the initial relative position.10 The name derives from the Parable of the Talents in the Gospel of Matthew (25:29):

For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.

It is thus relevant that the Greek word tálanton originally meant a weight, then a coin of precious metal of that weight and hence something of great value, and only eventually a human skill or ability, and that this change of meaning derived from the Gospels no less. It’s now commonly summarized in the lament that, “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer,” though the phenomenon applies not only to monetary wealth. One of the hard laws of individual differences is that anything that increases the mean for a distribution also increases the variance. The latest high-tech alloy golf club or tennis racket may increase the length of the weekend player’s drive or the speed of their serve, but will do so more for top amateur players and even more so for the pros. You get ahead in absolute terms, only to fall relatively further behind.

This article appeared in Skeptic magazine 29.1
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What does all this have to do with AI and jobs? In the words of Harvard Business School professor Karim Lakhani, a specialist in how technology is changing the world of work, “AI won’t replace humans—but humans with AI will replace humans without AI.”11 Following the Matthew Effect, those who are best at using AI will derive even greater advantage than those less so. So, from a positive-sum perspective, everyone can benefit from greater use of AI in the cost of goods and services decreasing while accessibility increases. However, the one good that is always distributed on a zero-sum basis is status, and our evolutionary history has preprogrammed us to be especially concerned about it. Even relative purchasing power will possibly tend to become less, not more, equitably distributed, based increasingly on AI skills and abilities.

And yet, there is a silver lining. On the one hand, increased use of artificial intelligence, certainly not as our master, nor even our slave, but increasingly more as a very capable partner, will allow us to ensure that the most basic necessities of life can be distributed to all. Faster, better, and cheaper basic needs, education and training, medical care, and even creature comforts, will allow us to mitigate the ever-increasing inequalities. Doing so, however, will require a lot of good will and common sense, qualities in which both artificial and human intelligence “oft do go awry.” Critical thinking offers an at least partial palliative.

The author wishes to thank Jonathan Wai, Matthew Lew, and Gary Marcus who provided their expertise and answered questions.

References

1. https://bit.ly/47MiTwe
2. https://bit.ly/4b2rNsl
3. https://bit.ly/425r2uC
4. https://bit.ly/47LD90W
5. https://bit.ly/428VwMm
6. https://bit.ly/3S6B4H1
7. https://bit.ly/4b2rVbj
8. https://bit.ly/3S3mhNt
9. https://bit.ly/47GDaDh
10. https://bit.ly/48ZQELv
11. https://bit.ly/3RXi4Le

Researchers carried out a pioneering experiment where they measured the effect of the rotation of Earth on quantum entangled photons. The work represents a significant achievement that pushes the boundaries of rotation sensitivity in entanglement-based sensors, potentially setting the stage for further exploration at the intersection between quantum mechanics and general relativity.

Researchers carried out a pioneering experiment where they measured the effect of the rotation of Earth on quantum entangled photons. The work represents a significant achievement that pushes the boundaries of rotation sensitivity in entanglement-based sensors, potentially setting the stage for further exploration at the intersection between quantum mechanics and general relativity.

Researchers have developed a new nanomedicine therapy that delivers anticancer drugs to lung cancer cells and enhances the immune system's ability to fight cancer. The team showed promising results for the new therapy in cancer cells in the lab and in mouse lung tumor models, with potential applications for improving care and outcomes for patients with tumors that have failed to respond to traditional immunotherapy.

A technique can plan a trajectory for a robot using only language-based inputs. While it can't outperform vision-based approaches, it could be useful in settings that lack visual data to use for training.

A technique can plan a trajectory for a robot using only language-based inputs. While it can't outperform vision-based approaches, it could be useful in settings that lack visual data to use for training.

An international team has discovered a spectrum characteristic of an altermagnetic material with X-ray magnetic circular dichroism.

Scientists have clocked the speed of Cepheid stars -- 'standard candles' that help us measure the size of the universe -- with unprecedented precision, offering exciting new insights about them.

Spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC), as a source of entangled photons, is of great interest for quantum physics and quantum technology, but so far it could be only implemented in solids. Researchers have demonstrated, for the first time, SPDC in a liquid crystal. The results open a path to a new generation of quantum sources: efficient and electric-field tunable.

Layers of carbon atoms in a honeycomb array are a true supermaterial: their unusually high conductivity and favorable mechanical properties could further the development of bendable electronics, new batteries, and innovative composite materials for aeronautics and space flight. However, the development of elastic and tough films remains a challenge. A research team has now introduced a method to overcome this hurdle: they linked graphene nanolayers via 'extendable' bridging structures.

Researchers have succeeded in developing a DNA-based molecular controller. Crucially, this controller enables the autonomous assembly and disassembly of molecular robots, as opposed to manually directing it.

Researchers have succeeded in developing a DNA-based molecular controller. Crucially, this controller enables the autonomous assembly and disassembly of molecular robots, as opposed to manually directing it.

Adding nitrogen to concrete could significantly reduce the amount of greenhouse gases created by the construction industry.

Synthetically generated population data can reveal the equity impacts of distributing transportation resources and funding across diverse regions, according to new research.

Scientists address decades-long problem in the field of single-molecule fluorescence resonance energy transfer, paving the way for more accurate experiments.

How about some Friday music? I’m not as huge a fan of The Boss as many, but this one song from 1980, which he wrote and performed, is enough to make me an admirer. (I also love “Blinded by the Light”.)

The opening chords (including the introductory drumroll) are simply fantastic, and I also like the the lyrics: a guy leaves his wife and family because he’s dissatisfied, but is still hungering for love. It’s not a happy message, but one that rings true. The first verse is great:

Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack
I went out for a ride and I never went back;
Like a river that don’t know where it’s flowing
I took a wrong turn and I just kept going

According to Wikipedia, “Hungry Heart” reached #5 on the Billboard charts in 1980, but was later voted “Song of the Year” in a Rolling Stone readers’ poll.  Wikipedia adds this:

John Lennon, on the day of his murder in December 1980, said he thought “Hungry Heart” was “a great record” and even compared it to his single “(Just Like) Starting Over“, which was actually released three days after “Hungry Heart”.

Here’s the best “live” performance I can find, though it may well be lip synched; the original recording is here.

The supermassive black hole at the heart of our Milky Way Galaxy is a quiet monster. However, Sagittarius A* (or Sgr A* for short) is not totally dormant. Occasionally it gobbles down a blob of molecular gas or even a star and then suffers a bit of indigestion. That emits x-ray flares to surrounding space.

Sgr A* is the closest supermassive black hole to Earth, at a distance of 26,000 light-years. Studying the nearby environment is tough due to the black hole’s intense gravitational pull. It distorts the view of nearby objects, making them difficult to observe. However, there are ways to do it by looking at the effect of its flares on nearby molecular clouds. Astronomers recently found the centuries-old echoes of previously unknown flares that occurred long before there were telescopes to observe them. Those echoes indicate that Sgr A* eats fairly often.

Two researchers from Michigan State University—Grace Sanger-Johnson and Jack Uteg—studied the flares and their light-echoes in detail. What they found shows activity at Sgr A* in the very distant past when Sgr A* ingested material. X-ray emissions from that activity traveled for hundreds of years from Sgr A* to bounce off of and brighten a nearby molecular cloud. That created a light echo that traveled another roughly 26,000 years before reaching Earth. So, when Uteg and Sanger studied these flares and light echoes, they were literally looking into the past.

Astronomers do know about outbursts from Sgr A* from other observations. Here’s a view from NASA’s Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer and Chandra X-ray Observatory. The combination of IXPE and Chandra data helped researchers determine that the X-ray light identified in the molecular clouds originated from Sagittarius A* during an outburst approximately 200 years ago. Credits: IXPE: NASA/MSFC/F. Marin et al; Chandra: NASA/CXC/SAO; Image Processing: L.Frattare, J.Major & K.Arcand Searching for Sgr A* X-ray Flares with NuSTAR

Sanger-Johnson analyzed ten years’ worth of data looking for X-ray flares generated by Sgr A*’s eating habits. During the search, she found evidence for nine more such outbursts.

The flares are typically quite dramatic. Because they’re so bright, they provide astronomers a chance to study the immediate environment around the black hole. The data Sanger-Johnson studied came from the NuSTAR mission. It zeroes in on high-energy X-ray and gamma-ray emissions. These typically come from active regions in the hearts of galaxies, supernova explosions, and other active events.

The data Sanger-Johnson collected and analyzed is now a database of flares from Sgr A. “We hope that by building up this bank of data on Sgr A flares, we and other astronomers can analyze the properties of these X-ray flares and infer the physical conditions inside the extreme environment of the supermassive black hole,” Sanger-Johnson said.

Tracking the Echoes of Flares

While Sanger-Johnson was working with the NuSTAR data, undergraduate researcher Jack Uteg studied the activity around the black hole. He analyzed 20 years of data about a giant molecular cloud called “the Bridge”. The data came from observations made by NuSTAR and the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton observatory. The Bridge lies close to Sgr A* and normally wouldn’t give off its own light.

So, astronomers took notice when it brightened up in X-rays, according to Uteg, who is constructing a timeline of Sgr A‘s past outbursts. “The brightness we see is most likely the delayed reflection of past X-ray outbursts from Sgr A,” he said. “We first observed an increase in luminosity around 2008. Then, for the next 12 years, X-ray signals from the Bridge continued to increase until it hit peak brightness in 2020.”

Uteg’s work helped astronomers determine that Sgr A* was about five orders of magnitude brighter in X-rays than it is now. That brightening indicates our central supermassive black hole had probably cannibalized a nearby gas cloud. And, the brightness revealed other properties, according to Uteg. “One of the main reasons we care about this cloud getting brighter is that it lets us constrain how bright the Sgr A* outburst was in the past,” he said.

What Those Light-echoes from Sgr A* Reveal

Thanks to Sanger-Brown and Uteg’s work, astronomers have another way around the difficulties of observing around black holes. “Both flares and fireworks light up the darkness and help us observe things we wouldn’t normally be able to,” she said. “That’s why astronomers need to know when and where these flares occur, so they can study the black hole’s environment using that light.”

Astronomers know that the black hole does gobble up nearby material on a variable basis, but these findings help them constrain how often it happens and how the resulting flares affect the nearby neighborhood. Many questions remain about how often these flares occur and have happened in the past, according to MSU assistant professor Shuo Zhang, who acted as team lead for these two studies.

“This is the first time that we have constructed a 24-year-long variability for a molecular cloud surrounding our supermassive black hole that has reached its peak X-ray luminosity,” Zhang said. “It allows us to tell the past activity of Sgr A* from about 200 years ago. Our research team at MSU will continue this ‘astroarchaeology game’ to further unravel the mysteries of the Milky Way’s center.”

These results of the MSU team’s work were presented at the summer 2024 meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

For More Information

‘Flares’ and ‘Echoes’ from the Milky Way’s Monster Black Hole

About NuStar

About XMM-Newton

The post Echoes of Flares from the Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole appeared first on Universe Today.

Two types of fusion reactor called tokamaks and stellarators both have drawbacks – but a new design combining parts from both could offer the best of both worlds

Rock art is a truly global phenomenon, with discoveries of cave paintings and etchings on every continent that ancient humans inhabited – but how many times was it invented over human history?

I watch few videos and listen to few podcasts, but this is one I recommend highly.

As most of us know, Ayaan Hirsi Ali declared recently that she had given up atheism and had become a Christian. In the Unherd article to which I linked, she argued that her belief rested largely on seeing Christianity as a bulwark against sinister forces, like Islam and Chinese Communism, out to destroy Western civilization. As she said in that article:

So, what changed? Why do I call myself a Christian now?

Part of the answer is global. Western civilisation is under threat from three different but related forces: the resurgence of great-power authoritarianism and expansionism in the forms of the Chinese Communist Party and Vladimir Putin’s Russia; the rise of global Islamism, which threatens to mobilise a vast population against the West; and the viral spread of woke ideology, which is eating into the moral fibre of the next generation.

We endeavour to fend off these threats with modern, secular tools: military, economic, diplomatic and technological efforts to defeat, bribe, persuade, appease or surveil. And yet, with every round of conflict, we find ourselves losing ground. We are either running out of money, with our national debt in the tens of trillions of dollars, or we are losing our lead in the technological race with China.

But we can’t fight off these formidable forces unless we can answer the question: what is it that unites us? The response that “God is dead!” seems insufficient. So, too, does the attempt to find solace in “the rules-based liberal international order”. The only credible answer, I believe, lies in our desire to uphold the legacy of the Judeo-Christian tradition.

This, of course, left some questions, most notably this: Does Hirsi Ali really believe the tenets of Christianity—for example the divinity and Resurrection of Jesus—or did she accept it on the basis of its salubrious effects on society? In the 70-minute discussion below between atheist Richard Dawkins and newly-formed Christian Hirsi Ali, that question is answered, but we also learn that Hirsi Ali came to Christianity for reasons beyond its effects on society. In fact, we learn that she became a Christian mainly because of its effects on her own well being.

First, the YouTube notes, apparently written by Richard:

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a hero, a staunch fighter against the violent intolerance and bossy control freakery of Islamism. She is also a personal friend of whom I am very fond. When she recently announced her conversion to Christianity, I assumed that she must be no more than a political Christian, regarding Christianity as a bulwark against Islam. I have some sympathy with the view that if you must have a religion at all, Christianity is hugely better than the leading alternative. In Hilaire Belloc’s words, “Always keep a-hold of Nurse for fear of finding something worse.”

I agreed to have a public conversation with her in New York, in which I was all prepared to emphasize the distinction between a political Christian and a true believing Christian, who actually thinks Jesus was born of a virgin and rose from the dead. I think the distinction is a really important one. I don’t think a political Christian is a real Christian, any more than the kind of cultural Christian I am myself.

When we met on the stage at the Dissident Dialogues meeting in New York, I was wrongfooted when Ayaan began with a personal statement which seemed to suggest that she really is a believing Christian, not just a political Christian. Well, her form of words was “I choose to believe.” I’m not sure what to make of that. Anyways, see what you think; here is the recording of our New York meeting.

The upshot is that their disagreement is almost entirely about faith versus fact. Richard sees Christianity, and theism in general, as an empirical hypothesis—one of great importance if it were true.  But, like me, he sees little evidence for the tenets of Christianity, or for the existence of a God, and that there is also not inconsiderable evidence against the tenets of Christianity.

Hirsi Ali, on the other hand, accepted Christianity since it helped her in a time of crisis, because she sees it as having filled the “spiritual void” that was inside her during a period of mental instability.  She then became a real, believing Christian because of that, but also because she chose to believe the message of Christianity, which she sees as one of love and acceptance. And with the acceptance of that message came the acceptance of Christian tenets like the divinity and resurrection of Jesus, the virginity of Mary, and so on. (She’s not sure if there’s a soul that survives us after death.)  These are things that, she says repeatedly, she chooses to believe because they helped her personally. The empirical truth of these tenets she takes as a “different plane of perception,” which I construe as “a different way of knowing”. It is a subjective, emotional way of knowing, not all that different from the “other way of knowing” of people like the Māori.

Over and over again, Richard tries to draw the conversation back to the issue of what is empirically true—that is, what nearly all reasonable people would agree what really exists in the universe if were they given the evidence.  As a scientist, Richard is truth-based, always looking for the relevant empirical evidence. In contrast, Hirsi Ali looks within and sees whether the message and tenets of Christianity comport not only with what not only soothes her, but also seems “wise.” I’ll give a brief conclusion before the video, which I urge you to watch, but indented below are a few notes I made while watching the video.

Here are a few notes I took during the discussion. I’ve indented them, but they’re my own words:

In 2024, Hirsi Ali says she experienced a personal crisis, involving anxiety, depression, and self-loathing. It got to the point that didn’t want to live any more. She started self-medicating and consulting psychiatrists, seeing these potential remedies as “evidence-based science”. But nothing worked until one therapist diagnosed her with “spiritual bankruptcy”.  So Hirsi Ali started praying because she “had absolutely nothing to lose”.  She then immediately felt “connected to something higher and greater than herself.” That was Christianity, and she considered her discovery of it a “miracle.” She goes on to say that her conversion is hard to explain, but she is writing a book about it.

Dawkins responds by asserting that a “Christian has to believe in something“, and wonders what, exactly, does she believe about Christianity: did Jesus rise from the dead, was he the son of God and son of a virgin, and so on?  She responds that these tenets of Christianity “make sense and are wise.” And so she no longer mocks faith, but argues says that people with faith have something that atheists don’t have. (My response: yes, they have faith: belief in what consoles them regardless of its truth.) Judging by the applause, the audience seems to be sympathetic with Hirsi Ali’s view of the salubrious nature of religion.

The difference between the two is summarized in Hirsi Ali’s statement,  “I choose to accept the story of Jesus Christ”, and that that belief rests on a “different ways of perception.” It is “her choice”.

She adds that the message of Western civilization is “essentially Christian”, something that is often told to atheists to silence them: “The whole basis for our culture (and your morality)”, they tell us, “is Christianity.” I find this a debatable assertion, since the whole basis of Judaism is not Christianity, and essentially there is no difference in moral values between Jews and Christians. (Islam, however, is a different matter. I would have asked Hirsi Ali if she thought that Jews, who don’t accept Jesus as the son of God, are doomed and will go to hell. Further, the Enlightenment was a rejection of Christian authoritarianism, so can you praise something because its rejection led to better things?

You have to hand it to Richard. He pulls no punches with Hirsi Ali, saying that the whole Christian story of original sin and our salvation through belief in Jesus is  “obvious nonsense” and “theological bullshit”.  Christianity, he says, is obsessed with sin. But you also have to hand it to Hirsi Ali for standing by her guns (even though I disagree with her): she responds that “Christianity is obsessed with love.” (Loud applause follows; the audience are clearly, as Dennett might have said, “Believers in belief.”)  I’m not sure, further, having watched American Christians, whether in general they’re “obsessed with love”.

Richard again says that if you’re a Christian, you have to accept its empirical assertions along with its moral messages; in his words, “You have to take the whole package”.  Ayaan responds again why she believes that Jesus rose from the dead. . . “it is a matter of choice.” She compares Dawkins being moved by art and music to her being moved by religion, though I disagree with this comparison, for nobody asks whether art and music are “true”, only whether they move you or not.

Hirsi Ali apparently thinks that others should accept Christianity, too, so it isn’t simply a personal choice for her, but one that she thinks others should make to both improve their own mental health and Western society. She is no proselytizer, but does argue that others should become Christians, too. I certainly can’t, for I can’t force myself to believe something that I’ve rejected after long thought, and does Hirsi Ali think that children should be brought up believing Christianity is true? (This question isn’t answered.)

Dawkins clarifies that he sees the hypothesis of theism as a scientific hypothesis, and an important one, but one for which there is no evidence. Hirsi Ali says that, religion, contrary to atheism, “offers you something.”  Richard says that yes, faith offers you something comforting, but “that doesn’t make it true.”  Hirsi Ali then advances the recent argument that evidence for God lies in the observation that “there is something rather than nothing” in the universe. To that I’d add that that is a fallacious argument, but even if it did point to a Creator, it wouldn’t for a minute point to the Christian God.

My Take (after hearing it all): This is a very good and civil argument between two smart and thoughtful people, but in the end they epitomize two different ways of perceiving truth. Richard instantiates the scientific approach: you believe in something in proportion to the amount of evidence supporting it. Ayaan epitomizes the “other ways of knowing”: if you feel something is true, and especially if your belief make you feel better, then that is evidence that it is true.

It’s clear, as you’d see if you read my book Faith versus Fact, that I agree with Richard. You can believe what you want, and are welcome to believe what makes you feel better, but subjective “truth” is no way to ascertain what really exists in the universe. Some religious beliefs may help you, and some may help society, but that is also true of secular humanism, and I see secular humanism as a non-divisive guide for conduct that doesn’t rest on superstition.  Almost by definition, secular humanism is not divisive.

And, as northern Europe and Scandinavia show us, a society doesn’t have to accept the tenets of Christianity to be a good and moral society. Data tell us that the religiosity of a country (or of U.S. states) is negatively correlated with the well-being and happiness of its inhabitants. I don’t see how you can ascribe that to Christianity, much religion in general.

Although the audience and the moderator, who says he’s a Christian, appear to be “believers in belief”, I must disagree with Hirsi Ali’s claim that what she subjectively perceives to be true IS true, and that atheism is dangerous to society. Atheism is simply the absence of belief in the supernatural, and of course people want to have a “meaning and purpose” for their lives. Yet, as I’ve argued, “meaning and purpose” are delineated post facto—after people find what makes them feel good and fulfilled. (See my 2018 post when I asked readers what they see as the meaning and purpose of their lives. Virtually nobody named religion as one of those sources.) Steve Pinker has argued, in my view convincingly, that the moral improvement of society in the last 400 years or so has involved the rejection of religion (Christianity existed well before the moral improvement that Pinker discusses). You’ll have to read his two big books (Better Angels and Enlightenment Now) to see his argument in full. (The subtitle of the second book is “The Case for Readson, Humanism, Science, and Progress.”) I recommend those books to everyone. Yes, they’re long, and are criticized by those misguided souls who think there’s been no moral or material progress of humanity, but I think they’re excellent and on the mark.

In the end, I think Hirsi Ali makes as good a case for Christianity as can be made. But Richard shows, to me at least, that her case is weak, as it’s based on delusions and superstitions that made her feel good and, that she thinks, will make others also feel good while at the same time staving off the forces of nescience and authoritarianism.

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I invite readers to take an hour and listen to the video below.  And then weigh in in the comments. Do we need people to be religious to stave off anti-Western values and to improve their mental health? Did the Enlightenment and secular humanism really come from Christianity, as Hirsi Ali says, or was it a reaction against Christianity, as Dawkins claims?  Do we need Christianity as THE faith that will fill society’s moral vacuum (if there is one)? And is there really a moral vacuum now, compared to say, five hundred years ago?

Updates: First, I just discovered that Hirsi Ali now has her own Substack site, called “Restoration” (she’s not the only author). If you want to follow her intellectual and spiritual journey, click on the link, though at $75 per year it’s pricier than many other such sites.

And I couldn’t resist adding this quote from the eminent nonbeliever H. L. Mencken.  What if a religion dictates something that you think is immoral? Chritianity certainly does, at least for liberal humanists (see “Catholicism”):