LabRat from the Atomic Nerds put up this post. Apparently a blog called Loving Christ With Your Mind “asked” 15 questions to atheists about why they were atheists in light of these questions. Most of these questions were either a form of logical fallacy or based on a logical fallacy. I mailed the article to my brother (aka The Brother / NetThrall) and expected to answer the list next week. (I really needed the weekend off). Fortunately, The Brother sent me his answers. The Brother and I have very similar views on most of these questions. On those we don’t, I’ve included my comments.

From The Brother:

Oh Holy Bullshit…

So you got to read a nice atheist’s responses to these questions. Let get a little more “anti-theist” and a lot less polite, shall we?

Also, I’ve had to spend a lot of time writing this response. Probably more that it took to author the original questions. This is one of the benefits that the religious and pseudoscience advocates have. It takes a lot less work to dump a bucket of bullshit on the ground and kick it around than it does to clean it up…

1. Why are atheists so obsessed with religion?
If life were meaningless and ends at the grave, why even bother. If life is just a monopoly game that’s going to be put up, why even try to take the property and money of others (in a metaphoric sense, of course)? It doesn’t make much sense. Given atheism, nothing really matters since it’s not going to last. So, again I ask you, why bother with religion and its negative effects?

Answer 1: Because I’m still alive. This predilection of theist constantly, either directly or in this case obliquely, telling atheists to “shut up”. Why bother with religion? Because religion insists on bothering with me. And my family. And my friends. And my country. And every living person on the planet.

I know[1] that I only have one shot at life. There is nothing after this one life that I have and it is my responsibility to interact with other living creatures in as positive a manner as possible. I don’t get a do-over (reincarnation), I don’t get a second round (afterlife), I only have this short span to make the best of my life and others’ lives as well.

So why bother with religion? ‘Cause it picked the fight with me and the rest of humanity, and I’m just trying to mitigate the harm it does.

2. Why are atheists so obsessed with monotheistic religions?
Why only the big three? If all religions are equally false, why only bother with Christianity, Judaism, and Islam? What about Hinduism or deism? Again, it doesn’t make much sense. Perhaps there’s a reason that atheists are so amazingly obsessed with Christianity?

Answer 2: Do you involve yourself with German politics? Argentinian politics? Why not? Because you don’t live there, because it isn’t what is constantly, every freaking day, in your face. The Abrahamic religions are everywhere in the U.S., which is where I happen to reside. I argue against religion, but more I argue against faith. Faith is the concept of belief without, or often against, reason and evidence. And “because I feel it is true” isn’t evidence.

Let’s turn this around. Why do only argue against the atheists that are questioning Christianity? Why aren’t you also arguing against the ones in India that call bullshit on Hinduism? Why don’t you defend Islam against those who call it a barbaric cult and list the ways it poisons societies and denigrates half the human race?

I’m not amazingly obsessed with Christianity, but if, to put it metaphorically, the only thing to drink in the house, that’s what I’m drinking most of time.

3. How do atheists explain the beginning of the universe?
Often atheists have pointed to the Big Bang to justify their worldview, but the Big Bang actually proves theism. Here’s a simple syllogism:
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause
2. The universe began to exist
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.
There is great evidence for the Big Bang. We can be led to it by first stating this fact: The universe is either eternal, or it is not. If it’s not, than my argument is scientifically supported. The universe cannot be eternal because of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which states that energy is running out. If the universe is eternal, it should’ve run out a long time ago. The Big Bang proves God because it proves the universe came into being from nothing, and nothing cannot create nothing, for it is nothing. Therefore, Something must have caused the Big Bang. So how do you explain away this evidence for the existence of God?

Answer 3: Let’s rephrase this to what is actually being stated: “There has to be a god because I can’t understand the science.”

Quick question: If whatever exists has to have a cause, then what caused your god?

But beyond that, I may not know what may have been the genesis of the perceivable universe, but neither do you, and stating by fiat the “it was god” doesn’t really fix the problem, now does it? All you are doing is labeling your “I don’t know” as “god” and stopping there instead of continuing to ask questions. The whole “god did it” argument is intellectual laziness. You either don’t want to do the work to find out and don’t want to be bothered with even thinking about it.

Also, you don’t get to change the Second Law of Thermodynamics to any random bullshit to make some fabricated argument. What it really states is that a closed system (i.e. no energy is getting added to the system) will trend to maximum entropy (lack of ordered state). That does not equal “running out of energy”.

So, in the end, there is no “evidence of god” to explain away, just an unanswered (and possibly unanswerable) question about the origin of the universe that cosmologists and other scientists keep working at instead of getting bored, flipping the table like a child and shouting “god did it!”.

4. How do atheists explain away objective moral values?

Objective moral values are ones that are independent of human thought. If God doesn’t exist, they wouldn’t exist either. There’d be no one in charge to make a universal standard of right and wrong. It’d simply be a matter or opinion. But moral relativism fails. For one, it says that moral claims are only a matter of opinion but it asserts that as a fact. Also, we know things such as rape, murder, and child abuse are wrong, and if everyone agreed that they were right, they’d still be wrong. We know things are objectively wrong because we feel guilt when we do what is wrong; If morality was just our opinion, we wouldn’t feel guilty, for we would be doing what is right for us. So how do atheists justify the fact of objective morality?

Answer 4: Object moral values do not exist. Morality is a social and cultural construct influenced on a very deep level by our biology and the evolution that molded it. Your arguments for “objective moral values” are rubbish. Your own holy book advocates the exact things you claim are objectively wrong – rape, murder, and child abuse. Let’s add to that genocide and slavery even though you didn’t include those, but I’d call those morally wrong.

And I’d call them wrong because my society, my culture, and my philosophy declares that those are wrong. Moreover, they are reprehensible.

Derek Ward: Understanding there is no objective morals is not the same as saying one can’t judge an act to be wrong and take action against it. I understand that “honor killings” in many Islamic and Steppe cultures is perfectly moral in their worldview. That doesn’t stop me from decrying them and backing efforts to stop them.

5. How do materialists justify immaterial realities?

Logic, math, morality, and other things such as free will, human dignity, and time exist. These things are all immaterial. We can’t put the number 7 or the Law of Noncontradiction in a test tube. But if God doesn’t exist, matter would be all there is, since there’d be nothing to be the foundation of immaterial things. Everything would come through by matter, and thus, be matter. How can atheists give an answer to this argument?

Answer 5: What of gobbledygook is an “immaterial reality”? Do you mean mental constructs that are utilized by humans to understand the universe and how to live in it?

Logic and math are some of the tools that we humans use to wrap our finite minds around it and better understand it. Morality I’ve discussed above, but it, human dignity, and free will are mental constructs, not some magical other-place that we tap into with some specialness of being humans. And time is a perceived aspect of the universe.

And that crap about “without god matter would be all that exists”? That’s a declaration of bullshit and not an actual, provable statement. Technically, the universe is all that exists. Matter is just congealed energy. Wikipedia is free – go use it.

Derek Ward: – To say that certain “immaterial” constructs can’t be tested is bullshit. Mathematics and logic can be tested to see if they produce consistent and reproducible answers. If they couldn’t, the technology we built to leverage natural forces to our advantage wouldn’t work. Free will is constantly being tested to determine if it exists biologically or if it is just another mental construct.

6. How do atheists explain the existence of the universe?

If atheism is true, there isn’t a reason for anything. It’s all an accident. There isn’t any purpose. But if there weren’t a purpose for anything, how do things exist? If God does not exist, the universe would have no meaning for its existence, and would, thus, not exist. So how can we living in a universe that both exists and has no reason for its existence?

Answer 6: You confuse lack of purpose with ability to exist. Something not having a purpose does not automatically mean it can’t exist. Second, even if I accepted the concept that the universe has a purpose, that doesn’t mean that your, or any, god exists. One does not automatically lead to the other.

But I really don’t believe there is a “reason” the universe exists. It doesn’t scare me that there isn’t some magical sky-daddy that has some master plan and is using me as an ignorant puppet.

7. How do you explain away circumstantial evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus?

Here are just two facts that help lead up to the conclusion that Christ is risen: 1. The early Christians died for their belief that He rose from the dead. You don’t die for what you know is a lie. No one does, and no one ever could. 2. Christianity started in Jerusalem. If the tomb weren’t empty, the Jewish pharisees could’ve proved it and ended the Christian movement. But they didn’t. How can an atheistic worldview explain this?

Answer 7: How do you explain away all of the non-circumstantial evidence that people neither rise form the dead nor that resurrection stories are common in mythologies? I don’t “explain away” (what a belittling, presupposing phrase) anything. I flat out state that there is no credible evidence of a resurrection taking place in the first place.

Let’s also tackle your two “facts”.
1. The Heaven’s Gate cult died for their belief that a alien spaceship was following the comet Hale-Bopp. They had faith, faith that was so strong they were willing to die for it. That doesn’t mean they were right. People die for what they believe all the time, regardless if that belief is supported by faith or facts. Just because early Christians died for their beliefs doesn’t mean they were right.
2. Where Christianity started is irrelevant. Why the hell is that sentence even there? Anyways, all an empty tomb means is that there is an empty tomb. Anyone can roll a rock out of the way and run off with a body. And what is more likely, that the body was stolen or moved and the early, pre-scientific Christian believers declared it to some magical occurrence (maybe even resurrection!) or everything we now know about biology and physics wasn’t true for one person?

Derek Ward: How do we know that the Pharisees didn’t try and prove them wrong and the early Christians ignored the evidence? Humans are remarkably good at ignoring evidence that doesn’t match their worldview. As to the actual empty tomb, we don’t because the evidence of the entire event is scanty outside of the Gospels (which aren’t what I would call reliable sources, see answer 8 below).

8. If the gospels are just pieces of historical fiction, why are there embarrassing details in there?

Jesus being accused of being a demon. A prostitute wiping Jesus’ feet, which was seen as a sexual approach. Peter being called “Satan” and denying Jesus three times. Jews being told to pay taxes to the Roman empire. One criteria of finding a historical truth is to see if the text is embarrassing to the writer. If it is, they probably didn’t make it up. Could you clear this up for me?

Answer 8: Your gospels can’t even agree with themselves about what actually happened and you expect me to be concerned about some “embarrassing details”?

The clearest response I have heard to this is (not my words):
1. Alien abductees must be telling the truth because they told embarrassing stories about being probed in the “nether regions.”
2. “Rocky” must really exist because he embarrassingly gets the crap kicked out of him in the early rounds of every boxing match.
3. “Han Solo” must really exist because he embarrassingly gets himself locked up in a cryogenic box for a few years.

9. If we are just matter, and not souls, why would some atheists support life-sentences?

The matter in our body is totally changed out every seven years. If Cartesian dualism—a view I embrace—is false, and we are just matter, that means I am not the same person as I was seven years ago. And this is also true for a criminal.The justice system is completely futile if atheism is true. If matter is who we are, why don’t we change as our matter changes?

Answer 9: First, the whole “body it totally changed out every seven years” is an urban myth and wrong, and because it is wrong your argument/question is without basis.

HOWEVER: Let’s tackle your dualism and life-sentence issue anyways. Our “minds” are products of our brains – if it wasn’t then LSD wouldn’t work and brain damage wouldn’t affect the mind. Our minds can learn from past experience, and incarceration is supposed to act as negative reinforcement and rehabilitation, as well as keeping dangerous people away from society. The more heinous the actions, the longer the incarceration. If the actions are sufficiently heinous and rehabilitation is not considered possible then we lock them away until they die.

So why don’t we just kill them? As a species we have evolved to consider life special and it should only be forcibly taken away under extreme circumstances. The bar for “extreme circumstances” has been continually raising for centuries – what used to be considered acceptable grounds for killing someone is not longer so in many circumstances. And if the actions of the criminal do not cross the threshold a society has into “extreme circumstances”, then the only option left is life imprisonment.

Derek Ward: There is also the maxim that we put people in prison not only to protect society from those people, but to protect society from itself. Incarceration by the justice system is better than the endless circle of vendetta that preceded it.

10. Why do so many atheists deny historical facts?

The common view today that most atheists hold is that Jesus didn’t exist. But Jesus did exist. How do I know this? Historically reliable sources such as Josephus, Tacitus, Lucian, the Jewish Talmud, and Pliny the Younger wrote about Jesus. So why do atheists hold to the Christ-myth hypothesis in spite of what we know through historical facts?

Answer 10: Why do so many theists deny both historical and scientific facts?

As for why a lot of atheists hold to the Christ-myth hypothesis is probably a lack of investigation into the matter and up to date information on the subject. It was an argument that was proposed and was never as publicly shot down as it was proposed.

Welcome to our world where so often crap hypotheses are tossed out as facts and then when the crap is refuted it is almost impossible to get the public aware of the correction. Its called dealing with humans, and atheists are as human as theists.

Derek Ward: There is a surprising dearth of Roman records from Palestine about the events that supposedly took place and the actions of a “renegade rabbi” named Jesus. For all we know Jesus was an allegorical construct of multiple rabbis preaching against the establishment of the time, much as Plato’s use of Atlantis was allegorical rather than factual.

11. Why do most atheists, such as Richard Dawkins and Daniel Denette, equivocate evolution with atheism?

Evolution does not prove God exists, nor does it prove God doesn’t exist. Darwin did not kill God. Most Christians accept evolution. Why, then, do so many atheists point to evolution as if it disproves Christianity?

Answer 11: I think you have things a bit backwards, at least in my anecdotal experience, as I have always sees it being the theists who tie evolution to atheism.

Hmmm… how to put this: You are talking about two different fights. One is atheism vs. theism. The other is science vs. fantasy. Usually (but not always) the theists and spiritualists are on the side of fantasy (you have to believe in things not backed up with evidence to have faith) and the atheists are usually (but not always) on the side of science. And it is the battle of science vs. fantasy where one of the most public fights is evolution vs. creationism (or whatever fancy title creationists have made up for it this year). It is also a fight where one side is decidedly religious (creationism) and the other side’s most vocal proponents also happen to be atheists.

There are a lot of other science vs. fantasy battles out there (homeopathy, chiropractic, energy healing, etc.) and there are theists and atheists on both sides.

12. Why don’t atheists actually question everything?

They’re always advocating skepticism, but fail to question their own views, including that of skepticism. If we should doubt everything, why not doubt atheism?

Answer 12: There is a difference between atheism (lack of a belief in gods) and skepticism (requiring evidence and not accepting things without question). Skepticism about religion and god can (and often does) lead a person to atheism, but I’m positive there are lots of people who have been skeptical of religion and not become atheists (all the stories of people overcoming a “crisis of faith”).

Your insinuation, however, that skeptics don’t question their own views is complete crap. We hold the views we have because, for many things, we didn’t just accept the first option out of hand and actually questioned and investigated which one seemed the most likely. And those viewpoints we have arrived at via skepticism (and those we haven’t examined yet) should always be open to debate.

But don’t just whine that you don’t like our decisions we arrived at using the process of skepticism. Either bring a good argument or GTFO.

And feel free to question whether or not atheism is reasonable against alternative options. I could neither stop or want to prevent you from doing so. Pretty much every atheist has and came to the conclusion that atheism is the most likely correct answer.

13. Where do rights come from?

Most atheists are supporters of the gay rights movement, and are furious when someone denies a homosexual of his or her rights just because of their sexual orientation. So it’s pretty clear that atheists believe inalienable rights exist. But where do they come from? How can they be explained naturally?

Answer 13: Rights are a social agreement. We in the U.S. agree as a society that people have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But those are a construct of our society. There are a lot of other societies that don’t believe or agree that all people have the right to liberty or many other things we consider “rights”.

There are only two truly natural rights that I can think of: starve and die. Every other right is granted by society and enforced and defended by social pressure (ostracism, force of arms, etc.). Without society, the only thing that can’t be taken away from you is the ability to starve and die.

Bleak, sure, but there is a reason we have society. The universe doesn’t care about our happiness. The universe doesn’t do anything but exist.

Derek Ward: I’m a little different from my brother on this. Rights come from being a sentient creature. They are not granted by deity or government. A person’s rights may be surrendered by social contract or taken away by government, but that does not invalidate their existence. Rights are based in liberty, a state in which has been demonstrated to be where humans succeed at the highest rate.

14. How can there be no objective evil, but religion causes it?

A top argument in the atheist arsenal is that religion causes evil. This doesn’t prove a thing, for Pythagoras caused evil but no one doubts that a^2 + b^2 = c^2. But when atheists argue against religion by pointing out its sins, they assume that objective morality exists. If morality were a matter of opinion, there’d be no point in asserting it as a fact. So why do atheists use religious evil to try to disprove theism, when it actually does the opposite?

Answer 14: I’m running out of vitriol and you are running out of coherence. “for Pythagoras caused evil”?

First: We covered “evil” under morality (your question #4 above). Morality is deciding between what is “good” and “evil”. With no objective morals/morality, there is no objective evil.

Second: Religion is evil because of the harm it willfully causes, and one of the biggest indicators of “evil” in my moral code is intentionally causing harm. Pointing out the harm that religion does is not assuming objective morality, it is assuming a moral code shared by all of participants in the discussion.

And pointing out that religion is evil does not disprove theism. The lack of evidence for a god disproves theism.

15. Why are there no good reasons to believe atheism is true?

Whenever I ask an atheist to disprove God, they can’t do it. When something is true, there are good reasons to think it is true. But there are no good reasons to believe God does not exist. So why do non-believers count me as irrational when I embrace theism?

Answer 15: Because you won’t listen to them. I’ll ask you: What good reasons are there for belief without evidence?

What separates imagination from reality other than evidence that can be replicated? The supernatural is an ever-vanishing hole in our scientific understanding of reality. There has never been an effect or event where the supernatural explanation was better than the scientific one. Not a single one. The supernatural explanation is a long-winded, fearful way of running away from saying “I don’t know”.

And your god is a supernatural entity.

Conclusion

If we are to take the claim “question everything” as a serious one, we should question atheism. After much doubt, we are able to find that Christianity offers better answers. If you are a doubting Christian, I suggest you to 1. Find answers to your doubts (please comment if you have any) and 2. Start doubting atheism. Atheism cannot offer credible answers to my fifteen doubts. Therefore, I am perfectly rational as a believer in God.

Answer: Conclusion:
Questioning everything, specifically religion, leads me to atheism. Atheism doesn’t have to explain anything. It is the starting position. It is religion that tries to explain events and occurrences. Atheism is saying “the sky is blue” and religion is the one coming in and going “no, really its green because sky-dictator likes green but knows that blue is more pleasing to our eye to magically makes it look blue to us, but he only told his special friends this way in the past and then they told us”.

Atheists became atheists because they called bullshit on all the crap religion threw at them and when the threw away all that crap they were left with atheism.

Anyone who prides themselves on faith, defined as “belief without evidence”, does not get to call themselves “perfectly rational”, no matter how much crap they throw around the room.

Footnotes:

[1] Let’s cover this now, since I’ll probably say “I know” several times in this piece. Do I know as an immutable fact anything that I write here? Unless its my opinion, no I do not. HOWEVER, I do have a high level of confidence which is based on the research, contemplation, internal and external debate that what I’m saying is correct. I am always open to rational, civil debate and with arguments and evidence I am willing to change my mind. So accept that I am using “knowing” with “have a high level of confidence but am open to correction with sufficient evidence” and substitute as needed.

[2] And if you answer with “well then who created the laws of nature?” then you are being deliberately ignorant and need to go read up on what is a physical law, which is often called a law of nature.