10 Questions For Every Atheist

Ah todaychristian, and all the other sibling sites that try and defend the Christian belief system. If it weren't for you, I'd have more of my fiction book and blogs done... oh well

Today I am answering the seemingly honest questions below;
http://todaychristian.net/10-questions-every-atheist/

1.       How Did You Become an Atheist?
Rational honest personal inquiry into what I believed and why, I am writing a book and a passage to another book on this, so expect it fleshed out in future. But that is the short of it.

2.       What happens when we die?
What happened before you where born? Curtain close, the end basically.

3.       What if you’re wrong? And there is a Heaven? And there is a HELL!
This is pascals wager, I have answered it in this blog several times. Basically it boils down to if I am wrong I am wrong and will accept my error. If God is truly good then he/she will see the good life I led with the evidence I had and not be annoyed by the lack of belief I had due to available evidence.

4.       Without God, where do you get your morality from?
Answered this one before too, but really WITH God, where do religious people get it from, it would seem there God's morality is very flawed. I am not just good without religion, but in-spite of it.

5.       If there is no God, can we do what we want? Are we free to murder and rape? While good deeds are unrewarded?
No we can't do what we want. Society has rules, you break those rules and you are removed from society. Good deeds are there own reward was what I was always taught as a child, if you are asking for a reward you are ultimately doing it for very selfish reasons, is that what you want me to describe heaven as, then so-be-it.

6.       If there is no god, how does your life have any meaning?
Yes, so much. Love, my children, my job, my friends, my writing, my reading. I see meaning in so many things, sometimes it is overwhelming, I don't need an external artificial source for this meaning.

7.       Where did the universe come from?Everything so far points to natural causes. We may never know; I'd rather have unanswerable questions than unquestionable answers.

8.       What about miracles? What all the people who claim to have a connection with Jesus? What about those who claim to have seen saints or angels?
What about them, what about all the people who claim to have a connection with Allah, Shiva, Vishnu, Thor, Woden, what about those who claim to have seen Shiva or Vishnu?

9.       What’s your view of Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris?
Very good writers, experts in their fields, but ultimately humans, with human failings. I'd rather take the advice of one of them though, one that is willing to revise there position on anything given sufficient evidence, over someone who wouldn't.

10.   If there is no God, then why does every society have a religion?
This is demonstrably false, the word atheist is of Greek origin, with atheistic writings dating back before the supposed time of Jesus, and tribes and societal groups with no god concept. Even if I grant this as true, so what, almost every society that ever existed has engaged in War, does that make it right?

Response - Ten quick responses to atheist claims

Response to http://www.christiantoday.com/article/ten.quick.responses.to.atheist.claims/41439.htm (not going to link it as I don't want to give them the traffic :P )

I can't believe supposedly educated philosophers have used these arguments in an attempt to answer atheist questions, I guess it was christiantoday's writer Heather Tomlinson who did and not Prof Lennox, but Lennox is a believer so he probably would use these or similar. I am going to try and go through these quick as I have better things to do, movie with the kids tomorrow.

1) You don't believe in Zeus, Thor and all the other gods. I just go one god more than you, and reject the Christian God.

The first line in rejecting this is very facile, so what if Thor isn't compatible wit the bible, that doesn't nor ever could detract from its truth, if there was any.
The real point of this argument is that most Christians will claim that these Gods were made up with no reason why, usually due to someone has told them they are made up. If they have any level of skepticism that prevents them from believing in these gods they will not apply the same level of skepticism to their own God.
They quote Prof Lennox, who being a Christian would argue of course due to the complexity of the eternal nature of the Christian God he trumps the "simpler" story of the created Gods, this isn't an argument against a created God, it is just baseless assertion.

2) Science has explained everything, and it doesn't include God.
This is an argument from ignorance. Science can't (at present) explain ethics or beauty, therefore God is missing loads of steps.

Science explains the origins of the universe, religion gives people hope who don't have the intellectual fortitude to say they don't know.

3) Science is opposed to God.
I don't know if I have heard many people say this, there are religious scientists. Science follows naturalism, that there is a natural explanation for a phenomenon and then endeavors to find it, not once has this explanation been magical or supernatural... that doesn't mean it can't happen, but it isn't looking good.
There are issues with an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient God of being logically valid. You can always argue the incoherent God is outside logic, but that is destroying any argument you could make as you are arguing against using the very logic you are using.

4) You can't prove that there is a God.
I agree with Lennox here, you can't "prove" it, in the mathematical definition. Of course I don't think you can do it in the reasonable doubt definition either. Some of the arguments Lennox uses here I have rebutted before, especially the WLC ones. The slighlty new ones are the argument from personal revelation (people have witnessed miracles), which is easily countered with people have seen Elvis since his death, probably as many non-Christians have seen miracles they attribute to their religion, and UFO witnesses: Witness testimony is at best biased and untrue and worst a complete mental fabrication knowing or unknowingly to make the person the center of a attention. This is best summed up with anecdote != evidence (that symbol in the middle means does not equal).
The other argument is from the Gospels, which for all we know where once considered a work of fiction or allegory, then there is the fact that they were witness testimony, not only written down near the event but in some parts of the bible almost a hundred years later.
So yeah you can't prove there is a God, and can't prove a negative, but the balance of probability doesn't favor one at this stage.

5) Faith is believing without any evidence.
Maybe Lennox doesn't know his bible;  "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Hebrews 11:1.
Faith is not belief with evidence, we already have a word for that knowledge. Again quoting the Gospels that are of unknown authors and undefinitive veracity doesn't sway anyone. To quote Thomas Paine "To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture."

6) Faith is a delusion. I'd no more believe in God than I would in the Easter Bunny, Father Christmas or the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
I don't think the people Lennox is talking about here are afraid of the light, these are the kind of people who would spend there entire life on an issue with a theory, and throw it out the window at the first strong sign of evidence to its contrary. I think most atheists I know would be intellectually honest enough to believe in God if he showed up and provided some proof, or if some decent evidence actually came to light.
I don't know if there are many Christians who would throw away their beliefs if they found them wanting, because they wouldn't be Christians long.
I know some atheists that wish a God did exist that answered prayers and actually had a plan for them, it isn't wish fulfillment if you don't have that wish.

7) Christianity claims to be true, but there loads of denominations and they all disagree with each other, so it must be false.
This is more to the point that you think that an omnipotent being could make a religion that would appeal to all, if God is so powerless that 10,000 religions to appeal to the 10,000 styles of worshiper rather than 1 that claims the monopoly on truth. The issue with the many denominations is many (see most) will claim that the others are wrong, and that the one you are currently in has the monopoly on truth and the other denominations believers are going to hell. They can't all be right with this monopolistic behavior, but they could all be wrong. Add these 10,000 denominations to the 15,000 other religions that have existed and you have an issue.

8) The Bible is immoral.
Morality has a basis in a secular world, it is built from society, it is built for social harmony and community cohesion. It is basically; least pain to the most people, see my other post here.
The bible is (based on the previous points) immoral, it encourages Genocide, OK's slavery and rape.

9) Surely you don't take the Bible literally?
I know people don't take the bible literally, it would be very hard to, no one stones their kids for back talk anymore. I think most atheists would realize that few people, but the most fundamentalists take it 100% literally. The question is, are they the ones that are being honest. How do you tell which parts to NOT take literally, how do you tell which parts aren't allegory or metaphor, if your only answer is what your pastor tells you then you are on shaky ground.
If you are a fundamentalist that takes it literally then the evidence is against you.

10) What is the evidence for God?Oh yes, please impart upon me something new from the last 2000 years of Theology and apologetics... Nothing new, just the same tired debunked arguments.  Hmm....

The question in this section is a valid one, if someone presented me real decent evidence for God and Jesus continued existence, then I think I'd be a bit terrified and want clarification... can I now get to heaven through good deeds or is it faith only or both, or am I predestined for hell as some faiths believe. I am guessing I would get none of these answers and I would have to just lead a good life and if God judges me well for that then he is just, if he doesn't then I would never have worshiped him/her.

Warning this video may be laughable to your atheism...

Like all good theist videos and blog posts neither of these allow comments, what are they afraid of, some discussion? A dissenting opinion?
Blog post; http://rbutr.com/http://godsnotdeadthemovie.com/blog/atheists-hate-video/
Video;


I think I have attacked the good old Kalam a fair few times, but I wanted to do a direct rebuttal for rbutr.com, as the only way to comment on these posts so here goes.


Firstly, wow flashy video, maybe it will distract from the vacuos content?

Whatever begins to exist has a cause, noppppee. Even if it did, why don't we save a huge God labelled step and say the universe never began to exist? Believing that something popped into existence is actually less of a stretch than magic, as if it pops into existence you only need to explain the thing that popped into existence not the thing and the magician and the hat and the magic, that is if you don't grant that the magician did a trick, are you equating god here to a trick, ruse, or a lie, cause I would agree with you there. The addition of a magician and magic complicates things immensely as the addition of a God using his powers to create does the same thing.

Why don't we see this happening all the time... we do at the sub-atomic level, virtual particles, pickup a book.

Did the universe begin, or has it always existed. Atheists haven't been the only ones who have sponsored the universes eternal existence, so have believers, they were both wrong based on current evidence, where is that evidence for God again.. oh you have word games to define him into existence, sorry but that doesn't cut it. Yes Science was wrong at one stage, but science adjusts its views based on what is observed, religion doesn't.
The universe could have always existed as a continuous cycle of expansion and contraction, this doesn't violate the second law of thermodynamics that is so often stated, incorrectly. The law states that all things tend towards disorder in a closed system. As the universe is running out of usable energy, but a reversal and collapse of this resets entropy. The usable energy doesn't dissapear, we aren't running out of it, it is simply dissapates into the universe, if the entire universe is collpased back on itself it becomes usable again, there is no where for the energy to be lost too as there is nothing outside the universe for it to dissapate too.

There are other hypothesis' that get around this problem, such as the aforementioned virtual particles over a finite amount of time causing a singularity that then expands into a new universe of matter and energy, and negative energy (dark energy), the positive energy being countered by the negative dark energy, for a balanced checkbook universe with no net energy being created, the ultimate free lunch.

All the arguments beyond here use evidence from science, evidence that has not once pointed to a divine creator, not once pointed to a supernatural cause to even the most mundane of events, there are no angels moving the planets in their orbits, there are no spirits guiding water down hill, and there is no God supported by modern evidence.

They then go on to quote mine Physicists, all of whom agree this universe had a beginning, but this universe could have formed out of the collapse of the last one, or be just another bubble in the multi-verse, we don't know, and we are OK with not knowing, the only way to find out the truth is to start with no knowing and go from there. Supposing the answer (God) before you investigate colours your view and will ensure bad conclussions.

The Universe has a cause?
If I grant the first two premises, which I am not, then it is a huge jump to that cause being an omnipotent, omnipresent entity. Why couldn't it be some stupid long dead being that had an accident with their super-collider causing this universe, after they had evolved naturally in their own universe.
Why couldn't it be a natural cause such as the multiverse theory of two other universes colliding? Which of these is more likely, the natural cause when all other events we have observed (save the virtual particles I mentioned) have had a natural cause, or a supernatural cause that we have never observed, let alone in a repeatable scientific test?

The universe can't cause itself, really? Where is your evidence for this statement, we know that virtual particles can, in certain situations cause themselves, so why couldn't the universe cause itself based on natural laws?
It must be spaceless, timeless, immaterial, Uncaused and powerful...The universe or multiverse could certainly be timeless, on the others though, were is your proof, even a logical one. This is jumping to your preconcieved conclussion.

Thanks for playing, better luck next time...