I think Scott Adams (Creator of Dilbert) needs a bit of an atheist education. In his post “The Atheist Who Thought He Was God“, he makes two common misunderstandings/fallacies relating to Atheism. Can you spot them?
Perhaps there are more, but I think they boil down to the following:
Few, if any, atheists claim to be 100% sure that God does not exist. (99.99999% IS good enough)
Pascal’s Wager (which Adams’ post is based on - although perhaps not knowingly) doesn’t account for the multitude of beings which claim punishment for non-belief. Of course the other fallacies of Pascal’s wager are equally present in Adams’ post.
I started thinking after reading this comment - why do atheists feel the need to call themselves atheists at all? Certainly a hard/strong atheist would be justified in doing so since they have a specific belief to describe, but since most of us do not explicitly deny the possibility of God’s existence (and rather, claim that we simply “have no belief in God”), why should we have a label like this at all?
I don’t go around calling myself an “a-redhead” or an “a-woman”, or saying that I have “a-green” eyes, I’m not “a-artistic” or “a-Swahili-speaking” (feel free to translate these words into Greek for the proper effect). Similarly, a Deaf person wouldn’t go around calling themselves “a-hearing”1. Why, then, do atheists insist on using a commonly misunderstood negative label2 to describe their lack of belief in God? Aren’t we just “not theistic”?
What other positive words or terms could we use to describe ourselves?
Although “hearing impaired” is a commonly used term, a “culturally Deaf” person who uses sign language and associates with the Deaf community would never use this term to describe themselves. [↩]
”a-theism” means, “without a belief in God”, which, one would assume should be the default position. [↩]
I must admit, I used to think that science and religion were natural enemies. How can something that relies on faith not be in direct opposition to a practice which specifically relies on reason and evidence? The thing is, it wasn’t always like that, and to some it still isn’t. Of course, there are those who choose to create conflict, but conflict isn’t necessary. Historically, science grew from the church. The first scientists were clergy, and scientific research was sponsored by the church. The church wanted to understand God’s world, and science was one of the ways they tried to do that.
Before I really began looking into things myself, I thought that the only rational scientific view could be that God (as always, I use the term very loosely) does not exist. But there is so much magic in the universe that we can’t help but feel insignificant in it. Even if the universe does exist due to a cosmic fluke, that’s still pretty darn amazing and if we could ever truly understand that, I think that would be on par with a religious experience.
Arthur C. Clark’s famous quote “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” seems to be true not only of technology as we know it, but also the natural world around us, which possibly explains why many seem to believe the only option is that this world was created by a “sufficiently advanced being”. As our science advances, we discover more and more things that seem like magic - we continually discover new exciting things that seem completely unreal and magical. The quantum world, for example - even the greatest scientific minds still can’t fully grasp what happens in our world on a quantum level. As time goes on, our science progresses, and we understand these things differently, but that doesn’t make them any less amazing. While I accept that both science and spirituality/religion have limits to what they can explain, they both seem to be striving to understand this same magic.
Can’t science be a path to God? If God exists in all things (as is often claimed), then by understanding the world around us through science, we could begin to understand God. Sure, the God we might find wouldn’t be Yahweh, Allah or Jesus - but some parts of the bible have to be interpreted as metaphor, right?
Wow! There’s been a LOT of traffic on my site the last couple of days, mostly thanks to StumbleUpon. All that traffic has also pushed my blog up to number one (for now) at a listing of top religion blogs.
I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who’s visited, commented, subscribed, and most importantly shared my posts on social networking sites. Remember, there’s a “share” link at the bottom of every post to make this part really easy… (*hint, hint*).
I saw this clip on TV tonight (The Chaser, an Australian comedy show, are playing repeats at the moment), and I thought it was funny. If you haven’t heard of these guys, I suggest you check out their show (currently taking a break) - you can download it at the ABC website.
Let me hear you say “I will empty the contents of my wallet into that little collection plate when it comes around…. hallelujah!”
Update: a reply! Supposedly, my comments were blocked by a rule which removes posts with more than two links. Given both my comments1 only had one link, this seems unlikely.
Just to being with, I’ll just say that in general, I don’t agree with Atheistic evangelism. I get really pissed off when Christians (I only single them out because no one else has ever tried to convert me, but I’m sure they’re not the only evangelists) don’t understand that I have no interest in joining their religion (or any other, for that matter). It is for exactly that reason that I disagree with atheists doing exactly the same thing. I don’t care if we’re right - I’ll happily debate with someone, and explain my position, but I’m not arrogant enough to think that everyone else should necessarily share my views. Before you say “why are you giving these religious people so much respect?” (as I’m sure many Dawkinians might), I would treat peoples political beliefs or choice of ice cream flavours in exactly the same way. “You don’t like rocky road? But what could possibly be better than the mix of smooth sticky marshmallow with crunchy nuts?” … “You don’t like nuts? Well ok, then…”.
I’ve had three discussions/arguments with various Christians/creationists recently2, two of which have been quite interesting, and possibly even productive.
That said, blatantly stupid comments still draw my ire - fine - be religious, believe in a personal God. I’ll disagree with you, but it’s still your right. Claiming that “we’re working on it” is not a better answer than “goddidit”, and you’ll get my argumentative juices flowing. Further trying to claim a law professor is somehow an expert in evolutionary biology, and even further that biology is not a natural science is beyond me.
I can’t imagine (note: sarcasm) why the Gay Conservative didn’t post my most recent comment3:
Secondly, if you want to quote someone reputable about evolutionary biology, an ex-Berkley law professor4 is not my idea of a credible source… Find me a reputable biologist (or even a reputable scientist in a related field), and I might take more notice…
Did I have a point? Was I too argumentative? Feel free to read through the comments on Gay Conservative’s post, and see if anyone else can get their comments published.
Apologies if the CoComment site doesn’t display the comments properly, but this is the only method I can find for a permalink [↩]
One in the comments of my post “Misquoting Jesus“, one on Facebook, and the other one I’m discussing here. [↩]
I think Scott Adams (Creator of Dilbert) needs a bit of an atheist education. In his post “The Atheist Who Thought He Was God“, he makes two common misunderstandings/fallacies relating to Atheism. Can you spot them?
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