Antinomy of the Atheist: An Open Letter to Anyone and Everyone

Here's the thing.

Atheism for the sake of atheism is rather absurd.

In fact, there is no good reason to repeatedly bring up that which one does not believe in.

Do you believe in flaggermaroos and kaliwag snicker-poodles? If not, does it bother you that you haven't immediately informed me and everyone else on the planet of it?

Probably not. 

Then why do atheists, especially these so-called "New Atheists," seem to revel in reminding everybody that they don't believe in God?!

Well, needless to say there are historical reasons for why atheists feel hard pressed to explain themselves. Mainly because the religious won't stop pigeonholing us into uncomfortable definitions of what it means to be an atheist.

How do I know this? Because everybody and their dog has an opinion on atheists!

As if they knew better than I do about what I don't believe! Ha!

It's god-awful presumptuous, if you think about it.

It is a lot like me, a Caucasian male trying to define what it means to be an African American female. Really, how would I know what it's like to be one when I'm not? But this is how religion has typically treated atheists over the centuries. 

Yeah. Atheism is a strange word. I'll be the first to admit it. It explains one, and only one, sort-of-belief a person has. 

In this case, it explains what they don't believe to be the case. 

God? Not so much. 

We atheists, for whatever reasons we may have, just can't bring ourselves to believe that one proposition. But that's all the term atheism or atheist denotes. Nothing more, nothing less. Atheism = 0 God(s).

Simple. To the point.

I hope you realized, that as people, atheists have so many more beliefs than the simple and unassuming belief that there is no God. It's strange that this doesn't get brought up. 

Why should religion have such a hard-on for what we atheists don't believe?

It's like the moment a religious person hears you're an atheist they want to strap on a dildo and fuck you in the ass with it to teach you a lesson. 

You see, religion has developed a bad taste for atheism.

Atheism is the antithetical position who what most believers feel to be a sacred truth. Therefore, atheists must be bad, right?

Over the centuries atheism has been vilified by the religious. After all, atheists certainly haven't been going around claiming they eat babies or worship the devil. These are specifically religious hang-ups.

Religion often brings up atheism in negative ways, and tries ever so hard to diminish the value of atheistic belief by attacking the individual, saying things like those who don't believe in God are somehow morally depraved. 

Religion is in the habit of highlight atheism and putting it in a negative light. The religious will often try to make it seem like anyone who is an atheist is also corrupted or deficient in some way.

In fact, they will go as far to suggest that if you're an atheist, something very traumatic must have happened to you when you were young--maybe your parents divorced, or you were molested by your priest. They always try to take away from the rational or intellectual reasons one may have for being an atheist by raising non-sequiturs or distracting us with wild absurdities.

This maltreatment of atheism, and atheists in general, is a historical occurrence. It's sad, but true. It's been going on for thousands of years and continues to this day.

That's the thing that bothers me the most.

It continues to this day.

Famous news anchors go on national television and call atheists pin-heads simply because they are atheists. 

I mean, what if the same famous news anchor went on and called all Jews pin-heads simply because they are Jews?

What if, for that matter, he went on and announced all women are pin-heads because they are women?

It's called oppression. Women and minorities have valiantly fought to get out from under such oppression, and now atheists are pushing back too.

Which is why I miss Christopher Hitchens so goddamn much. He always was able to land a much needed Hitch-slap to such odious, obnoxious, and deserving news anchors.

But it's this very oppressive attitude taken by the mainstream religious, and religions historically, that gives the "New Atheists" cause to correct the misconceptions of what atheism is and, in doing so, help to counter the blatant and often spiteful misrepresentations of it. 

Of us.

I doubt the religious realize the irony when they ask why us atheists can't stop talking about a God we don't believe in. 

The answer is, we wouldn't, if you religious folks would only stop cramming God down everyone's throats while actively slandering those who think differently in the process.

Learn to agree to disagree, for Christ's sake. 

Granted, not all religious people are this dense. But the level headed ones often seem to get drown out by the obnoxious noise of zealot believers trying to silence the atheist anyway they know how, whether it is burning them at the stake, hunting them and jailing them, making up absurd laws that means any atheist who professes to be an atheist will be considered a terrorist of the state and arrested and given an automatic 20 prison sentence such as in Saudi Arabia, or whether it is simply religious apologists like Randal Rauser blocking atheists like me because he didn't like the fact that I called him out on his rude behavior towards, you guessed it, other atheists.

So we still have a long ways to go before we can publicly announce that we don't believe in flaggermaroos and kaliwag snicker-poodles, but I suppose that's why I created this blog, The Advocatus Atheist.

To help bring awareness to these issues.

I probably wouldn't have had to either, but the moment I became an atheist everyone seemed to either turn their backs on me or turn on me.

This blog was my defense--not only of what I don't believe--but what I DO believe.

And that, perhaps, is the more important part.

If you don't want to believe in something, more power to you. I won't stop you, and I certainly won't expect you to not believe in all the things I don't believe in either (if that makes any sense). But to you religious folk out there who may be reading this, if you ask me why I don't believe in God, well, I'll be more than happy to tell you. In fact, I invite you to do so.

Just don't expect that you know better than I do as to what I don't believe in.

Sincerely,

The Advocatus Atheist

Is Atheism More Rational than Theism?

Is atheism more rational than theism?

When I was a practicing Christian I would have simply said "No." 

But, then again, when I was a practicing Christian I didn't know very many atheists and I certainly wasn't familiar with their arguments. Heck, I wasn't very well versed in my own Christian theology. 

Yet now that I have considered both sides, I find the atheist arguments hold up better to scrutiny. If they didn't then I certainly wouldn't have become an atheist.

So then, why do I feel atheism is more rational than theism? Well, several reasons, I think.

It's true theists and atheists alike are both making assumptions as this is required for establishing any belief. 

Technically speaking beliefs are assumptions about very simple yes or no propositions. Do pigs fly? Yes, no, or maybe so? No. Okay, then. Most of us are in agreement on this question, and so most of our beliefs will conform to the answer: no, pigs don't fly. 

How do we know this? Well, we've never seen pigs fly, for one thing. Second of all, they don't have wings. And we've never seen a pig levitate or hover all on its own. So simple observation confirms our assumption, and therefore we know our belief is true. 

Almost every belief can reduce down to a yes or no proposition, thus when it comes to unknown propositions since we know that almost all beliefs are probabilistic (I say almost because properly basic beliefs may be exceptions to the rule) we can presume that disputed beliefs, like the question of God or whether or not the universe came from nothing, are either true or false, and therefore in a state of uncertainty must have a probability of being one or the other. 

So, taking a guess (or better still an educated guess), we use our experience with things like flying pigs to say, well, I know those aren't real because I've never seen one and they're not very plausible given what I know about reality. 

So what about this God business? Well, I've never seen God either, so logically speaking, I probably shouldn't believe in that one either. God doesn't match with observed reality, and it seems to me this is why theists like to say God exists outside of reality, but if so then this requires many more unfounded assumptions and so it all seems that much more less likely to be the case.

As for the verity of those beliefs we don't know either way, at least not with any certainty, we can only guess as to what their probability of being right or wrong is given the status of the evidence and quality of the logic.

This realization leads us to demand rather strict demonstrations of proof for low probability beliefs, otherwise, our beliefs simply aren't warranted, certainly not to the same degree as high probability beliefs are. 

Also, there may be certain things we have a lot of evidence for but we still might remain uncertain about. For example, consider questions about love. Is love merely the chemical and biological interplay going on within the brain or is love something more? 

Well, in all probability, love seems to be an emotional and physical condition which arises from the goings on in the brain. We have lots of evidence which demonstrates this, but because it seemingly goes against what we typically think love to be, based on our own experiences of it, we are hesitant to say 'yes, love is merely the chemical reactions happening in the brain' with any certainty. We feel inclined to say love is something more. But feelings aren't proofs. 

The fact of the matter is, the probability that love is merely a byproduct of goings on in the brain is rather high given what we currently know about the chemistry and biology of love, so we can say 'yes' with near certainty that this is what love really is. If we say 'no, love is something more', contrary to what the evidence suggests, then we are placing a higher burden of proof on ourselves to demonstrate our belief that love is something more and thereby lessen our chance of being correct.

The higher the burden of proof the more difficult it will be to prove beliefs that defy observation and evidence, thereby forcing us to make more arguments and assumptions  in order to defend such beliefs, ultimately leading to a greater probability of being mistaken.

So let's write it out another way.

Love is merely a chemical process happening in the brain + Lots of evidence which suggests this assumption is correct = high probability of being correct.

Love is something more than mere chemical processes + Little to no evidence = low probability of being correct. 

Could it be that the scientists and those of us who think that love is merely a chemical process happening in the brain are all wrong? 

Yes, that is a possibility. But because it looks as if we have the higher probability of being right about this assumption, being wrong has a low probability and we won't fret about it. Needless to say, it is up to those who feel differently to demonstrate their claims convincingly, otherwise we have no reason to go from a high probability assumption to a low probability assumption.

So why exactly do I believe, after having given it a lot of consideration, that atheism is more rational than theism? Well, my reasoning goes something like the following.

My claim is atheists assume less. For example: 

The theist assumes God x 1 = 1 God.

The atheist assumes God x 0 = 0 God.

Since the atheistic view aligns with real world (testable) observation, mainly that there is no convincing evidence for the existence of God, no additional assumptions or arguments are required. 

The theistic view does not match real world (testable) observations, however, thus additional assumptions and arguments are required to get the belief off the ground and then sustain it.

Also, the testable part of the observation is important, because if it constitutes a reality, we should be able to make the same observation under the same conditions. Unable to do so would suggests that we might be mistaken about what we think we are observing. Religious beliefs of the supernatural variety have, to my knowledge, failed this prerequisite of testability making it seem far less likely that they constitute any given reality.

Hence the atheistic position is the simpler because it assumes less and, in turn, is easy to test. So much so that we find it matches with real world observation giving us a greater confidence in the assumption that atheism reflects one aspect of the given reality we are able to test and observe.

When I say atheism is more rational it is because it doesn't make unnecessary assumptions and doesn't try to amend failed a priori assumption ad hoc with respect to God-belief. In fact, the only way to force the atheist into a position of amending their atheism is to demonstrate the metaphysics of any given religion true via the classical means of empiricism (this assumes the Venn diagram of both the metaphysical sphere and physical sphere of existence are overlapping--if not then God would be impossible to verify via any recognizable causality, which means such a metaphysics which incorporates God has to be overlapping in order for anyone to discover said God in the first place). 

Positing unjustifiable claims of certitude for undemonstrated claims which often times defy reason is, I would venture, slightly less rational than reserving one's conclusions until convincing evidence is forthcoming.

***

So in the atheistic theory there are no Gods and this matches with observation but with the theistic theory which states that there is a God we find that this does not match with observation, at least not in the way we'd commonly expect, thus on this basis that atheists aren't assuming more than they can know, deluding themselves, or being delusional (i.e. believing in things that aren't there or aren't real), makes atheists more rational; if not also more prudent.

On the other hand, if theists are seeing something atheists are not, then it is up to them (the theist) to provide the evidence and demonstrate their claims thereby justifying their belief that God exists. 

Not to do so would also make them less rational since, technically speaking, they are the ones making the positive claim which is apparently contradicted by observation.

I'll be the first to admit, however, that atheists could be wrong. But if we atheists are wrong, then common sense dictates that it should be quite easy for theists to provide undeniable evidence for the existence of God, and atheists would happily change their minds accordingly. But this clearly hasn't happened. 

Could all atheists be deluded in the same way we claim believers are? No. Why not? Because our assumptions match with observation. So we're not deluding ourselves to the truth of the matter. 

Additionally, the theist demand for the atheist to prove there are no God(s) is asking us atheists to prove a negative which is already in agreement with observation. We do not have evidence for God, we do not observer anything that could justify the belief in God, and so it is perfectly reasonable to believe, as atheists do, that there is no God. This being the case, asking us to prove what already seems to be the case given our current understanding is an irrational demand, once again making theists less rational than atheists. (Granted, only the theists making this demand would be making irrational demands, making them only slightly more irrational than theists which don't.)

Given these considerations, I think it is fair to say that atheism is more rational than theism.

Any arguments for theism, or even to counter the atheist position, would have to automatically assume more than atheism does thereby giving rise to a greater probability that the theist is wrong. After such arguments are made, it is a matter of demonstrating them and taking them to their ultimate conclusion.

I dare say though that after thousands of years of belief in God it seems that theists are still making the same variety of arguments, usually putting a new spin on them here or there (usually to better account for discoveries in science and our better understanding of the universe), but still there is no trace of God.

After two thousand years of failed theistic arguments, not to mention a complete and utter lack of demonstration (and not for a lack of trying either), the only thing we can be sure of is the atheist position has never had to assume anything more and therefore remains the more reasonable position. 

As with the above example of love, the question becomes what convincing reasons do atheists have for going from a high probability assumption to a low probability assumption with regard to their belief?

Atheism: God is not something which exists + Lots of evidence, or rather lack thereof, which suggests this assumption is correct = high probability of being correct.

Theism: God is something which exists + Little to no evidence (matches with atheists level of evidence, or rather lack thereof) = low probability of being correct. 

The answer is there are no convincing reasons to compel us atheists to go from a high probability to a low probability belief assumption, otherwise there wouldn't be such a thing as atheists. Therefore atheism remains the more reasonable position.

Atheists do not pretend to know more than they possibly can. They have no evidence, so their belief reflects this. Theists think they have ample evidence, but they continually fail to meet the burden of proof yet continue to pretend to know with certainty the things they have no proof for, therefore the theist position is less rational.

In fact, the beauty of atheism is is that the only way to truly falsify it is to successfully demonstrate God beyond a shadow of doubt so that it would convince all and every rational minded person in the existence of said God. But this has not happened--not for the Christian God--not for any god. Therefore atheism remains the more rational position to take with respect to belief in God.

The Morals of Cannibal Mice: Excerpt from my upcoming book The Swedish Fish

Excerpt from Chapter 25: Aliens, Serial Killers, and Cenobites! Oh, My!

Look, if mice can ‘morally’ eat their babies, then perhaps a creature more highly evolved than us can rape, torture and murder human beings in accord with their interests. And if this is possible, then it could be the case with Ramirez. (Randal Rauser, The Swedish Atheist, p.120.)

Again, Randal is confused about the way evolution apparently works. If, for example, a mouse evolved a moral awareness and realized that eating its young was morally wrong, that would be in accordance with evolution, because it would represent a mouse passing along its genetic traits more successfully—namely a mouse that refrains from eating its young has a better chance of propagating its genes than one which eats its young. 

But the only way to say, as Randal does, that a mouse might evolve in such a way as to suggest eating its young could somehow be morally good could only happen if eating its young somehow advanced the well-being of the mouse in such a way that directly lends itself to a greater success of propagating its genes so there would be later generations of cannibal mice for evolution to work upon--which could not happen, you see, since all the young mice would have been eaten before their cute little fury cannibal genes could have ever been passed along.(ft.111)

[Mouse breeder Cait McKeown explains that first time mothers often will eat their entire litters if the babies are sick, if the mother is stressed or if the males are not separated from the females after the appropriate given time. But this isn’t to say the mothers always eat their young. Under the right conditions, the mother may have no reason to eat her babies. See: http://www.fancymice.info/birth.htm]

How the Internet Slayed God Like a Jaeger Slaying a Kaiju

Imagine an ultimately powerful being who rules for eons over his creation. Imagine now that this seemingly invincible being was snared by a web, in this case a web which spanned an entire world, and once subdued, the creation turned on this being, like a Jaeger turning on a Kaiju, and with a million billion Occam razors they descended upon this monstrosity and relentlessly hacked away at their antiquated God until the beast died.

And this God did not die with a resounding lamentation, or even the question as to why its creation rejected it, but he died in silence. For this God was simply usurped by a more powerful deity--the bulwark of all human knowledge and ingenuity. 

Perhaps you will better recognize this God-slaying champion by it's commercial name: the Internet.

The MIT Technology Review we reports that the rise of the Internet correlates directly to the rise of atheism and nonbelief. Although correlation does not imply causation, there is more to the data than just the simple growth of Internet use and subsequent decline of faith in God. But don't take my word for it, read the findings of the study for yourself!

Saudi Arabia Welcomes You to the Seventh Century!

In Saudi Arabia, a Muslim society, where "As-salamu alaykum" or "Peace be upon you" flows so easily from their lips, in a crackdown against so-called 'political dissidents' and by decree of King Abdullah they have made it illegal to be an atheist by declaring all atheists terrorists.

What does this mean in the land where "Peace be upon you" flows so easily from their lips?

It means anyone who is caught advocating atheism, and presumably anything resembling atheistic thought such as secularism, separation of religion and politics, or even godless science will be declared a terrorist and will receive up to 20 years mandatory jail time, according to the Royal Decree 44 issued by King Abdullah.

In the land where "Peace be upon you" flows so easily from Muslim lips, the greatest threat to what you believe is what other people don't believe. 

In the land where "Peace be upon you" flows so easily from Muslim lips, it seems that if you truly wanted peace, you'd have to actually mean what you say, and ignore insular minded, self-serving, ignorant kings.

But who would dare challenge a person willing to toss you into jail to spend the rest of your life simply for what you believe--or more specifically, what you don't believe?

In Saudi Arabia, where they say things like "As-salamu alaykum" or "Peace be upon you" we know now that it is only said as a cruel joke.

To learn more on this shocking display of insular minded reasoning by Saudi Arabia, follow the link:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/saudi-arabia-declares-all-atheists-are-terrorists-in-new-law-to-crack-down-on-political-dissidents-9228389.html

God is a Parasite

Since my deconversion, I have strongly felt that the God of the Christian Bible has more in common with a parasite than anything worthy of worship. Many of my thoughts on the subject were superbly summarized in this eloquent and beautiful Matt Smith monologue from Doctor Who, The Rings of Akhaten.

Planetary: A Review

I am taking a break from blogging about religion and related philosophical questions for the rest of this month, so instead of just leaving a void of nothingness in place of your regular broadcast, I thought I'd fill it with the white-noise of my other unrelated ramblings; in this case a review of the graphic novel Planetary. 

A decade in the making, Planetary, a comic series written by the brilliant Warren Ellis and drawn by the unlimited talent of John Cassady, began in 1999--the year I graduated high school.

Due to numerous delays the series wasn't completed until 2009. But now the massive 864 page omnibus collecting the complete saga along with some bonus team-up issues and specials is now available. Needless to say, I burned a hole in my pocket faster than you could say "shut up and take my money!"

Over the past several days I read it, slowly. All I can say is the wait was well worth it. This has to be my all time favorite graphic novel. It's less pretentious and wordy than an Alan Moore comic (although I love Watchmen and V for Vendetta), and it doesn't try to be gimmicky like a Jeph Loeb story (even as Superman for All Seasons and Batman the Long Halloween rank up there with the best of them). 

If I were to describe Planetary in one word it would be: scope.

The story has scope. It takes it time, it builds up a great big mystery in layers, where each story is a stand alone piece of a larger whole, but how that piece fits into the great scheme of things one never knows. At least no until the very end. 

Scope.

To tell a story like this you have to have the whole thing in your mind. You have to take your time. Even if it takes a decade.

This is a story which stays with you long after you've read it. In fact, you can't quite view comics and graphic novels the same after reading such a story because this book sets the bar so high that everything else is always just sub-par.

I can only think of a few exceptions that rise to the challenge: Blackest Night by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis, the aforementioned Superman for All Seasons and Batman the Long Halloween by Tim Sale and Jeph Loeb, Alan Moore's Watchman, Frank Miller's Sin City, and Art Spiegelman's Maus. As subjective as comic book taste is, as most art tends to be, most will tell you the above graphic novels are the creme of the crop, plus or minus a few others.

But none of them, in my opinion, can hold a candle to Planetary.

Planetary is hard sci-fi, but it has a dry humor and a charm to it that dulls the otherwise razor like edge to the weight of the story. The characters are charming, original, and well rendered. 

In fact, the stand alone stories which expertly build into an epic climax is so rewarding that you find yourself going back to re-read everything and see how it all fits together. Precise. A book with scope.

I've rarely felt so rewarded by a book, graphic novel or otherwise, once I've closed the last page. That sense of gratification, of having gone on a journey through splendid worlds that blend the best of 50's science fiction with modern concepts like quantum foam and the multiverse so well that it's hard not to fall into the story, as if you were really there watching things unfold, between the empty spaces of reality--or the bleed, as Elijah Snow would inform us.

But all this is fine and dandy. You're still probably wondering what is Planetary, exactly?

It's a story about a mysterious super-powered man named Elijah Snow, who suffers a bout of amnesia when he suddenly is contacted by a secret archaeological agency named Planetary. Planetary's field archaeologists include Jakita Wagner, a woman with Wonder Woman like strength, and an informational black hole named Drums, who can speak to machines and even see the digital code of genuine magic. 

Recruiting Elijah Snow, the three investigate a series of strange and bizarre artifacts, including a multi-dimensional space craft, ghosts, an ancient society of superhuman guardians, a sleeping quantum computer brain, a radioactive woman, giant ants each the size of a city bus, alien beings, time travel, and many other strange and wondrous things.

Behind all this weirdness is an even more secret and strange group who seem to be pulling all the strings as they shape the course of human history. A group simply known as "The Four."

And, well, that's as much as I feel comfortable telling, since the rest is, as River Song would say, spoilers.

If you get a chance, I highly recommend you read Planetary. Even if you're not a fan of comics, there is something unquestionably special here.