Well I was going to continue in a similar vein to the previous posts, showing that Dawkins is really writing within the scope of theology and philosophy, and therefore needs to act in a "scientific" manner insofar as he should equip himself with a knowledge of the subject - an awareness of what the academic community are saying in the area he is addressing.
Insofar as he clearly hasn't a clue about either subject, how are we supposed to take him seriously about religion ignoring "science" when he is guilty of the same crime? It seems it is not ok for creationists to write about Dawkins' subject with no awareness of the academic community, the history of the subject - no qualifications in the appropriate areas etc etc - yet Dawkins can do the same for philosophy and theology and it doesn't matter. Hmmm.
This of course was shown clearly in his debate with Rowan Williams chaired by Anthony Kenny. Now Dawkins and Williams didn't engage - more on that later - but Kenny and Dawkins did and it was clear - indeed he himself admitted it - that Dawkins didn't have a clue about philosophy.
Anyway, my point actually isn't really going to be about this after all, as I have realised - and this came to me following watching the film Paul - that it isn't actually about God or religion or Christianity at all, it is really all about the creationists - and I guess also the Intelligent Designers. That is who Dawkins has in his sights - admittedly it takes up his whole view, and he sees them as somehow pretty much the whole deal (although he also throws some dirt at random other targets, Islam, liberal Christianity etc) - Fundamentalists are who he wants to bring down.
Well if that's the case we know why Rowan Williams and Dawkins didn't engage, because Dawkins in fact only has a problem with Fundamentalists and really hasn't anything of substance to say to other believers - basically because he doesn't know what they think. He stopped believing at what - the age of 12 or something - so he has a 12 year old's view of Christianity, and the only extra stuff he has taken on is the creationism. So we know he can debate that, let's just let him get on with debating that.
I guess most people who know Fundamentalists are aware that they leave when they are ready to leave. They don't leave when someone argues with them, so whether Dawkins will really make a lot of difference who knows, but if he can, well good luck.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Thursday, November 15, 2012
Thoughts on Dawkins 4 - Debate
Dawkins and Debate
When we look at Dawkins giving his opinions on how we define religion, what the meaning of the Bible is, the psychological basis of religious belief, religion as a cause of violence, his views in relation to philosophy and theology and so on we can see that in every area he is giving views that relate to a specific area of study and expertise, yet he himself does not engage with that area - he does not acknowledge other views in the areas he is opinionating on - why is this?
There seem to be two obvious reasons.
Firstly, in engaging with other opinions he would have to show some humility and lose some arrogance as clearly he doesn’t have all the answers, and would have to acknowledge that where genuine issues exist in these areas of study and expertise he has no more answers than anyone else. Yet of course he doesn’t want his opinions to appear as one among many - his opinions are different to everyone else, as he is right and they are wrong.
Secondly he would have to make it clear how little he knows in each area - in addressing arguments by the experts of a given field - theology, philosophy, biblical studies, psychology etc - he would have to actually read up in the given area, yet his arrogance tells him he doesn’t need to do this. He isn’t engaging with the field of religion in order to understand it or learn more about it, he is engaging to show everyone his shallow and ill-thought through opinions are right and everyone else is wrong.
So Dawkins isn’t really interested in any sort of debate or discussion - for him the only purpose of debate is to show his opponent how wrong they are, he isn’t there to listen, he isn’t there to learn anything. Although he pays lip-service to liberal ideas of respecting the opinion of others, his arrogance and refusal to learn anything about the areas he is speaking about prevents him actually being able to engage in genuine dialogue.
By contrast religious groups are typically much better able that Dawkins and the New Atheists to collaborate and work together. Religion by default creates multiple patterns of belief. Where there is no hierarchical structure (often imposed by the state) within a religious group, beliefs and practises multiply. Even within the Catholic church many different orders and groups established themselves (different orders of Monk - Franciscans, Dominicans, Carmelites, and Augustinians, different order of Nun within the Benedictine order alone are Benedictines, Cistercians, Camaldolese, and Trappists, among others). Amongst Protestants there are thought to be around 30,000 different denominations.
The fact that the vast majority of the time religious groups live peacefully side by side belies the idea that religion is the cause of much division in the world. There are many different versions of Hinduism, yet they have all lived together in general very amicably. Even in the Holy Land at the time of the Crusades, Christians, Jews and Muslims were living together quite happily until the Crusaders came along and attacked all of them (Christians included).
So hatred and violence can pick up on almost anything to stir up conflict - but there are plenty of examples through history of religions living together, listening to each other and learning from each other.
When we look at Dawkins giving his opinions on how we define religion, what the meaning of the Bible is, the psychological basis of religious belief, religion as a cause of violence, his views in relation to philosophy and theology and so on we can see that in every area he is giving views that relate to a specific area of study and expertise, yet he himself does not engage with that area - he does not acknowledge other views in the areas he is opinionating on - why is this?
There seem to be two obvious reasons.
Firstly, in engaging with other opinions he would have to show some humility and lose some arrogance as clearly he doesn’t have all the answers, and would have to acknowledge that where genuine issues exist in these areas of study and expertise he has no more answers than anyone else. Yet of course he doesn’t want his opinions to appear as one among many - his opinions are different to everyone else, as he is right and they are wrong.
Secondly he would have to make it clear how little he knows in each area - in addressing arguments by the experts of a given field - theology, philosophy, biblical studies, psychology etc - he would have to actually read up in the given area, yet his arrogance tells him he doesn’t need to do this. He isn’t engaging with the field of religion in order to understand it or learn more about it, he is engaging to show everyone his shallow and ill-thought through opinions are right and everyone else is wrong.
So Dawkins isn’t really interested in any sort of debate or discussion - for him the only purpose of debate is to show his opponent how wrong they are, he isn’t there to listen, he isn’t there to learn anything. Although he pays lip-service to liberal ideas of respecting the opinion of others, his arrogance and refusal to learn anything about the areas he is speaking about prevents him actually being able to engage in genuine dialogue.
By contrast religious groups are typically much better able that Dawkins and the New Atheists to collaborate and work together. Religion by default creates multiple patterns of belief. Where there is no hierarchical structure (often imposed by the state) within a religious group, beliefs and practises multiply. Even within the Catholic church many different orders and groups established themselves (different orders of Monk - Franciscans, Dominicans, Carmelites, and Augustinians, different order of Nun within the Benedictine order alone are Benedictines, Cistercians, Camaldolese, and Trappists, among others). Amongst Protestants there are thought to be around 30,000 different denominations.
The fact that the vast majority of the time religious groups live peacefully side by side belies the idea that religion is the cause of much division in the world. There are many different versions of Hinduism, yet they have all lived together in general very amicably. Even in the Holy Land at the time of the Crusades, Christians, Jews and Muslims were living together quite happily until the Crusaders came along and attacked all of them (Christians included).
So hatred and violence can pick up on almost anything to stir up conflict - but there are plenty of examples through history of religions living together, listening to each other and learning from each other.
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Thoughts on Dawkins - 3 Religion and Violence
3. Dawkins - Religion and Violence
One of the arguments made by the New Atheists regarding “good” religion and “bad” religion - e.g. the Martin Luther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi and Bishop Tutu type of religious people, and the Jerry Falwell, Osama Bin Laden and Ayatollah Khomeini type of religious people is that the good religion - while it may not be totally bad in itself - nevertheless serves to support and defend bad religion, therefore for that reason all religion must be abolished.
Clearly this is an incredibly bad argument. It seems to be claiming that if any group or organisation has some undesirable outcome or elements, the group itself should be removed. Thus we would have no drivers to prevent drunk drivers, we would fly no aircraft to prevent planes crashing, we would have no politicians to prevent corrupt or evil politicians, we would have no banks to prevent bank crashes and so on.
Nevertheless it is the case that some people feel religion in itself is a bad thing, no matter what religious people actually do.
In the book The Ambivalence of the Sacred: Religion, Violence and Reconciliation by R. Scott Appleby the author writes at the beginning of the book about a presentation he makes on the role of religion on global conflicts.
Here he is describing his audience:
“Assembled in the cavernous auditorium of the National Defense University were 200 officers representing the various branches of the US armed forces along with policy analysts from the State Department and a smattering of foreign diplomats and visitors”
At the end of his presentation in which he has tried to show that religion can play both positive and negative roles in areas of global conflict, he writes this:
“... as the audience filed out of the auditorium, one of the officers remarked that my presentation had confirmed his previous opinions about the topic, “religion is a powerful medicine” he offered, “and it should be administered in small doses if at all”. This book is a rejoinder to that statement and to the broader sensibilities and opinions it represents. Specifically I refute the notion that religion, having so often inspired, legitimated and exacerbated deadly conflicts cannot be expected to contribute consistently to their peaceful resolution.”
The book then provides numerous examples to support the role many religious people play in seeking to resolve conflicts. The idea that these people in working towards a peaceful resolution to conflict in their region are actually supporting violence simply by being religious cannot be in any way supported by the evidence.
Also note that the comment “religion is a powerful medicine that should be administered in small doses if at all” is self-contradictory. If religion was a powerful medicine then of course it should be administered in whatever dose is necessary! Whoever heard of a medicine so powerful it should not even be administered?
When detectives are seeking to solve violent crimes - for example murder - they look for motives. Typically these motives will be money, thrill seeking, sex/passion, seeking status or fearing loss of status - the idea that religion is the major cause of violence is not supported by the evidence.
In fact it seems from reviewing history and human psychology that these types of motive are generally the real motivating factor in violent acts including wars. Wars are almost always fought as “politics by other means” (Carl von Clausewitz) in other words to further political influence and expansion, rather than religious differences. In Northern Ireland Catholics and Protestants didn’t start fighting over doctrinal differences but due to the abuses of civil rights, the Taliban didn’t arise as a result of religion, but due to the acts of aggression and repression by western powers in countries such as Afghanistan.
The idea that if we got rid of religion we would have a more peaceful world is nonsense - peace comes through justice, while powerful people are acting unjustly they will always be resisted, while nations exist they will compete for global resources - sometimes violently, while the powerful abuse their power there will be violence and unrest. The idea that all this would magically vanish if everyone was a secular atheist is absurd. Indeed to focus attention on religion instead of the injustice being perpetrated around the world simply serves to confuse and obscure the real issues.
One of the arguments made by the New Atheists regarding “good” religion and “bad” religion - e.g. the Martin Luther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi and Bishop Tutu type of religious people, and the Jerry Falwell, Osama Bin Laden and Ayatollah Khomeini type of religious people is that the good religion - while it may not be totally bad in itself - nevertheless serves to support and defend bad religion, therefore for that reason all religion must be abolished.
Clearly this is an incredibly bad argument. It seems to be claiming that if any group or organisation has some undesirable outcome or elements, the group itself should be removed. Thus we would have no drivers to prevent drunk drivers, we would fly no aircraft to prevent planes crashing, we would have no politicians to prevent corrupt or evil politicians, we would have no banks to prevent bank crashes and so on.
Nevertheless it is the case that some people feel religion in itself is a bad thing, no matter what religious people actually do.
In the book The Ambivalence of the Sacred: Religion, Violence and Reconciliation by R. Scott Appleby the author writes at the beginning of the book about a presentation he makes on the role of religion on global conflicts.
Here he is describing his audience:
“Assembled in the cavernous auditorium of the National Defense University were 200 officers representing the various branches of the US armed forces along with policy analysts from the State Department and a smattering of foreign diplomats and visitors”
At the end of his presentation in which he has tried to show that religion can play both positive and negative roles in areas of global conflict, he writes this:
“... as the audience filed out of the auditorium, one of the officers remarked that my presentation had confirmed his previous opinions about the topic, “religion is a powerful medicine” he offered, “and it should be administered in small doses if at all”. This book is a rejoinder to that statement and to the broader sensibilities and opinions it represents. Specifically I refute the notion that religion, having so often inspired, legitimated and exacerbated deadly conflicts cannot be expected to contribute consistently to their peaceful resolution.”
The book then provides numerous examples to support the role many religious people play in seeking to resolve conflicts. The idea that these people in working towards a peaceful resolution to conflict in their region are actually supporting violence simply by being religious cannot be in any way supported by the evidence.
Also note that the comment “religion is a powerful medicine that should be administered in small doses if at all” is self-contradictory. If religion was a powerful medicine then of course it should be administered in whatever dose is necessary! Whoever heard of a medicine so powerful it should not even be administered?
When detectives are seeking to solve violent crimes - for example murder - they look for motives. Typically these motives will be money, thrill seeking, sex/passion, seeking status or fearing loss of status - the idea that religion is the major cause of violence is not supported by the evidence.
In fact it seems from reviewing history and human psychology that these types of motive are generally the real motivating factor in violent acts including wars. Wars are almost always fought as “politics by other means” (Carl von Clausewitz) in other words to further political influence and expansion, rather than religious differences. In Northern Ireland Catholics and Protestants didn’t start fighting over doctrinal differences but due to the abuses of civil rights, the Taliban didn’t arise as a result of religion, but due to the acts of aggression and repression by western powers in countries such as Afghanistan.
The idea that if we got rid of religion we would have a more peaceful world is nonsense - peace comes through justice, while powerful people are acting unjustly they will always be resisted, while nations exist they will compete for global resources - sometimes violently, while the powerful abuse their power there will be violence and unrest. The idea that all this would magically vanish if everyone was a secular atheist is absurd. Indeed to focus attention on religion instead of the injustice being perpetrated around the world simply serves to confuse and obscure the real issues.
Friday, November 2, 2012
Thoughts on Dawkins - 2 - The Bible
2. Dawkins and the Bible
Dawkins is selective over how he defines “religion” and is similarly selective over his reading of the Bible.
Dawkins view of the Bible is that is should not be used for providing moral instruction, that the lessons it teaches are either already obvious to the reader (e.g. the prohibition against murder) or actually immoral (e.g. killing in the name of religion). Therefore while the Bible may be studied as literature it should not be read as teaching how to lead a good life.
As with the subject of “what is religion”, when reading the Bible Dawkins appears to make no reference to any authorities on the subject and just makes it up as he goes along. For example he cites examples from the Old Testament about Israel attacking other tribes in the region, and sees this as a justification for genocide. He provides no other authorities to support his reading or any indication that Biblical studies is an academic discipline that requires years of study, instead the implication of his actions is that this is a topic that anyone can have serious opinions on even with little or no study on the subject.
First, let’s take the example of the “genocide” texts. Biblical scholars point out that there are at various layers of textual sources for these Bible accounts - called “E”, “J”, “D” and “P” - further reading on this topic can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis
The point is that some sources encourage peaceful cohabitation (typically “E” texts) with other tribes, while other sources (typically “J” texts) are more warlike - it isn’t the case that a single view can be derived from the different sources, still less that random texts can be quoted in the manner of Dawkins to “explain” what all the texts are about. As with any ancient text an accurate understanding requires a very close reading of the material.
Dawkins may argue that he isn’t trying to accurately explain the meaning of the texts, but how they might be interpreted by a modern reader. He may claim a modern reader coming to the text could read the warlike sections and see these as a justification for oppression of the Palestinians today, for example. Such a claim raises many questions.
Rather than cite verses out of context what is important in any reading of a text is to look at the broad, general trajectory of the story. Dawkins needs to give an account of what the Bible is broadly teaching and to show that this is immoral - even then of course it will be his reading against anyone else’s reading - and given he does not appear to have any qualifications on the subject it will be doubtful how factual or accurate a reading he would provide.
Broadly the message of the Old Testament is of God’s acting to save Israel when they were slaves in Egypt, God chose them to be his people so that through them all the nations of the earth would be blessed. In the scriptures of the Old Testament God tells his people to care for the poor, the oppressed, the widow and orphan, to show love and compassion, justice and mercy, and a future hope that in the future all nations will live together in peace. This doesn’t appear an immoral message, but one that encourages those who follow the teachings of the Old Testament to look after and care for their fellow human beings, working together for a better world.
Similarly the broad message of the New Testament is of God sending his Son Jesus to give humanity an example of selfless love, to bring about a kingdom of peace, love of enemies, turning the other cheek and hope of new life. Again, Dawkins may wish to quote certain texts out of context, but the broad teachings of the New Testament encourage people to live better lives.
One final point - Dawkins claims the Bible can be read as literature, but not as a moral guide. Great literature is great because it teaches us about the human condition. A great work of literature which had a shallow, even immoral view of humanity would be very unusual. To claim the Bible can be read as literature - and therefore a set of stories to teach us about our humanity - and yet have no reference to morality is to misunderstand what great literature is about.
Dawkins is selective over how he defines “religion” and is similarly selective over his reading of the Bible.
Dawkins view of the Bible is that is should not be used for providing moral instruction, that the lessons it teaches are either already obvious to the reader (e.g. the prohibition against murder) or actually immoral (e.g. killing in the name of religion). Therefore while the Bible may be studied as literature it should not be read as teaching how to lead a good life.
As with the subject of “what is religion”, when reading the Bible Dawkins appears to make no reference to any authorities on the subject and just makes it up as he goes along. For example he cites examples from the Old Testament about Israel attacking other tribes in the region, and sees this as a justification for genocide. He provides no other authorities to support his reading or any indication that Biblical studies is an academic discipline that requires years of study, instead the implication of his actions is that this is a topic that anyone can have serious opinions on even with little or no study on the subject.
First, let’s take the example of the “genocide” texts. Biblical scholars point out that there are at various layers of textual sources for these Bible accounts - called “E”, “J”, “D” and “P” - further reading on this topic can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis
The point is that some sources encourage peaceful cohabitation (typically “E” texts) with other tribes, while other sources (typically “J” texts) are more warlike - it isn’t the case that a single view can be derived from the different sources, still less that random texts can be quoted in the manner of Dawkins to “explain” what all the texts are about. As with any ancient text an accurate understanding requires a very close reading of the material.
Dawkins may argue that he isn’t trying to accurately explain the meaning of the texts, but how they might be interpreted by a modern reader. He may claim a modern reader coming to the text could read the warlike sections and see these as a justification for oppression of the Palestinians today, for example. Such a claim raises many questions.
- Even given some texts that suggest a warlike stance, there are others that support a peaceful co-existence with other nations, so there is no compelling argument that random reading of texts will necessarily give a bad moral compass.
- Texts supporting one nation living in one particular location is surely better than teachings that support a nation conquering many other nations and keeping them in servitude which is what the “pagan” nations of the time such as Assyria, Egypt, Media-Persia, Greece and Rome were doing, and which many nations today appear to continue to believe is a justified course of action.
- Dawkins idea that destroying any “spoils of war” is somehow bad needs to be contrasted with the view that if a nation is allowed to keep the “spoils of war” this encourages going to war. If Israel is not allowed to keep any spoils of war (as in the case of the “sin of Achan”) then why would they go to war? Surely only to defend themselves, not to gain the wealth of other nations - so there is certainly more than one way to interpret the “bad” texts Dawkins cites from the Bible.
- More generally how a religious text is interpreted is through the religious tradition, not from some random reading of texts, so Dawkins really needs to show that interpretations of Bible texts have never had a good impact on morality, rather than finding some texts that he can interpret in a negative manner. As most people will recognise, Bible texts can often be used to justify all sorts of actions - both good and bad, it is just not possible to show they are always negative in their influence.
Rather than cite verses out of context what is important in any reading of a text is to look at the broad, general trajectory of the story. Dawkins needs to give an account of what the Bible is broadly teaching and to show that this is immoral - even then of course it will be his reading against anyone else’s reading - and given he does not appear to have any qualifications on the subject it will be doubtful how factual or accurate a reading he would provide.
Broadly the message of the Old Testament is of God’s acting to save Israel when they were slaves in Egypt, God chose them to be his people so that through them all the nations of the earth would be blessed. In the scriptures of the Old Testament God tells his people to care for the poor, the oppressed, the widow and orphan, to show love and compassion, justice and mercy, and a future hope that in the future all nations will live together in peace. This doesn’t appear an immoral message, but one that encourages those who follow the teachings of the Old Testament to look after and care for their fellow human beings, working together for a better world.
Similarly the broad message of the New Testament is of God sending his Son Jesus to give humanity an example of selfless love, to bring about a kingdom of peace, love of enemies, turning the other cheek and hope of new life. Again, Dawkins may wish to quote certain texts out of context, but the broad teachings of the New Testament encourage people to live better lives.
One final point - Dawkins claims the Bible can be read as literature, but not as a moral guide. Great literature is great because it teaches us about the human condition. A great work of literature which had a shallow, even immoral view of humanity would be very unusual. To claim the Bible can be read as literature - and therefore a set of stories to teach us about our humanity - and yet have no reference to morality is to misunderstand what great literature is about.
Thoughts on Dawkins - 1 - What is Religion?
It is a while since I read the New Atheists but I was having a discussion with someone recently about them and a number of thoughts came to mind about their arguments that I thought I'd put down here.
This is really to help me clarify my thinking - I find I don't really know what I think until I put it down on paper and have a look at it.
Here goes with the first post.
1. What is religion?
Reading the New Atheists there appear to be all sort of skewed definition of how we define religion. If you read social anthropology or writers about different religious traditions you’ll see it is actually pretty difficult to come up with a broad set of categories to define religion, it is actually quite complex with lots of debate.
However as is typical of Dawkins he appears totally ignorant of any of the facts or issues in this, and just comes up with his own definition at the start of The God Delusion in which he separates out a belief in a non-personal God and a belief in a personal God. He doesn’t even consider the issue of the Greek conception of the divine as being beyond time and space, being all good and all powerful and so forth, in relation to the Judaic notion of a personal God who appears to exist in time has emotions such as regret - both descriptions co-exist within Christianity but how they relate is the topic of a long tradition of theological and philosophical thought, it which it could be argued it is better to see the two as poles on a sliding scale of conceptions about God, or even different ways in which we relate to God, rather than two opposites.
He certainly doesn’t attempt to address how the issue relates to eastern notions of religion - Hinduism, Taoism, Buddhism etc - nor even how it relates to the Islamic notion of God as totally transcendent.
In any case, Dawkins simply assumes the two notions can be defined in opposition to each other and simply separated out, he then proceeds to bracket off any belief in a non-personal God as not a “true” belief, irrespective of whether such a belief has been accompanied with what we might term traditional religious practice - in other words someone “being religious”, and pronounce that the rest of the book would concern only the notion of a personal God.
Hitchens can be even more cavalier in his definition - claiming that religion is simply superstition and the irrational, therefore anyone who acts irrationally is religious - and by this definition manages to include the ideologies of Marxist states such as the USSR and China in spite of their clear adherence to atheism.
Sam Harris similarly distinguishes early on in his book Letter to a Christian Nation those who simply have mystical experiences and are not dogmatic in their religious assertions, with “real” religious people who are.
In each case the author clearly tacitly acknowledges that religion as commonly understood is not going to conform to the sort of criticisms that are going to be thrown at it in the subsequent argument, therefore they have to re-define religion in such a way that it now becomes not what most people call religion, but some new definition of “religion” invented by the author, which can of course only lead to mystification and confusion when they then start making pronouncements about religion, because of course it will only be about their own made-up definition of religion they are talking about, whereas it will read as if it is referring to what is commonly understood as “religion”.
This really seems a sort of “double-think” strategy to allow the sympathetic reader to simultaneously keep both definitions in mind. For most of the time they can think that the arguments apply to the public definition of religion, but when cornered with counter-arguments and evidence or when the claims become too preposterous, they can switch back to the second definition.
I would also add that such a definition that in-effect means when I speak of religion I only mean the bad things in religion, seems to conform to any sort of bigotry or hate-speech. When the Nazi’s wished to define the Jews they did so with a combination of definitions, which included images of rats and vermin. Similar arguments can be made over other racist language and definitions - how for example gypsies/travellers are defined/presented by those on the extreme right. An analysis of this sort of hate-speech in terms of how the enemy is defined is distressingly similar to how the New Atheists define their “enemy”.
This is really to help me clarify my thinking - I find I don't really know what I think until I put it down on paper and have a look at it.
Here goes with the first post.
1. What is religion?
Reading the New Atheists there appear to be all sort of skewed definition of how we define religion. If you read social anthropology or writers about different religious traditions you’ll see it is actually pretty difficult to come up with a broad set of categories to define religion, it is actually quite complex with lots of debate.
However as is typical of Dawkins he appears totally ignorant of any of the facts or issues in this, and just comes up with his own definition at the start of The God Delusion in which he separates out a belief in a non-personal God and a belief in a personal God. He doesn’t even consider the issue of the Greek conception of the divine as being beyond time and space, being all good and all powerful and so forth, in relation to the Judaic notion of a personal God who appears to exist in time has emotions such as regret - both descriptions co-exist within Christianity but how they relate is the topic of a long tradition of theological and philosophical thought, it which it could be argued it is better to see the two as poles on a sliding scale of conceptions about God, or even different ways in which we relate to God, rather than two opposites.
He certainly doesn’t attempt to address how the issue relates to eastern notions of religion - Hinduism, Taoism, Buddhism etc - nor even how it relates to the Islamic notion of God as totally transcendent.
In any case, Dawkins simply assumes the two notions can be defined in opposition to each other and simply separated out, he then proceeds to bracket off any belief in a non-personal God as not a “true” belief, irrespective of whether such a belief has been accompanied with what we might term traditional religious practice - in other words someone “being religious”, and pronounce that the rest of the book would concern only the notion of a personal God.
Hitchens can be even more cavalier in his definition - claiming that religion is simply superstition and the irrational, therefore anyone who acts irrationally is religious - and by this definition manages to include the ideologies of Marxist states such as the USSR and China in spite of their clear adherence to atheism.
Sam Harris similarly distinguishes early on in his book Letter to a Christian Nation those who simply have mystical experiences and are not dogmatic in their religious assertions, with “real” religious people who are.
In each case the author clearly tacitly acknowledges that religion as commonly understood is not going to conform to the sort of criticisms that are going to be thrown at it in the subsequent argument, therefore they have to re-define religion in such a way that it now becomes not what most people call religion, but some new definition of “religion” invented by the author, which can of course only lead to mystification and confusion when they then start making pronouncements about religion, because of course it will only be about their own made-up definition of religion they are talking about, whereas it will read as if it is referring to what is commonly understood as “religion”.
This really seems a sort of “double-think” strategy to allow the sympathetic reader to simultaneously keep both definitions in mind. For most of the time they can think that the arguments apply to the public definition of religion, but when cornered with counter-arguments and evidence or when the claims become too preposterous, they can switch back to the second definition.
I would also add that such a definition that in-effect means when I speak of religion I only mean the bad things in religion, seems to conform to any sort of bigotry or hate-speech. When the Nazi’s wished to define the Jews they did so with a combination of definitions, which included images of rats and vermin. Similar arguments can be made over other racist language and definitions - how for example gypsies/travellers are defined/presented by those on the extreme right. An analysis of this sort of hate-speech in terms of how the enemy is defined is distressingly similar to how the New Atheists define their “enemy”.
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