Rev. William Cwirla comments on another scathing critique of the new atheists, this time from Charlotte Allen, writing in the LA Times, no less. In the course of his discussion, Rev. Cwirla lists the five basic arguments against the existence of God, which, when you put them like this, are exceedingly weak and illogical:
1. The existence of God can’t be proven scientifically, therefore there is no God.
2. Religious people do bad things, therefore there is no God.
3. No one has yet to convince me there is a God, therefore there is no God.
4. The world sucks, therefore there is no God.
5. Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy don’t exist, therefore there is no God.
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Here are the logical fallacies involved. If I did not include one please add to the list.
#1 Appeal to Ignorance-Basically, if one cannot prove God scientifically then God does not exist. Also, it commits the invincible ignorance fallacy. Basically, no evidence would be sufficient to change their mind because God could never exist. This is the root of all fanaticism, that is it cannot be debunked. #3 commits the same logical fallacy.
#2 commits the hasty generalization fallacy. Atheists people do bad things does that mean God exists? No. It means that humans are sinners. This is commonly known as the “you too” fallacy because it attacks the person who in this case believes in God, but not the argument God exists.
#3 see #1 (invincible ignorance fallacy)
#4 post hoc, ergo propter hoc (“after this, therefore because of this”)- Simply, the argument attributes the world’s unpleasantness to God. It also ignores other that another cause. Also, it is a false dilemma because there is no other choice.
#5 See #1 Appeal to Ignorance. Also, ignoring the disproof fallacy. In essence, it disproves something that is not in question, but then relates it to God.
Sounds like New Atheists need to study the history of their Religion.
Their fathers have already been answered, and found wanting.
Trey-
I’m not sure I understand your counter to argument 4. My understanding is that the argument isn’t attributing anything to a non-existent God (in their view). Rather, they define what a God would be (idolatry) and how the world would be if their idol existed; they then conclude that because the world doesn’t fit that theory, the “God” they originally postulated doesn’t exist.
This is obviously a false argument, and I think you made that point with the “false dilemma” line–it ignores the possibility of a different God. I’m just not sure how it “attributes the world’s unpleasantness to God”.
Let the esteeemed reader be aware that these are my somewhat tongue-in-cheek reductive paraphrases of positions, and therefore potential “straw men” (to cite another fallacy) in their own right. However, I believe they accurately describe the arguments of the celebrity pop atheists cited in the article. #1 and #5 belong to Richard Dawkins. #2 is the position of Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchins. #3 is the so-called “weak (passive) atheist” position employed by anyone who wants to beg the God-question. #4 is a blunt paraphrase of the issue of “theodicy” and the problem of suffering and evil which everyone likes to use as though they were the first to discover it.
What may be inaccurate is the word “therefore.” No atheist argues this directly from premise to conclusion. Most thinking atheists are much more nuanced than that, and to do proper justice to their logic, one would have to chart out the entire syllogism.
For example, Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion argues in this fashion:
1. All that exists can be known through scientific study.
2. God cannot be known through scientific study.
3. Therefore, God does not exist.
Put this way, the fallacy is in the first statement and begs the question by anticipating the conclusion.
To be fair, Dawkins says that the existence of a god is “highly improbable” to “nearly impossible.” He rates himself a 7 on his 1 to 8 religiosity scale, leaving himself 1 shy of an absolute atheist. I guess everyone but Chris Hitchins has to hedge their God bet in some fashion.
As a scientist, statements like those of Dawkins never fail to amaze me – the claims of intelectual omnipotence is breathtaking.
Furthermore, I have seen no serious enagement by these atheist aoplogists with issues like Godel’s Incompleteness Theorems (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_incompleteness_theorems), and the philosophical fall out from these.
Basically, Dawkins channels a certain Logical Positivism reminscent of late-nineteenth century optimistic Scientific utopianism, an outdated philosophy that has been rejected by most philosophers. Logical Positivism provided the philosophical stage for Hilbert’s Program (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert%27s_program), which collapsed under Godel’s Incompleteness Theorems.
All to say that Dawkins needs to go back to school….
#5 EconJeff
You are right the post hoc doesn’t work, it should be the if then fallacy. It seems they arguing that because the world is unpleasant God could not exist because if God did exist the world would be pleasant. I think it is a if-then fallacy as follows:
God exist, thus the world is blissful
The world sucks, thus God does not exist, which is the negation and affirming of the above statement.
Of course, the reason the “world sucks” is because of the rebellion of man. These are fatuous arguments.
What do you think?
As much as I like Christopher Hitchens–a dynamic writer, entertaining, and frankly, I agree with him on a number of issues–these five topics tend to be Hitchens’ key topics. They’re emotive, short on depth, and don’t really engage in a solid intellectual digestion of the atheist/Christian issues at hand.
There are plenty of intelligent atheists in the world today, and they do a disservice by emphasizing shallow arguments. But, as Christians, we should not dismiss atheists who present solid (but ultimately flawed) arguments against the faith.
Trey-
I agree with you that these arguments are mostly silly. I would re-word your re-wording of number 4, though, to: “If God exists, then the world will be blissful; since the world sucks, God cannot exist.”
As I indicated before, this amounts to nothing more than a perverse form of idolatry where you create your own god just to demolish it.
It completely ignores the given reason for a non-perfect world (man’s rebellion, as you point out). Which, I guess goes back to the ignorance you argue, to some extent.
Dawkins has a strange statement he loves to repeat, thinking it is profound: “A universe with a god would be a completely different kind of universe.” Whatever that means.
I agree that Hitchins is a good writer. Ironically, as a Lutheran, I find myself agreeing with much of his critique of Christianity. Like the others, however, he tends to take the “worst of” and apply it to everyone as a guilt by association.
I think the chief problem with Dawkins/Harris/Hitchens/Dennett is that they really haven’t thought about the issue of God; they are simply justifying their presupposed atheism. As Stanley Fish points out, there are no objective players in the God game.
wcwirla at #6; you put it well about Dawkins begging the question in argument number 1. He consistently relies on a strictly scientific method of inquiry and is surprised when he only discovers empirical data. I think this is also why he has a problem when someone calls God the ‘uncaused cause.’
However, I do think the “tongue-in-cheek” example of the problem of evil (argument number four) carries a bit more weight. Of course it does not account for the Biblical understanding of the Fall and it is important to point out how much evil is directly responsible to mankind. Nonetheless, an atheist could accept this point but then question why did God originally allow mankind to rebel? From this it is typical for people to respond that mankind would not be give the free choice and if they were not free then they could not love God sincerely (Milton in Paradise Lost) or that God’s infinite goodness allows evil to exist to create good (Augustine and Aquinas).
But I think this begins to compromise God’s omnipotence, omniscience, or omnibenevolence. Would it be impossible for God to create a world where creatures could sincerely love God and not be free to chose to disobey? Does God need to allow evil to exist to create good?
I have wondered how an atheist using this argument would define evil though, as most monotheists agree with Augustine that it is nothing, i.e., the absence of something; evil depends on goodness for its existence.
The atheist does have a problem in defining good and evil. Whose moral law is he going to use? If the world is an accident; an undesigned result of blind, irrational forces or matter – why call anything good or evil? People are just dancing to their DNA. Which, interestingly seems to be the argument of many in favor of the homosexual agenda. [i.e. they were born that way, can't help themselves]. If such is the case – one’s moral evaluation of this world is completely relative and a matter of personal taste. It’s ludicrous to speak of a problem of evil from such a platform.
Jarod #12 – I am an atheist who has considered the Biblical concept of the fall, and I don’t find it persuasive for many of the reasons you have outlined.
I don’t believe in heaven, but I assume you do. Do you think there will be sin and rebellion in heaven? If not, why not?
If the blood redemption is going to provide post-mortem benefits, continually cleansing the sinful acts of what are (even in heaven) still human souls, it would seem to reflect a lack of foresight on God’s part not to have bestowed that redemption pre-Adam and saved us all the drama.
If we (well, you) are to be transformed into sinless creatures of light, what was the point of inventing these meat bags in the first place? Instead of creating “the heaven and the earth,” why not stop at the point of perfection, populate it with the celestial creatures of eternity, and once again spare us all the drama?
I began by saying I was an atheist, but what that really means is that I don’t believe an all-good, all-knowing, all-powerful being which created the universe is logically compatible with the universe in which I find myself. I could believe in a god which is not absolutely good, or which has the ability to create universes but not to control every detail of such creations, or which creates and then “loses track” of its creations (much as I may forget where I put this post, and wander off to play in some other cybercorner). All-powerful, all-knowing, and strictly benevolent just doesn’t mesh with a world in which babies are drowned in their cribs by tsunamis. Killing innocent babies because of some age-old grudge over a piece of fruit is not the act of a benevolent being.
Jerry M # 13 -
As an atheist, I don’t have any more difficulty assessing right and wrong than you do. I use my evolved sense of empathy to guide my assessments, and I suspect you do too.
You may CLAIM you’re using some more permanent, more absolute standard, but when the rubber hits the road, you probably aren’t. The Bible forbids the eating of shellfish and the wearing of mixed fabrics, but it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that you still eat shrimp or wear blended shirts.
The Bible tells you to give away all your possessions, but you’re still typing on a computer. Unless you write all your comments from the public library, you’re choosing to ignore what the Bible says in this instance too.
If your right eye offends you, do you pluck it out? No, that would be wrong, wouldn’t it? And do you know why?
Does the Bible prohibit you from cutting in line? No? But you don’t do it, do you? Empathy.
Now, you may say the Bible DOES prohibit you from cutting in line – “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” And since you wouldn’t want people cutting in front of you, you’ll refrain from cutting in front of them.
But I’m guessing from your comments about “the gay agenda” that you may be one of those “defense of marriage” folks who doesn’t think the state should allow same-sex marriages. So there’s one case where your empathy — your “do unto others” — breaks down, because you wouldn’t want anyone telling you you couldn’t marry the person you were in love with.
There was a time when mixed-race couples faced the same discrimination, and that is no longer the law of the land, not because the Bible or the voice of God said that mixed-race couples were okay, but simply because people’s evolving sense of fairness molded by empathy convinced them it was wrong.
Humans, as a race, are always making it up as we go. Yes, it is relative, which means we can adapt to the constantly changing world into which we’re being born.
Constructing another person’s argument in an unfavorable way is obviously straw manning.
This is foolish.