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Manfred comments on In Defense of Tone Arguments - Less Wrong
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[citation needed], of course.
Consider it my opinion, and the whole of this article as the substantive argument for why. If you have an issue with the argument, of course, you're free to present it. Alternatively, if you know somebody who was converted from religious belief to atheism by The God Delusion, that would be an evidence-based argument as to why I am wrong on the matter as a whole.
Hm. The rest of your article explains that tone can be bad for effectiveness, and when it is, it's reasonable to act on that information.
You do argue that a confrontational tone will put people on the defensive. Which seems true on average, and ceteris paribus will result in persuading fewer people than a nonconfrontational tone. But there are "non-average" effects, for example if people who don't immediately become defensive are also more (or less) likely to be persuaded by confrontation, that gives a positive (or negative) term. And there are "ceteris isn't paribus" effects, where a confrontational tone might get noticed a lot more (or less) than non-confrontation, gaining a positive (or negative) effect that way.
Anyhow, one could find anecdotes both pro (yay google) and con (I guess we'll count you for that one. We'd prefer anecdotes of opinion because of rather than opinion on, but those will be scarce unless Dawkins actually makes people join religions). To get non-anecdotal evidence, maybe we could estimate some long-term impact on atheism? That gets awful theory-laden awful fast, though. I guess you'd need some persuasion studies on the marginal impact of tone, and a model that could account for effects like those I mention above.
I've met both sorts, people turned off by "The God Delusion" who really would have benefited from something like "Greatest Show on Earth", and people who really seemed to come around because of it (both irl and in a wide range of fora). The unfortunate side-effect of successful conversion, in my experience, has been that people who are successfully converted by rhetoric frequently begin to spam similar rhetoric, ineptly, resulting mostly in increased polarization among their friends and family.
It seems pretty hard to control for enough factors to see what kind of impact popular atheist intellectuals actually have on de-conversion rates and belief polarization (much less with specific subset of abrasive works), and I can't find any clear numbers on it. Seems like opinion mining facebook could potentially be useful here.
Amongst the sophisticated theists I know (Church of England types who have often actually read large chunks of the Bible and don't dispute that something called "evolution" happened), they will detail their objections to The God Delusion at length ... without, it turns out, having actually read it. This appears to be the religious meme defending itself. I point them at the bootleg PDF and suggest they actually read it, then complain ... at which point they usually never mention it ever again.
This is part of why I tend to think that for the most part, these works aren't (or if they are, they shouldn't be) aimed at de-converting the faithful (who have already built up a strong meme-plex to fall back on), but rather for interception and prevention for young potential converts and people who are on the fence. Particularly college kids who have left home and are questioning their belief structure.
The side effect is that something that is marketed well towards this group (imo, this is the case with "The God Delusion") comes across as shocking and abrasive to the older converts (and this also plays into its marketability to a younger audience). So there's definitely a trade-off, but getting the numbers right to determine the actual payoff is difficult.
I think a more effective way to increase secular influence is through lobbying. I think in the U.S. there is a great need for a well-funded secular lobby to keep things in check. I found one such lobby but I haven't had the chance to look into it yet.
I think in practice, it has to be a movement and it has to, in its various parts, work all the angles at once. Which is pretty much the present state of things - there's plenty of work to go around.
Dawkins, of course, has a pile of them. While this selection is obviously lacking in arguments against, it is precisely the thing you just asked for.
I'll have to concede that point then. Most of those weren't strong believers to begin with, but the presence of one refutes my argument, leaving me with the weaker form "The God Delusion does more damage than good."
I look forward to your substantiation, on a more robust basis than personal feeling.