Atheism: A Falsified Hypothesis by Brian Colón
Several Atheists like to complain that Theism, unlike Atheism is unfalsifiable. If this is true, then it means that Atheism can be proven false, Theism cannot. Many Atheists consider this to be a strong point for Atheism and a weak point for Theism. The problem is, since Atheism CAN be proven false, then IF it IS proven false, then Theism (its negation) would necessarily be proven true. When there are only two possible answers for a proposition, and one of them is proven false, then the other is necessarily true. Consider the question "Does God Exist?" There are only two possible answers, "yes" and "no". If the answer "no" was proven false, then the only alternative answer remaining is "yes". (MP3 Audio | RSS | iTunes)
The way I choose to show Atheism false is by showing the self contradictions contained within the Atheistic worldview. Logically speaking, if a proposition contains necessary consequences that are themselves self-contradictory, then the proposition cannot be true. For example, there are no living corpses, there are no unemployed employees, and there is no dehydrated water.
According to a few famous Atheists, here are a few necessary consequences of Atheism. There is no God; there is nothing but the physical world (Dan Barker – Protest sign at the Washington State Capital). Humans are nothing but machines that generate DNA (Richard Dawkins – The God Delusion). Morality is based on the consensus of human beings (Gordon Stein – “The Great Debate: Does God Exist?”). If this is true then it would be impossible to account for things such as moral absolutes, laws of logic, or human dignity; three things that we all understand to be indisputable.
Moral Absolutes
Every Atheist I've ever met believes that murder and rape is evil. But what is evil? I thought all that exists is matter. Is there anything evil about matter? Does the knife care that someone used it to kill someone? Of course not. Perhaps evil is just something that we experience as decreasing our happiness. Wouldn't that mean that since the rapist increases his happiness by raping people, then raping people would be considered good for him? Who's to say that the rapist's moral judgments are flawed and ours are not?
Once an atheist woman told me that she heard that her co-worker was cheating on his wife with another woman from the office. She told me that she was outraged at how immoral he was and how she lost all respect for him. I asked her “What was so wrong with what he did?” Why does the fact that he’s married make the act of sex with another woman immoral? She simply said “Its just wrong!” I agree, but I’d like to know why it’s ultimately wrong given the Atheistic worldview.
Laws of Logic
Consider the law of “excluded middle” which says that a proposition is either true or false, there is no third option. What is the ontological foundation of this law? Is this law just a result of the chemical functions in our brain? If so then how is it universal? Is the law material? Of course not! Laws of logic are immaterial abstract entities, the very things that cannot exist if the only thing that exists is matter.
Dan Barker, in a debate with Dr. James White, attempted to refute this argument by saying that “logic is not a thing.” Well if by thing he means a physical object then I would agree with him. The problem is that he already said that things are all that exist. So according to Dan Barker there is no logic.
Human Dignity
Why do people put on a lab coat and argue that people are simply evolved animals, and then say that we shouldn't treat people like animals? If all that exists is matter, then that would mean that we are nothing but matter as well. If that’s true then why do we believe that humans are worthy of respect? In a debate with Paul Manata, Dan Barker asserts that human beings are no more important than broccoli. I find it very interesting that the piece of broccoli known as Dan Barker thinks that other certain pieces of broccoli are worthy of love and respect, as if they were something more than just broccoli. Every single day we all treat each other with respect and dignity, and we all know that those who disrespect people ought not to do that. This is true for Theist and Atheist alike. Humans really are worthy of respect. This is inexplicable on the Atheistic Worldview.
Conclusion
The Atheist is able to recognize moral absolutes, laws of logic, and the dignity of human beings, three things that cannot exist given the worldview of the Atheist. So the question is, why is the Atheist contradicting his/her own worldview? The answer is obvious, because as we’ve seen, the proposition "God doesn't exist" entails impossible consequences.
There is however, another worldview that is capable of accounting for the very things that the Atheist cannot account for, namely Christian Theism. On Christian Theism moral absolutes make sense because God is provided as the absolute moral standard. Immaterial, timeless, transcendent entities such as the laws of logic make sense because they can be grounded in an immaterial, timeless, transcendent God. Human dignity makes sense because humans are created in the image of the only being worthy of honor and praise, God.
Atheism is inadequate and incapable of explaining our experience of the world around us. Atheism therefore cannot be true. This is why I conclude that the best proof for the existence of God is the impossibility of the contrary.
Hi, Brian. I translated your post above and published in my blog. I gave all credit to your page and you. I hope that you don't be worry. If you don't want, please, tell me, ok?
God blessl you.
Gaspar
PS: I'm from Brazil
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I'm honored! Thanks for visiting my blog!
-Brian
PS: I'm from the United States
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The conclusion "The Atheist is able to recognize moral absolutes" is clearly wrong. I think it over-generalizes what you've seen in a small sample of people. The opposite conclusion, namely, that there is no such thing as moral absolutes, is very popular among many branches of atheism.
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I realize that many Atheists say that there are no moral absolutes. I just don't believe they are being entirely honest. These same Atheists who say there are no moral absolutes tend to condemn things like the Inquisition, the Crusades, and the Salem Witch Trials. The belief that there are no moral values is consistent with Atheism, but it is inconsistent when you follow that person home and see how he lives his life.
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This is just a point of detail, but you seem to be equating "we condemn events from our present perspective" with "there are moral absolutes," which does not follow. A person can condemn an event from his own values while admitting that his values are not absolute.
I do agree with you that there are moral absolutes, but you haven't proven the case, especially given Christianity's inherent subjectivity. In Christianity, there can be no such thing as moral absolutes because morality is innately subjective to God's will.
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My point is that we perceive these values to be absolute.
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Hi Brian, kudos on your brave attempt to disprove atheism. However, I still find your logic unsuccessful. Seems fishy to use atheism to prove there is a god. You are simply presenting 3 common reasons for the existence of god, there's nothing new here.
The MORAL ABSOlUTE: How do we know what the rapist does is wrong even though it causes him happiness? Easy. It is causing suffering to another, and any behavior that purposely causes suffering should not be tolerated (you may call it evil). It is by human consensus over time that we come to moral truths, not absolutes. I believe claiming moral absolutes is a dangerous thing. They bring great discord amongst peoples. This fits just fine with the Atheist world view. Remember, despite any claims atheists make (such as "there is only matter") atheism is ONLY addressing the existence of a deity, nothing more. It is not supposed to be an answer to everything. It is not meant to provide a moral foundation on which to base society nor is it meant to increase or decrease human dignity. Those things are all up to each individual and society as a whole. Atheism is simply the rejection of theism.
Personally the human dignity I feel and express to others comes from the fact that I am not simply another animal in the environment, but an intelligent animal that uses reason and has developed consciousness through still undiscovered evolutionary processes. And that I am part of a larger community of like-minded animals all striving for happiness, that is what brings dignity to our species. I have no respect for broccoli, it has achieved nothing on its own. I do have deep respect for other more complex species than broccoli. We just happen to to be the most evolved species on our planet and that is something worth saving and respecting...we don't need a soul to make a living organism special and worthy of dignity.
On LAWS OF LOGIC, you let me down. Your argument is a poor attempt and you know it. Of course logic is not matter, you know this, I know this and Dan Barker knows this. Thoughts, feelings, ideas are all immaterial, but that does not mean there is a god. All immaterial experiences exist because matter exists first. You cannot engage in a logical discussion if you lack all brain cells. You cannot feel love if certain hormones in your brain aren't produced and you can't have a transcendental religious experience without your body.
To summarize, atheism never makes the claim that it is capable of explaining our experiences and our world, it is simply a rejection of the claim that theists make, based on the lack of objective evidence.
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Enrique,
You've made a lot of comments here that seem to all be linked together by the common claim that "Atheism is nothing more than the rejection of Theism". What you seem to be missing here is there are positive claims included with the assertion that God does not exist. I listed those positive claims in my essay and those are the claims I am critiquing. In fact, you made even more positive claims in your critique of my essay.
You say "any behavior that purposely causes suffering should not be tolerated". Why not? Because suffering is bad? Bad compared to what? Because its undesireable for some people? So what? It's desireable for others. Who's to say what is right?
You say "It is by human consensus over time that we come to moral truths, not absolutes" If you're going to resort to Human consensus to defend your position then you're basically saying that the rapist does nothing more wrong than the person who passes gas at the dinner table. I'm personally convinced that rape, murder, theft etc. are more wrong than just the disagreement with the consensus of Humans.
About logic, you say that "All immaterial experiences exist because matter exists first" and "You cannot engage in a logical discussion if you lack all brain cells". You are confused about what I mean by logic. I'm not talking about our abilities to use deductive reasoning, using multiple premesis to come to a conclusion. I'm talking about the fact that deductive logic makes certain conclusions neccesary. This would be true whether or not we had brain cells. A question Dan Barker asked one time was "Did the laws of logic exist at the big bang?" Unfortunatley the person he asked was a Young Earth Creationist so the answer wasn't great, but I would simply reply "Yes of course they did". At five seconds after the big bang, was it true that the Big Bang happend five seconds prior? Was it false that it happened ten seconds prior? Was it false that it never happened. Logic is NOT depended on our physical brains.
About love, you say that "You cannot feel love if certain hormones in your brain aren't produced". I find this claim very dangerous, especially if you're married. What your basically saying is that you're love for your wife is completely based on the chemical composition of your brain. This means that I could do an operation on your brain and remove those chemicals, thus nullifying your love for your wife. Of course I agree if such an operation was done to you, then you would no longer feel love to your wife. But if thats all you think love is, chemical reactions in the brain, then go ahead and tell your wife that, just be sure to wear protective gear when you do. Personally I'm convinced that it is much more than that.
You also say, "you can't have a transcendental religious experience without your body" I think you might want to look up the word "transcendental" and "trancsedent" because you seem to be misuing the word here. I think what you meant to say was that you can't have a "trancendent" religious experience without your body. I agree that you can't experience something unless you have a body, but that says nothing about the entity being experienced. The entity still exists whether or not you are able to detect it, especially if the entity is transcendent. Besides I think its very interesting that you say "YOU can't....unless YOU had a BODY". On the Atheist view, isn't it the case that we ARE our body? It seems to me that you are making a distiction between the identity of a person, and the body of a person. This is sounding dangerously close to a description of the soul.
One more thing. Notice that my essay did not attempt to prove that God exists. I was showing the impossiblity of God NOT existing.
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Great stuff, thank you so much for sharing this with us.
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Sorry, but like all other presuppositionalist arguments, your arguments presume that you know exactly what all materialists believe. You don't. Moral absolutes, laws of logic and human dignity do not contradict my specific worldview.
Stop fighting straw men.
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Francois,
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You seem to have completely misread what I said. Not surprisingly for a presup, you read what you wanted to read.
What I said, if you read it again more carefully, was that my worldview DOES say there are moral absolutes, laws of logic, and human dignity, and that none of these things contradict what I believe. Your assumption that all materialistic worldviews MUST contradict these things is nothing more than an assumption.
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Why don't you explain your worldview then?
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Isn't the fact that you are now asking me what my worldview is, an admission that your whole presuppositionalist thinking is wrong? If you actually did know all materialist worldviews, and were able to refute them all, why would you be concerned by any specific one? You'd already have all the answers.
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You have a misconception of the term "Presuppositionalist". Presuppositionalism is the branch of Christian Apologetics that seeks to prove God's existence from the impossibility of the contrary. It does not offer a positive argument FOR God's existence (for example the cosmological argument), but rather a NEGATIVE argument against God's non-existence. Presuppositionalists like me claim that one must presuppose the existence of God in order to make sense of human intelligibility, human conscience, moral aboslutes, logical absolutes and so on.
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Yes, I am very well aware of what presuppositionalists CLAIM. However, this CLAIM is invalid, because it is impossible to prove that "one must presuppose the existence of God in order to make sense of human intelligibility, human conscience, moral absolutes, logical absolutes and so on" unless one first proves that "there is no way to deny the existence of God and make sense of human intelligibility, human conscience, moral absolutes, logical absolutes and so on." All that you can do, as a presup, is examine your own worldview and see that it justifies "human intelligibility, human conscience, moral absolutes, logical absolutes and so on" (it doesn't, actually, but I assume you believe it does, otherwise you wouldn't be a Christian). But the fact that your worldview presumably answers these questions does not prove that it is the only way to answer these questions, unless you actually prove the universal negative. Otherwise we are left with two kinds of worldviews, Christian and materialist, which we must evaluate on their own merits. And that's most definitely not what you want, otherwise you wouldn't be a presup in the first place.
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"Otherwise we are left with two kinds of worldviews, Christian and materialist, which we must evaluate on their own merits. And that's most definitely not what you want, otherwise you wouldn't be a presup in the first place."
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But you don't know what "the materialist worldview" is. That's the whole problem. You presups set up a straw man and then claim that you've defeated all atheists, when you've probably only talked to a few of them and know the beliefs of maybe one or two at best. You're acting exactly like the Creationists who claim to refute Neo-Darwinism and then claim that they are right, mainly because they are ignorant of the hundreds of other positions on the subject, both scientific and religious.
This is the problem: how do you refute something you know very little about? What is the common property of all materialistic worldviews that you have identified that have led you to reject them? Can you even identify one such property?
The fact that you keep asking me to present my worldview only makes my case! Why are you asking me something you should already know for your argument to be valid?
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Look, if you have some brand new worldview that I've never heard of before then let me hear it.
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Hi, just poking my head into this convo. You can't really push a presuppositionalist to defend a universal negative when you are speaking hypothetically. It is like those teenage atheist bloggers who say things like, "what if there was a religion with a quadrinity instead of a trinity, and everything else was the same, wouldn't that also explain reality?" Well, no, but you also missed the point that presuppositionalists want to talk about actual belief systems, not some hypothetical system that no one actually believes or lives by.
Francios, listen to yourself. Your worldview is a total failure, not only because you (apparently) can't articulate it, but because you expect Brian to read your mind to defeat your position. I'm not a big dog, I've only read a few books by Bahnsen, and maybe 2 and a half by Van Til (ok, and one by Frame). They represent a pretty good slice of presuppositional apologetic literature. As far as I can tell, none of them expect from us what you are asking for when you say "Isn't the fact that you are now asking me what my worldview is, an admission that your whole presuppositionalist thinking is wrong?"
The strength of presuppositional apologetics is that it stresses the point that you must be able to live consistently with what you profess to believe (as well as the logical consequences of your stated beliefs). I promise you that you do not. If you think that a Christian needs psychic powers to read your mind in a comment convo then you have MAJOR epistemological problems. If you have ever made a single moral/ethical judgment in your entire life then you have unwittingly borrowed from the Christian worldview. If you have ever expressed disgust at a crime or behavior which, to you, seemed inappropriate or unbecoming then by thought you grant the existence of the God who makes such a thought intelligible, expressible, and coherent with your other experiences.
just my two cents
Glenn Hendrickson
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I am not "expecting Brian to read my mind." It is precisely BECAUSE Brian cannot read my mind or otherwise know what I believe that I fault his presup orientation. It is an argument from ignorance, nothing more.
I am not stating my worldview because I see no reason for it: the presup already assumes I am wrong, therefore he should be able to prove it without me having to tell him what it is. If your argument hinges on there existing no refutation to your position anywhere, then you better know that this is in fact the case. The only way to know this is to use a deduction from the properties of materialism as a whole. No presup I have debated has ever done this.
"If you have ever made a single moral/ethical judgment in your entire life then you have unwittingly borrowed from the Christian worldview."
Nope. Nothing in my moral and ethical systems implies that God exists or that Christianity is valid. Sorry. (in fact, God existing or Christianity being valid would not really change anything in my reasoning).
"If you have ever expressed disgust at a crime or behavior which, to you, seemed inappropriate or unbecoming then by thought you grant the existence of the God who makes such a thought intelligible, expressible, and coherent with your other experiences."
Nope. God is not a necessary concept in order to acknowledge or justify the existence of intelligible and coherent thought.
Once again, if you KNEW this, you would have the argument to prove it. But you don't.
To quote yourself:
"Your worldview is a total failure"
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I propose that you are not stating your worldview because if you did it would get torn apart. You can't fault Brian's presuppositional argument for not knowing the specific worldview of a blogger he's never met, rather Brian can fault you for not being forthcoming with your belief system and then childishly using that against him. In short, your silence is not his fault.
Maybe you misunderstand presuppositionalism. We do not list out every worldview (actual and hypothetical) and offer a sound refutation of each in order to defeat yours without you having to tell us what it is. This method of apologetic happens in actual conversation. With non-Christians who have some ability to explain what they believe and why they believe it.
"Nothing in my moral and ethical systems implies that God exists or that Christianity is valid. Sorry. (in fact, God existing or Christianity being valid would not really change anything in my reasoning)."
The fact that you make moral judgments and then turn and deny the necessity of God proves that you want to have universal concepts like a morality that is more than the chemicals bouncing around inside your skull. Without God that is truly all you have: your own personal opinion. The moral judgments you have made prove that you believe that God exists in your heart of hearts (so to speak).
Of course on the surface you deny it. But that doesn't change the fact that you have expected people other than yourself to understand you when you say "that was wrong," "that should not have happened," "he ought not to have killed/raped/said/etc..." At the point where you elevate your opinion into morals you either grant that God exists (in whom the ground for all such universal claims) or you grant that you are insane (implying that the chemical reactions in your brain have some moral bearing on the actions, thoughts, or words of another person (with their own brain chemical-opinions)).
I can explain why I have the ability to refute your worldview (if you would ever bother to share it with us). You can not explain why you have the ability to refute mine, (or at least try to) without stepping outside of your stated beliefs and utilizing ideas which are introduced to the world through God's revelation in Scripture.
Glenn
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Brian,
I am admittedly not a well read person on this subject, and I’m sorry if this seems a little obvious to you and I just completely missed something. (which is likely)
Morality seems semi-universal around this planet, not just in human beings. Birds for instance, do not just kill another bird. They band together, living as a community. They will kill an outsider or a threat, or in some cases, a bird of their own flock that has committed some crime we can only guess at. Perhaps it woke up everyone 15 minutes too early for the millionth time and they’d had enough of it. Who can say?
The point is, varying levels of morality seem to exist everywhere, not necessarily as some deep religious instinct, but by basic evolutionary need.
Caveman 1 has a piece of food. Caveman 2 doesn’t. Caveman 2 smacks Caveman 1 and takes the food, your first example of government. Caveman 1 goes to Caveman 3, and together, they beat up Caveman 2 and share the food, the beginnings of civilization and morality. It becomes apparent that those who band together survive better, and it’s impossible to band together if you consistently do not respect another person’s existence.
At what point in our lives, aside from perhaps the savagery of middle school, has it been viewed as “right” to steal from someone? Concepts of right and wrong surround us every minute of our lives, and in an environment like that, how could we not pick them up?
If human beings are nothing more than matter, why bother respecting one another? Basic survival instinct that every life form shares. I don’t try to kill you, you don’t try to kill me, and we’ll get along fine and both survive.
I remember a recent case in the news where two men were arrested after shooting another man. Both suspects were avid hunters and wanted “…to see if it felt different than shooting a deer.” Both men were also Atheists that had taken the step of “If human beings are animals, why not treat them as such?”
Modern civilization is only possible because of us respecting each other, and its benefits are obvious. Other animals haven’t achieved this level of civilization, possibly because they haven’t developed the degree of morality that we display on a regular basis. If we live more like a common animal, our civilization, and the benefits that go with it fall apart- that is why we treat human beings with more respect that say, a dog or a cat.
I don't mean to attack your position, and I am not an Athiest, I just have a lot of questions.
Thank you for your time, and again, I'm sorry if this seems self obvious to you or anyone else who reads this.
-Seth
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I have no problem with the fact that animals exibit what appears to be moral behavior the same way humans do. The argument seems to usually be that because the animals are able to act that way without religion then the act must not come from religion. But I've always granted that moral behavior doesn't come from belief in God, but rather that objective moral values wouldn't exist in the absense of God.
Your analogy of the cavemen only displays the way we as humans become aware of moral values. I'm perfectly willing to consider any theory one might have as to how we come to know moral values. My concern is with the moral values' ontological foundation (their foundation in reality). The cavemen, merely discovered morality, they didn't invent it.
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Sorry, I meant that modern morality seems to be nothing more than learned, mutually benificial behavior as a species.
Of course, it's a lot simpler an answer to say, "'Cause God said so." I don't mean to belittle your argument, I just mean that Ockham's Razor seems to apply here too.
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Well notice that no where in my explanation was the explantion that "murder is wrong because God says so" or "without the Bible we wouldn't know the difference between right and wrong". I'm simply saying that in order to judge something right or wrong, there must be an objective standard. That standard is not what God has told us to do or not to do, but rather that standard IS God himself. He is perfectly good. He is the straight line by which we are able to show other lines to be crooked.
I wouldn't be so quick to resort to Ockham's Razor here. It seems to me that having a single standard for morality is far more simpler that saying that morality is based on the consensus of hundreds of thousands of people.
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"That standard is not what God has told us to do or not to do, but rather that standard IS God himself. "
Now THIS I've never heard before. I am very eager to hear you explain to us how a person can perceive God itself, instead of just perceiving God's words. If what you say is possible, then the entire world will be changed.
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I'm rather hesitant to explain anything to you about my worldview at this point since you just spent an incredible amount of energy explain absolutely nothing to me about your worldview. But in this case, Seth asked the question.
God's own moral character is the objective standard by which all other things are measured. His moral character is then expressed to us in the form of Divine Commands (Thou shalt not murder). But murder was an evil act long before God told Moses it was. This is because, before the command was receieved, it was already true according to God's nature. And the people knew it was an evil act before they were told it was as well. This is because God has written his moral law on the heart of every person according to Romans 2:14-15.
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