And then there are the significant threats posed by some popular western values to Christian values.

By many accounts, Nancy Reagan persuaded her husband's appointment makers to rely on what her astrologer advised her as to opportune timing.

"Second, they largely fail to defend against lesser attacks on Reason from superstition, which, while milder than terrorism, are more pervasive." Do you really have any evidence of this claim? One should expect that the stuff about religion is going to get the lion's share of attention in the media & the blogosphere, since it's more controversial and attacking beliefs that are held by more people, and held more strongly. But there is a _lot_ out there by folks who are either part of or allied with the 'new atheism', that takes aim squarely at "new age" beliefs, the paranormal, crazy health fads, and so on. Really, I think you've just got an instance of the availability heuristic on your hands -- there's just no reason at all to think that these guys are failing to take aim at other forms of belief that they would take to be epistemically slack.

Phil, I guess I should clarify that I mean the most popular expressions of the new atheism. (I think global data on atheists would be hard to come by.) Judging by what makes the best-seller stands and who gets invited on prominent talk shows, we see much more of Hitchens than the Amazing Randi.

If we are talking about the base motivation behind the atheist movement, I think you have to factor in the impact religion has on personal freedom.

Many faiths seem to share the same common problem at the moment. Christians are faced with issues like pro-life versus pro-choice, teenage sex, and even how casual versus respectful they should dress for church. Eastern religions at a turning point with how much western influence is changing traditional views. Muslims are also faced with strict adherence to tradition versus a new, more relaxed faith.

These crises of identity in religion are allowing individuals to decide for themselves what is right and what is wrong - where in the past this was largely dictated. Faiths exacerbate the problem by lessening their standards to make their version of worship the most palatable option to the largest common denominator.

The consequence is that many people progress down the path so far in determining what structure religion should play in their lives that no role becomes their choice.

The loss of preconceived attitudes, rules, and thoughts about topics is liberating for many. Given freedom of choice and enjoying that freedom to decide their stance on an issue may lead some to despise their previous path.

My first tendency after leaving my faith for atheism was to voice my support for my new found freedom and to show the light to all those still duped by religion.

Then I realized that I had no right to sway the choices of another - nor could I be certain that I had the right answer.

In the end, all that matters is that we have choice. At all costs, we must defend our rights to believe how we will.

Part of that means that atheists must endure Indiana license plates that reference god - and part of that means Christians enduring atheist books on the best seller list...

I wasn't speaking of global atheism, but of the sorts of people involved in the 'new atheism' movement. And, again, I worry that you are relying far too much on _passive_ measures of their involvement in opposing superstition and the like, i.e., the extent to which that is -- or isn't -- talked about in the media and blogosphere. And that means that you should suspect that you're just being subject to the availability heuristic.

Looking a bit deeper into thing reveals plenty of more general opposition to superstition and the paranormal. For example, it took me very little googling -- just plugging in their names and "paranormal" --to turn up the following:
--Daniel Dennett has worked recently as a fellow for CSICOP, the paranormal-debunking organization
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2843/is_6_27/ai_110575753

--Richard Dawkins devotes an entire chapter of his _Unweaving the Rainbow_ to astrology and the like.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unweaving_the_Rainbow#Hoodwink.27d_with_Faery_Fancy

--Googling on "brights paranormal" reveals a strong anti-paranormal attitude in that (oddly-named) community. The following seemed to me pretty telling on the current topic, in demonstrating that the movement is not defined by its atheism, but by its opposition to belief in the supernatural more generally: "Of course, a great many Brights are atheists by definition (e.g., they are without belief in any gods). Many self-identify as atheists, too. But, by the same token (i.e., by definition), atheists who have worldviews that do incorporate supernatural ideas are not Brights. It helps to keep those atheists in mind. This helps to see how being a bright is something else. There are the atheists who wear magnets to ward off disease, atheists who arrange their furniture using feng shui, or make decisions by horoscopes, or plant their gardens "by the signs." These are atheists who would not be Brights. They do not have the requisite naturalistic worldview."
http://www.the-brights.net/vision/faq.html#13

the looming threats creationism and Islamic extremism pose to Western values

Hmmm...I think you must mean something here other than the values which have guided Western civilization for the past 2 millenia, or even the past several centuries. Some form of creationism has been the dominant worldview throughout the entire history of Western civilization. Perhaps you refer to the more recent attempts by certain groups to replace or accompany evolution with creationism or intelligent design in public school curricula. But I don't see how even those attempts threaten Western values--they do, however, threaten the particular strain of secularism which the "New Atheists" had been contentedly watching rise to prominence in many aspects of Western life.

"Some form of creationism has been the dominant worldview throughout the entire history of Western civilization"

I think your mixing up the idea of Western civilization with the idea of Christendom. Christian values are a part of the Western ideal, but not central to it. Read any number of books on the meaning of the word, "Western civilization" before that term fell out of fashion and you'll know what I'm talking about. Carroll Quigley's chapters on the subject from Tragedy and Hope are illustrative.

It's going to depend on what is meant by "creationism"; I take it that Zach's usage was meant to pick up on those creationists who put their views in _conflict_ with science, and would impose changes in the biology curriculum in particular. This willingness to let faith _trump_ science is, I think, the danger to Western values that Zach has in mind. And it isn't one that is historically relevant, since it's only relatively recently that there would be a conflict between an idea like intelligent design on the one hand, and the values of science on the other. For a long time the design inference was an intellectually respectable one. But, because of developments in the science, it is no longer such, which is why appeals to history and tradition here cannot gain any purchase.

Chuck wrote:

I think your mixing up the idea of Western civilization with the idea of Christendom.

Actually, no. I did think about the pre-Christian roots of Western civilization in Rome and Greece, and I'm fairly certain they believed the Earth had been created by the gods, though I admit I'm not an expert on Greek and Roman mythology.

phil--good point. If Zach meant that letting faith trump science is a threat to the modern Western value of scientific inquiry, then I'd agree that certain creationist factions do pose such a threat--albeit a tiny and weak one.

(BTW, from what I've seen the design inference is still an intellectually respectable position for someone (including a scientist) to hold on a personal level, just not necessarily as a scientific premise.)

"(BTW, from what I've seen the design inference is still an intellectually respectable position for someone (including a scientist) to hold on a personal level, just not necessarily as a scientific premise.)"

We might be using these terms slightly differently. I'm using the word "inference" here on purpose, to refer to the claim that the empirical observations we make of the physical world support a design hypothesis as the best explanation -- i.e., the sort of thing that biological versions of the teleological argument are made from. It would be an argument for a _belief_ in design, but would not be the only way that one might have such a belief; one might have such a belief as a way of rectifying one's religious beliefs with the actual deliverances of science. Adherents to theistic evolution would presumably be of this sort.

So, even if a design _belief_ could be intellectually kosher, I do think it's still the case that a design _inference_ is not.