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An atheist's convictions: A response to 'What is Atheism?'
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He ain't afraid to take y'all at once!
(Photo by Flickr user ensceptico, under CC Free Attribution license)
On the heels of the Islamic Examiner's arguments against atheism, to which I have responded, Christian Apologetics Examiner Tony Scialdone chimes in with an entry taking a look at what defines an atheist. While Scialdone seems at first to make a good-faith effort at an unbiased examination, he blows it out of the water by proclaiming, in bold font no less, "there are no intellectually honest atheists."
Well, ouch, Tony.
(Scialdone then goes on to write, "Yes, those are bold words," which made me laugh. They are, indeed, words in bold.)
Actually, Scialdone's reasoning for this quite scurrilous, ad hominem assertion, is pretty pedestrian. Nothing you haven't heard or read before:
To say that God doesn't exist is to make a truth claim on par with any other truth claim. It's a statement about what one knows. Knowing with certainty that God is not requires full knowledge of all that is...which is obviously impossible.
Well, of course it is. Which is why it's a little odd that Scialdone, I presume using Richard Dawkins to bolster his case, makes a point that actually demolishes it:
[Dawkins] doesn't make the claim that no God exists...he simply puts the probability that God exists so low on the scale that it's not worth believing.
Which is why Dawkins even titled a chapter of The God Delusion, "Why There Almost Certainly Is No God." Note the "almost." Yet he seems pretty darned comfy with calling himself an atheist. To be agnostic in the common understanding, meanwhile, is fairly atheistic in itself, for it is an admission that the evidence for God isn't strong enough for belief. The person in question just hasn't committed to saying, "I'm convinced that there isn't one." That's an atheist.
Similarly, I am convinced that the Moon is not cheese-based, though I have never been there to check. What I do know about the Moon is plenty for me to be fully convinced of this. Likewise, I know enough to be able to quite assuredly reach the conclusion that the existence of a celestial super-grandpa is so poor and flimsy as to warrant confident disbelief.
But I don't consider myself to be a member of an Lunar Cheese-less religion because of my contentions about the Moon, I just don't believe that it is made of cheese. Am I an alunacheesist? Fine. But to Scialdone, being an atheist is taking a "religious position" (or taking the non-existence of God "on faith," as it were). Why? Because a lot of people believe in God, therefore to not do so is religious. Ahem. More Scialdone:
If there has ever been a people group that had no religion at all, I'm not aware of its existence. It appears that a defining characteristic of humanity is an understanding of God.
Um, I'm raising my hand right now. Hi, Tony, we're right here. And we've been around a while. And there's a lot of us. I'm not sure where this contention comes from. And I'm also pretty sure that the first humans didn't have "an understanding of God" as they were dodging predators and gathering nuts. They eventually invented gods and fairies and leprechauns and animal spirits and then one day we had Deepak Chopra. Or perhaps Scialdone thinks that people who don't have "an understanding of God" are not really members of humanity? If so, we'd best stop calling ourselves humanists!
Finally, Scialdone tells us:
When discussing the nature of the universe with an atheist, it can be difficult to find any common ground. If your friend denies the possibility that he or she might be wrong about God's existence, there's simply nothing to discuss. If we can agree that God might exist, we can then begin to examine the evidence for God's existence and the arguments against it. It's the beginning of a long process, to be sure...but it's a beginning.
These discussions are happening all the time. Indeed, the New Atheists are sharing stages with theists and debating God's existence time and time again. Christopher Hitchens, the most combative of the "Four Horsemen," is taking on four theists at once at a Christian book expo! (Okay, three, but I'm guessing the moderator is a believer, too.) And even if we're unmoved by theist pseudo-evidence for God (which I thought was irrelevant anyway, because it was all about faith), there is a lot more to discuss after that, such as how we reconcile the church-state divide, how we can teach science unhindered by mythology, and how we can stop people from using religion as an excuse to oppress and murder.
By rejecting faith and relying on evidence, yes, atheists are generally convinced that God does not exist. If He were to show up and prove himself beyond a reasonable doubt, we would of course change our minds. It is theists, in the face of overwhelming evidence for God's nonexistence, that remain unmoved, holding their immovability -- their faith -- as a virtue. I say that playing the faith card when backed into a corner is a much better example of there being "nothing to discuss."
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P.S.: Milwaukee Atheism Examiner Micki Schmalfeldt, in her own take-a-baseball-bat-to-him way, responds to Scialdone here. I expect she won't be the last.
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