The futility and emptiness of the atheist world-view. Science cannot explain everything.
An exploration of the most obvious flaws in atheist dogma.
I feel the notion that atheism, like religion, is well founded in the common mind, rhetoric aside. They both have rituals, they each make metaphysical claims. They both have the equivalent of high priests etc. Both atheism and religion seem to contain extremists with the attendant arrogance difficulty. Of course there are some very obvious flaws in both atheism and theistic fundamentalism.
For the fanatical religious person, a holy book is canon for ultimate truth and for the “died in the wool” atheist it’s the philosophy of science as the only relevant criteria for what is considered knowledge. This is why some convinced fanatical atheists have a problem with human free will, and even the existence of consciousness itself in some cases. This is down to the fact that if free will is real, it is another method of action in the cosmos other than the study of cause and effect, otherwise known as science. Obviously this would give convincing evidence that the philosophy of science was not the only grounds for knowledge, and thus its denial is tried by atheists of the far extremist grouping.
One of the issues, getting into rhetoric, is the question of who is an atheist anyway. One of the most common definitions for atheist is one who simply has no belief in a God. Extremist atheists encourage the adoption of this definition because it increases the numbers of their fellows in the world and can include agnostics in their number. What it hasn’t got however is the ability to differentiate different atheist types.
Some people of religion, including the most extreme elements, push another definition; that atheists are those who maintain there is absolutely no God. Agnostics then become those who are undecided or cannot come to a definite view. This has the result of lowering the number of atheists in the world. It’s essential to be cognizant of this almost subconscious use of words for both parties to the debate.
For me it is more sensible and useful to make a distinction between those who insist there is no God, those who are effectively undecided, and those who are convinced there is a God. For this reason I believe there is more justification to use the definition that atheists are those who maintain there is no God, agnostics are those in between who are undecided, and of course theists who preach there definitely is a God. It doesn’t artificially inflate adherents for either of the groupings at the expense of refined definition. It also has the positive of being how most people generally use the words anyway. It also doesn’t back up any philosophical bias.
Another idea that springs into my mind is on the issue of evidence. Atheists will frequently equate fairies, Father Christmas or their fellows, with God, in that they put them on the same choice list. The criteria given for doing this is based on evidence they insist. This is actually the truth of course. When it comes to scientific evidence there is indeed the same amount for God as fairies, i.e. “zero”. However this belies the notion that there can be more than one type of evidence other than only scientific evidence.
To my mind another example of evidence involves people and motive. For instance no one can categorically prove that their spouse loves them. It’s a non-scientific question. Evidence is certainly garnered in order to decide if it’s the case or not for the one in receipt of the love, and one loving, naturally, is aware they love without any evidence at all. As mentioned in my previous comment, this realm of evidence all relates to people and the fact they are beings with agency and consciousness. Something many atheists try to deny based on science of course. A useless effort by my reasoning!
Any reasonable thinking person will concede that this type of evidence is not scientific but is still valid, based on a certain kind of truth, in this instance personhood. Taking into account that personhood and a whole realm of evidence that is based on it witnesses to a deep fundamental truth, that there is more to existence than science alone and also that agency itself is a competitor as it were to science. On this basis, the notion of a God is not unreasonable, as God is defined as having personhood. As personhood is agency and agency can engender an effect apart from the scientific definition of cause and effect without agency, the cosmos could very well have been made by the agency and personhood of a God. The evidence for this would be un- scientific, but sufficient, on the other principal type of evidence we all acknowledge and utilise daily when interacting with and acknowledging people.
With this reasoning it’s not feasible to place fairies on the same playing field as the concept of God. After all science cannot explain science but an agency could conceivably do so and fairies are not thought necessary to create the fine tuning of the natural world. The term freethinkers cannot be applied to atheists who`s basis for all thought and all evidence is the philosophy of science. There are other things outside their philosophy.
Atheists cannot be considered to be freethinkers when their basis for all thought, and all evidence is confined within the philosophy of science.
This quote from the immortal William Shakespeare is one that needs to be memorised by everyone of the atheistical persuasion.
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy”.
Some music to compliment my words.
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