Ray on Occasional Days: 8:4

If you are a beginner atheist, there’s a belief system you should embrace and a language you should learn, or you will find yourself in trouble. Here are ten suggestions for the novice:

First off, this is a common misconception.  While it’s possible that an atheist could potentially claim that his or her lack of belief in God is itself a belief, I’ve never met an atheist who claims this.  It seems that the vast majority are like Ziztur and myself; that our lack of belief in a god is more accurately described as a conclusion than a belief.  I have no difficulty acknowledging a Christian who might claim that they don’t believe that Jesus is God, they have come to that conclusion by weight of evidence.  Of course, I think that they’re wrong, but I can simply argue that they are mistaken, or don’t have all the facts.  I don’t have to insist that they have no “evidence” for their “belief.”  As for the “system” and “language” an atheist should learn, they’re nothing more than critical thinking skills, logic, knowledge, perhaps the scientific method, and humanistic ethical principles.  I should add that everyone should learn these things, not just atheists, and that these things are, more often than not, the cause of atheism, not ideas embraced after the fact.

1. Whenever you are presented with credible evidence for God’s existence, call it a “straw man argument,” or “circular reasoning.” If something is quoted from somewhere, label it “quote mining.”

When I originally read this, my first thought was, “What’s with the quotation marks around ’straw man argument’ and ‘circular reasoning’?  Does he believe that an opinion can still be valid even if it’s a logical fallacy?  Does he know what a logical fallacy is, or how logic works at all?”

I’m afraid that this is exactly the situation in far, far too many cases.  A “straw man argument” is when you distort or misrepresent your opponent’s position as a position that can be easily rebutted.  For example, Comfort continually insists that atheists believe that nothing created everything.  This is completely counter-intuitive, but it’s not what atheists “believe,” so he hasn’t accomplished anything.  If this still isn’t clear to those who don’t understand basic logic, let’s try a different example:  If an atheist like me says that, “Christianity claims that you will get anything you pray for, but this doesn’t happen, so Christianity is false,” have I proved anything?  No, because Christians don’t claim this.  I’ve committed a strawman fallacy (even though this is still debatable, because the Bible does, in fact, say this).

If your argument can be applied in the exact same way that you use it to a different situation and your logic completely breaks down, that means that there is something wrong with your logic.  This is all that’s necessary to show what’s wrong with a “circular” argument.  When Comfort says that “Creation proves the existence of a creator,” he’s assuming in his premise that the universe is, in fact, a creation.  An atheist can say that “The naturalistic, undesigned universe proves that there is no creator,” and say the exact same thing:  nothing.  An atheist stating this as evidence that the universe has no creator would obviously be completely illogical, yet this is the exact same type of logic that Comfort must rely on to “prove” the existence of his god.  He seems to be mocking us atheists because we point out the glaring logical failures of his thinking.  I’m very curious as to how someone would even attempt to make the case that a blatantly circular argument is perfectly rational.

2. When a Christian says that creation proves that there is a Creator, dismiss such common sense by saying “That’s just the old watchmaker argument.”

Comfort is correct that simply saying, “That’s just the old watchmaker argument.” isn’t a valid rebuttal.  The point of that response is that the “design argument” for the existence of God has been rebutted so many times that, at this point, any rational conversation about this argument would have to begin with the theist’s response to the rebuttal.  Since Comfort does not do this, it’s probably safe to assume that he doesn’t understand the rebuttals to this old, tired argument.

3. When you hear that you have everything to gain and nothing to lose (the pleasures of Heaven, and the endurance of Hell) by obeying the Gospel, say “That’s just the old ‘Pascal wager.’”

Again, the point of that seemingly-simplistic response is that, frankly, Pascal’s Wager is a top contender for the single stupidest argument for the existence of God (or more accurately, the stupidest argument for the desirability of claiming that you believe in God, even if you’re lying).  When an atheist says something like “That’s just the old (extremely old and rebutted a thousand times over) argument,” it’s not that they don’t have a response.  It’s just their frustration at hearing these stupid arguments over and over again.  You have probably heard these responses from atheists in the past, Ray.  Just trust me, they weren’t trying to dodge the question, they’re just very dissapointed that you didn’t have any intellectual weight to add to the conversation.

There are ten of these helpful hints altogether, so stay tuned!