The Myth of Intellectual Atheism

Introduction

Epigraph

Once upon a time...

In line at the buffet…

The Cool Table Atheist

The Jordan Doctrine

Atheist Faith

Intellectual Atheism

Epilogue

            The humor and general content contained in "The Myth of Intellectual Atheism" is not intended as an insult to the scientific abilities or personal intelligence of atheists; rather, they are tools to establish that today's popular atheistic views originate from somewhere other than science or personal intelligence. Yes, it is true that a certain amount of intellectual gymnastics, along with the commensurate back flips and flourishes, are attached to the doctrines championed by today’s atheists; however, if these intellectual gymnastics were an Olympic sport, they would not score above a 4.5, except of course for the Soviet judge.

          Today’s popular atheism in the West - which is the target of this essay - is not the stuff of Nietzsche. Yes, it is true that in the history of the West atheism can boast a long and storied intellectual tradition. However, the atheism espoused by the likes of Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris and preached on the internet and around the water cooler is not part of that tradition. This new McAtheism is of a different stripe than its predecessors and it is this atheism that is the target of my sarcastic tone.  

            It is true that I am a Christian writer and minister, but this essay is not, strictly speaking Christian. I will challenge atheism's basic assumptions, not by defending the Christian faith, but by focusing on and separating this new atheism’s own Intellectual gymnastics from its attacks on religion. This is not strictly speaking an essay either. It is written in a style that includes poetry, prose and the occasional wisecrack so it could be classified as parody or Lyric Essay.               In any case, I will show that this modern incarnation that I am dubbing Intellectual Atheism is much like an alternate on a great intellectual gymnastics team—not good enough to appear on the mat based on its own merit. Instead, this alternate must cause the star of the team to fail, and only then, by default, can it enter the arena of human ideas. The star of the team is religious faith, and Intellectual atheistic arguments are always only negative arguments against religion’s ability to perform. This essay will search for and examine the nature of atheism's own performance as an intellectual alternative.

                

“And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

                                                         William Shakespeare, Hamlet

             As fairy tales go, atheism based on scientific or philosophical reason is very effective. One way fairy tales can be described is as narratives filled with make believe to convey an idea or a moral. The plausibility of the narrative is not important, but the truth of the moral that the narrative conveys is all-important.

            The fact that wolves don’t huff and puff and blow down houses or pigs do not construct houses is not important to the moral or truth of the story of The Three Little Pigs. The moral of the story is working harder to build your house with bricks is always better than taking shortcuts and using inferior materials. If this moral is true of pigs and houses, then it is also true of people and their life pursuits.

            This assumed plausibility, which is the genius of the fairy tale, conveys complex important ideas to children in ways that they can absorb them—if only subconsciously. Likewise, this assumed plausibility is also the genius of the narratives of intellectual atheism; they convey atheistic ideas without the hearers having to understand all the details or even being aware of what they are being taught. The plausibility of a particular philosophical or scientific idea presented as an atheistic narrative is not important but, like the fairy tale, the moral or lesson that the idea conveys is all-important.

            Intellectual atheism is narrowly defined for our purposes here as “the use of scientific theories or philosophical ideas as absolute proof that God does not exist.” These scientific and philosophical proofs are expressed as narratives and appear throughout our intellectual cultures like items in a cafeteria buffet, and, at every point, these narratives are the replacement of religious beliefs. This atheistic buffet was created to be consumed by the masses and is the primary source from which popular atheism draws its ideas. Access to this buffet begins in elementary school, and being exposed to the atheistic buffet of narratives is inescapable. From the theories in our grade school science textbooks to the stories in our grade school English textbooks, the buffet of narratives is ever-present. The moral served in every narrative worthy of the buffet is "There is no God, and if you believe there is a God, you are unscientific, backward thinking, and you are something less than enlightened."

            In order for this atheistic moral to thrive, however, it must be diligently defended, and the buffet of ideas held unassailable. For the atheistic moral not to be preeminent and unquestioned in intellectual circles is for the philosophy to lose all its power and influence because the idea that atheism equals enlightenment and rational thought cannot survive on its own intellectual merit. If examined too closely, the atheistic moral contained in the buffet of narratives collapses of its own weight. 

            For any intellectual culture to examine any of the ideas of the atheistic buffet objectively is to stand accused of doing violence to all that is reasonable and forward thinking. For example, Darwinism is as plausible as huffing wolves and building pigs. When the evidence is examined objectively, Darwinism does not rise to the level of a scientific theory but is better described as a fairytale in training pants. Yet Darwinism is defended and accepted as fact as is Euclid's geometry and anyone who questions Darwinism is accused of giving his or her reasons in an unknown tongue. The evidence is not the basis for the defense of the theory. The fact that it is from the buffet and is a linchpin in the atheistic narrative is what makes its defense an imperative—not the evidence. An advanced degree is not required to challenge Darwinism’s central claims. Any middle school student armed with his science textbook and the right questions can challenge the theory in ten minutes.

            "Teacher, is Darwinism supported by the fossil record?”

“Teacher, I didn't ask why the fossil record doesn't support it; I just wanted to know whether or not it supports it? No? Okay.”

“Teacher, have mutations ever been observed changing the fundamental nature of a species either in the laboratory or in nature? No? Okay.”

“Teacher, do we have any scientific evidence that random variation and natural selection, which is the central idea of Darwinism, can account for fundamental changes to any species or is capable of creating the current level of the world’s biological complexity and diversity? No? Okay.”

Teacher, is there any evidence that animals change beyond limited variations in response to their environment?”

“Yes, I agree. It could explain why a frog's rear end is watertight, but is that evidence for fundamental changes in the nature of the frog?”

“No? Okay.”

            When atheists claim that their beliefs grow out of a cool intellectual pursuit of the truth through the available science, they misrepresent the truth, the science, and what it means to be cool. Plainly stated, the only difference between a traditional fairy tale and much of intellectual atheist doctrine is, “Once upon a time...” and “Science has discovered....” 

            In the natural sciences, atheists are not objectively examining evidence of scientific theories; rather, they are creating and supporting theories that defend their moral. Heaven help the scientist who wants to examine the evidence without regard for how it affects the atheistic moral; they will either be force fed from the buffet or offered a suspicious looking apple from a wicked witch.

            To be part of popular atheism is to be in line at the intellectual house of atheism buffet, seeing what's being served, sometimes looking at what other people are having, then grabbing the overly fingered tongs or spoons and acquiring your chosen selections. “I’ll take one of those ‘Everything is relative,’ two of those ‘If God exists, why is there evil?’, and one of those tasty ‘Science tells us how life really began....’ ”

Our society rarely examines these ideas beyond the superficial, not caring how it makes our intellectual bottom look in our philosophical jeans. We ingest a lot of information, but we do not do the exercise of making this information useful by examining it for ourselves. Our personal world view has become flabby, and it is not a good look.

            It has become popular to embrace atheistic ideas—not for their own merit—but because embracing these ideas somehow magically makes a person a part of the enlightened culture. The person who calls himself an atheist these days is the equivalent of sitting at the cool table in any high school lunchroom and takes about the same amount of thought. These "cool-table atheists" look down on all they survey with a measured arrogance that comes from believing they are superior but not having quite worked out how or why. This arrogance is not based on knowledge; rather, it is based on an agreed-upon standard of what is acceptable to believe.  

            These agreed-upon ideas are wide-ranging, and, to an increasing degree, include popular atheism and its first cousin—functional atheism. This category of ideas is known generically as "political correctness," and if you do not ascribe to it, you are viewed as unsophisticated, crass, backward, and perhaps even unintelligent.

            The idea that a set of ideas cannot be questioned is a dangerous proposition. The worst parts of human history are, for the most part, the story of unquestionable ideas—the Spanish Inquisition, the Nazis, Stalin’s purges, and the killing fields of Cambodia, to name a few. All of these tragic chapters in human history started quietly with a set of agreed–upon, unassailable ideas.

            And yet our society is still at the atheistic buffet, and all those who decline its delicacies are looked upon with a polite disdain at best and at worst are categorized as potentially dangerous to the future of humanity. And so it starts. In case you think this is an overstatement, may I share some of the language being used concerning religious faith and those who do not partake of the atheistic buffet:

“The days of our religious identities are clearly numbered. Whether the days of civilization itself are numbered would seem to depend, rather too much, on how soon we realize this.”

― Sam Harris, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason

“I want to put on the table, not why 85% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences reject God, I want to know why 15% of the National Academy don’t.”

― Neil DeGrasse Tyson.

            These sentiments and others like them trickle down from the scientific atheists and other framers of intellectual atheism to the general public and express themselves in a watered-down fashion as popular atheism. Though watered down, the ideas of popular atheism are still potent enough to plant the seeds of disdain in its adherents for anyone who does not eat from the atheistic buffet.

            In my years of serving in ministry, I have had the privilege of encountering people of many ages, education levels, and cultures. I have had many conversations about God, and during many of these conversations, I am given what I call, “The Look.” It would start with a discussion of one of the many scientific, social, or philosophical subjects dealt with in the atheistic buffet, perhaps a conversation about God’s creation of life. This look says, "I know you believe that a God created life, and I am sorry for you for I have become enlightened beyond such childish thoughts. I don’t want to embarrass you by telling you how life really began and how foolish your little beliefs really are, so I will just sit here and stare at you with my knowing sympathetic smile." When I would get “The Look,” it was almost impossible to get "the looker" to say what he or she was really thinking, so I might ask a couple of questions about the origins of life. "I'm wondering, by what mechanism—even theorized mechanism—could inanimate objects like amino acid strings become alive and animated enough to respond to their environment and survive."

“The Look” would then turn into “The Smirk,” and I would hear some version of, "Amino acid strings were nourished in the primordial soup and energized by ultraviolet energy, and that was life's origin."

Then I might tell the person that he or she misunderstand the question and ask, "Exactly how does ultraviolet energy and nourishment change an inanimate substance into a living one?" Then I would be looked at like a German shepherd responding to an odd whistle with his head cocked to the side and a confused, attentive expression. I might continue: "Nothing inanimate has ever been observed becoming alive in nature or in the laboratory under any conditions. Science does not have a clue as to how this could happen, and this fact is fairly easy to know and understand by anybody with a library card or access to the Internet and a willingness to ask the next question. Please do not misunderstand me. I am not unsympathetic because I too have a similar belief. I believe in the 1960s a teenager was bitten by a radioactive spider and, as a result, acquired amazing “spidey” powers. Yes, it’s true, I don’t know of a mechanism—even in theory—as to how this could take place, but that fact doesn't stop people from teaching and learning the primordial soup/ultraviolet energy version of life being created, so I figure I'm okay."

By now “The Look” would usually be replaced by "the scowl," which says, "I don't care if you have made a point. I am not going to accept what you are saying because your answer is not from the buffet, and so it has to be wrong. More importantly, I would lose my seat at the cool table if I believed it."

            This level of arrogance about an idea and commitment to that idea that is not supported by the facts rises to the level of what is commonly practiced in Congress. This fact alone should be enough to frighten even the atheist into frequent diligent prayer.

           The cool table atheist can be divided into two groups: popular atheism and functional atheism.

            Popular atheism consists of members of the general public whom are led and fed by scientists and other members of the atheistic intelligentsia who write books, publish articles, conduct interviews, teach at universities, and do the work of preparing all the intellectual delicacies for the atheistic buffet. This atheism is discussed at the water cooler, argued over drinks, and is quickly invading popular culture.

            Functional atheists, on the other hand, are people who may or may not intellectually acknowledge that there is a God, but they live their lives as if God does not exist. Unfortunately, this group includes an increasing number of professing Christians. Such Christians claim Christ but have little knowledge of the Christian faith. These Christian can be recognized by their ignorance of the Bible, which is the only repository of knowledge for the Christian faith. All Christian knowledge draws its wealth from the Bible, and if its wealth derives from a different source, it is not Christian knowledge. It is as likely for a person to live as a Christian without reading the Bible as it is to be an Olympic swimmer but never enter any water. For these Christians, Christianity is primarily a function of social interaction—not personal faith. They attend church when it is convenient because they think they are supposed to, especially on Easter and Mother's Day. They do not enjoy the preached or taught Bible unless it is in some way entertaining or emotionally stimulating. These Christians can be heard commenting on how much they enjoy the Sunday morning sermon, but if you ask them how the message influenced their lives, they struggle in expressing anything beyond the superficial, emotional, and entertaining. If the given message contains anything of Christian value, it is summarily ignored. 

            Ironically, these Christians can be very fanatical and annoyingly obtuse—especially in pushing their religion on others. This fanaticism is derived from their devotion to their denomination or church because their denomination or church is the sole source of their faith. Basing their faith on their church or denomination frees these professing Christians to live their lives by any arbitrary standard that they choose and separate from any Biblical standard of Christian devotion as long as they remain in good standing with said denomination or church. For these Christians, a relationship with Christ or study of the Bible is not relevant for their day-to-day Christian walk.

            This entire group of Christian functional atheists acknowledging God but not accommodating God within their day-to-day existence is like a person who acknowledges that there is a natural force of attraction called gravity, but he or she will not take the time to know what gravity means for his or her life or adjust his or her life to accommodate the reality of this force. If this person enjoys the down slope of a roller coaster, he or she might jump off the top of the Empire State Building for the short-lived thrill—not recognizing the inevitable consequences.

            This group of professing Christians is not doing much thinking either way, so they do not eat from the buffet nor do they read the Bible. For this group, being able to defend or even have a basis for a life philosophy is unimportant. What is most important to the Christian functional atheist is to be able to live his or her life however he or she chooses, apart from any Christian accountability and have a seat at the cool table even if, in the case of these professing Christians, it is an honorary one based on lifestyle.

            The functional atheists who are not professing Christians are simply living their own lives without much thought to any of the larger questions of existence:

The fact that they do not seriously consider these questions should not be a measure of their ability to do so. To think deeply beyond the superficial aspects of life is simply not a priority for this group. These functional atheists’ approach to life is some variation of “eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we wear dentures.”

            If the professing Christian functional atheist is like the person who actually acknowledges gravity but ignores its implications, the non-Christian functional atheist is like the person who won't acknowledge that a force called gravity exists. Things fall simply because they fall. If the professing Christian takes a leap of misplaced faith from the Empire State Building, these non-Christians simply stumble off.

And as we witness both these groups

Accelerate past the various windows

Flowing toward gravity enlightenment

And the inevitable sidewalk overdose,

They are heard to whisper

As they exchange the sweetest smile,

“I believe everything will work out

In the end."

           Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and to evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence. – Richard Dawkins

            There is a rudely arrogant attitude displayed by atheist toward religious faith in general and the Christian faith in particular. Scientific atheists provide most of the cooks for the buffet and serve up the lion's share of fundamentalist atheism. This atheism may go under the guise of various names, including secularism, agnosticism, and humanism, but its true nature is revealed in its actions which are to do violence to the notion of God at every turn.

            Religion is portrayed by intellectual atheists as the opposite of rational thinking, so any conclusions that are perceived by them as having been influenced by faith are invalid, and therefore must be eradicated. In order to get rid of perceived faith-based conclusions, the cooks for the buffet have not only fought hard against any ideas that suggest that there may be a God but have also replaced these ideas with those that are consistent with atheistic beliefs. For example, the cooks of the atheistic buffet have tried to replace the Christian idea of God creating life limited in its ability to change and not able to change at all from one species to another with the idea of all plant and animal life descending from one common ancestor as stated by Darwinism. The cooks have also replaced the idea that the universe had a singular beginning with ideas like the multiverse or landscape and all the various versions of string theory. In fact, so many versions of string theory exist that they have become a type of landscape themselves. These multiple string theories together do manage to support this one hypothesis: give some scientist enough string, and he will hang himself with it! 

            Throughout the scientific world, the ideas that are in vogue are atheistic because these are the necessary theories by which the idea of God can be eradicated.

            I will not attempt to examine the scientific arguments expressed by intellectual atheism or the sometimes brutal slave barge-like control exercised over the scientific community that preserves the preeminence of those arguments with all their cracking of the whip and beating of the drum. That examination is best left to scientists like Dr. David Berlinski in his book, The Devil's Delusion or by Dr. Jonathan Wells in his book, Icons of Evolution, or in documentaries like, "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed." What I will do is examine the nature of the arrogance and ignorance that permeates intellectual atheism and leads to the rejection of all things relating to the idea of God.

            Science is the tool for studying the material world, and the material world is its limit. The question, "Does God exist?" is among those questions that science is not equipped to answer. Other questions include:

It is impossible to prove or disprove God through any intellectual discipline, including any of the disciplines of the natural sciences. The notion that scientific study should naturally lead to atheism is not a rationally defensible idea, but that notion is the exact assumption which underlies popular atheistic beliefs. There are brilliant scientists on both sides of the question of God, and that fact alone should lead society to understand that the decision to believe or not to believe in God comes from somewhere other than science or personal intelligence, and that scientific inquiry is not sufficient to dismiss matters of personal faith.

            Using your expertise in a particular scientific discipline to speak to matters of personal faith is as logical as an NBA basketball player informing a MLB player how to hit a curveball. A scientist should have no expectation of competence in matters of faith simply because he is a scientist in the same way that a basketball player should have no expectation of being a competent baseball player simply because of his basketball skill and expertise. I call this idea, "The Jordan Doctrine."

            For those of you who may not know, by all accounts Michael Jordan was a very good baseball player before he committed completely to basketball and went on to be the best basketball player ever to play the game. If he had chosen baseball instead of basketball as a career, he might have become a great baseball player but to return to baseball near the end of his basketball career was too much to expect even for him.

            In flouting the Jordan Doctrine, intellectual atheists go beyond the brash confidence of Michael Jordan's attempt to return to his former discipline of baseball and these atheists arrogantly try to apply the principles of natural science to the completely unrelated discipline of personal faith.

            It is not only the height of arrogance, but it is irrational to believe that your expertise in a scientific discipline (or any other intellectual discipline, for that matter) automatically entitles you to claim proficiency in matters of personal faith. In truth, Michael Jordan had a better chance of hitting the baseball curveball because of his basketball skill than a scientist has of accurately speaking to faith because of his scientific expertise. Michael Jordan at least used the same type of perception that he used in basketball as a baseball player. The scientist cannot apply his scientific discipline to faith because they are not only different disciplines but also because the nature of scientific inquiry uses a different type of perception than is used in personal faith. Attempting to perceive matters of faith through scientific study is like trying to perceive color through one’s ear. The organ of perception is not appropriate for the task.

            This idea of perceiving an experience through the wrong organ of perception can be illustrated by a major league batter and a scientist facing that big league curveball. The major league batter perceives the speed and trajectory of the ball in a totally different way than would a scientist through scientific observation. Major league baseball teams do not teach their batters the physics of linear motion, air density, trajectory, rotation, torque, inertia, momentum, friction and the many other scientific observations involved in perceiving and physically interacting with a big league curveball. This is just the physics behind the perception. Major league baseball teams also do not teach their batters the complex biology of perceiving and acting on the curveball, but the scientist would use all of these scientific observations to perceive the curveball.

            Would any MLB team spend an inordinate amount of money on a big league contract to sign a scientist who has studied all the physical and biological and statistical parameters of hitting a big league curveball so they can have him pinch hit with two outs in the ninth inning of the World Series? Well, maybe the Yankees. But most teams would not spend that money on a scientist to swing away at the curveball because those teams understand that the scientist’s organ of perception is not appropriate to the task.

            The scientist's organ of perception is reason through scientific observations and is not adequate to the task of hitting a major league curveball. The baseball player's organ of perception is experience through interaction and is uniquely tailored to the hitting of the curveball. The curveball is the same for both the scientist and the major league hitter, but the way of perceiving that curveball is completely different for each of them. The hitter perceives all of the physics and biology that the scientist perceives but from an experiential perspective. He is not using the academic disciplines of physics, biology, or math to experience the curveball. His is a different organ of perception. In the same way, the scientist cannot perceive matters of faith through the intellectual disciplines of physical science because matters of faith are perceived and expressed through the human spirit and the organ of perception is faith.

            The human spirit using faith to perceive the material world is as common to human beings as swings of the bat are to big league hitters. What makes a hitter believe that he will be successful at hitting that curveball? Experience and statistics tell a major league hitter that he will fail to hit the ball at least two out of three at bats. The statistics plummet for the hitter when measuring hits per swings of the bat. Science itself says that the act of hitting a round ball with a round bat with both traveling at surprising velocities and angles is an unlikely prospect. The faith of the human spirit gives hope when the material world says, “Probably not.”

            What makes us believe in love, our children's safety, our long-term health, the strength of the roof over our head or the sturdiness of the floor beneath our feet, that the other drivers on the road next to us are not dangerously impaired, or that the food we buy is not tainted? Is it because humanity is safe from mishap, and it is logical and scientific to presume mishap is an unlikely prospect? No! It is because we are creatures of faith, and to live without the hope that faith provides is to invite madness.

            Scientific atheists have the same proclivity to act spiritually through personal faith as the rest of humanity. When personal faith is applied to the question of God the faith of the atheist and the faith of the Christian are but two sides of the same coin. One person’s faith is directed toward God; the other person's away from God. Neither atheism nor Christianity is proved by scientific perception and inquiry. To believe in either atheism or Christianity, the organ of perception is always faith.

            Have you ever wondered why the scientific atheists spend so much time opposing the notion of God? If they are, as they believe, of the enlightened culture, why do they need to constantly oppose the idea of God? Why not state the facts of scientific evidence and let the science speak for itself? If the facts of science are so overwhelmingly in favor of an atheistic view, what more is needed? If science is not overwhelmingly in favor of atheism, then scientific inquiry demands open discussion and reasoned observation.

            Why attack religion at all if it is not part of scientific inquiry? If people believe God exists, so what? How could believing in God possibly affect the findings and evidence contained in the sciences? Why do the scientific atheists waste so much time and energy attacking the idea of God? Yes, there are many answers to these and similar questions, but none of them adequately explain the level of vow-like dedication and emotional earnestness given to the denying of the existence of God by atheists. The atheist doth protest too much, methinks.

            Faith toward or away from God resides deep in the spirit of a person, and there spiritual matters find their most pure expression emotionally. The denying of God is faith-based, and therefore is expressed emotionally which explains the passion with which scientific atheists deny the existence of God. The important question is “What creates this strong personal faith which is channeled toward denying God?”    

            The human spirit is the repository for all that makes humanity unique on the earth. What our spirit expresses can be shaped and affected by our experience. Our experiences in this cruel, painful, and seemingly arbitrary world full of crass, vindictive, and spiteful humanity can, if we allow it, change the nature of our spiritually expressed faith.

            When we see concerns like children suffering, populations starving, or cruelty flourishing; or when we feel our own individual tragedies that result in personal loss, personal suffering, or personal despair; when we feel powerless and impotent to affect change or rescue for ourselves or others in this cold and seemingly random world, out of this cauldron of disappointment and spiritual anguish can be birthed a deeply seething, quiet rage. When this rage is turned inward and buried because it lacks a specific target to blame for the world's general condition or our own life’s tragic chapters, our spirit can despair. If our spirit then surrenders hope for ourselves personally, or for humanity in general, the target for this rage can evolve into God.

            This is not true of every atheist, but it is true of atheism's most passionate core. The impetus behind the rapid growth of the worldwide atheistic movement is this growing quiet surrendering of hope and the accompanying unacknowledged rage. This rage against God and His perceived lack of care for the affairs of humanity in general and in particular individual humans is manifested as atheist faith.

            This cycle begs the question: how can atheists have rage toward God if for them He does not exist? The answer is: “the same way atheists can express so much passion and energy opposing what they say is a figment of the Christian imagination.” The simple answer is this rage is directed at the idea of God—not directly at God Himself. I can rage against the idea of an indifferent, uncaring God and deny His existence at the same time. In fact, my denying of His existence can be fueled by my rage at the idea of an indifferent, uncaring God. This is why atheism, for the most part, cannot be strengthened or weakened through rational discussion because rational thought is not its foundation; rather, its foundation is rage fueled faith.

            Faith is a belief that originates from beyond material perception, and can fuel the expression of deeply felt emotional sentiments. The most important sentiment in an atheist’s faith is: "No matter what we observe or experience in the world around us, God had no part in it because God does not exist." For the intellectual atheist, the idea that God does not exist becomes the controlling passion of his or her life, and then all other ideas, narratives, and conclusions proceed from this statement of faith. The atheist can never be persuaded that the scientific evidence is as inadequate to disprove God’s existence as it is to prove God’s existence because the atheist’s belief is not reason based through the evidence; rather, it is emotion based through faith.

            For the atheist, neither the evidence nor belief in any scientific theory is as important as expressing the quietly emotional rage-fueled faith. For instance, Darwinism is just a vehicle for doing away with the Creation idea. Even if Darwinism is riddled with problems and is largely not supported by the evidence, atheists will still use its narrative to oppose the idea of God creating life until something better comes along.

            This puts scientific atheist in a bit of a quandary. When the evidence is less than compelling (which it is), and the buffet is less than intellectually appetizing (which it is), then the scientific atheist resorts to his last line of defense: "The point is that I'm smarter than you, I am more educated than you, and people listen to me more than they listen to you, so you should believe what I tell you to believe."

            This is the well from which scientific atheists draw the arrogance and ignorance to ignore the Jordan Doctrine—the well of emotional and intellectual desperation.

            Atheist faith is “the surrendering of all hope and the belief in nothing.” Everything is hopeless and means nothing because everything comes from nothing, and everything is headed toward nothing. The love of a child, noble gestures and acts of sacrifice, goodness toward one’s fellow human, the opposition of evil, the concepts of good and evil themselves, and everything else is nothing—just accidents of an accidental universe and without intrinsic value, destined to disappear forever.

            In fact, for the atheist the universe is less than an accident. An accident implies that there is such a thing as purpose because an accident is a deviation from an intended purpose. If there is no purpose behind the creation of the universe, then the universe cannot rise to the level of an accident. The entire universe is something less than an accident—a completely purposeless event called the hopeless universe.

            Here is where atheists face their largest problem. If the universe is a godless and therefore purposeless event, then humans are likewise godless, purposeless events. Every human being’s behavior and choice are just products of undirected purposeless evolution, and since they have no intrinsic value, their morality has no intrinsic value. Moral choices are only what undirected purposeless evolution says is necessary for survival.

            Why not kill other humans if our survival is at stake? Can the human race stand to carry the weak and less valuable? Can the existence of those who jeopardize the existence of humanity by being a drain on resources and not contributing enough to the common good really be tolerated? The only hope the human race has for the future is in cold Darwinist terms: the survival of the fittest.

            The populations of entire countries are increasing beyond the capacity for them to be fed, and these countries contribute little to the survival of the species of humanity. Yet our society continues to feed them, provide them with medical care, and come to their aid when natural disaster strikes. Why should the world continue to spend dwindling resources to aid these countries?

            There are diseases that can be cured much more quickly if our medical establishment used our medical technology to experiment on humans who have no other value. We could also use useless humans as organ donors. Should we really allow a valuable school teacher to die when a pickpocket from a dangerous neighborhood could be made to donate his or her heart? If you find these ideas chillingly familiar (as I certainly do), please tell me what in atheistic philosophy prohibits them? Nothing!

            What you hear from the atheists is that society does not need a God to tell it to do what is good. Humanity knows what is good, and human beings have always known what is good. There is nothing a God can contribute to that knowledge.

            This answer fails because it ignores the obvious problem. On what philosophical framework is atheistic goodness based, and who decides its standard? Who decides which human beings or group of human beings’ philosophy and standard of morality is better than another's? Certainly the Nazis had a philosophical standard of morality.  Torquemada and the Inquisition had a philosophical standard of morality. Pol Pot had a philosophical standard of morality for his killing fields. Stalin's purges had a philosophical and moral standard. Throughout history, the only consistency about the standard of the morality of humanity is that the people in power have the authority to set the criterion.

            If there is no Godly standard beyond what the most powerful humans deem as valuable, then there is no standard at all because it changes with whoever seizes power.

            One can argue that humanity has ignored or deformed a Godly standard of morality in the past, but is the removal of any moral standard beyond what is expressed by human philosophy and power an improvement?

            The only way atheistic faith can be an acceptable belief is to stop it well short of its logical conclusions. The fact that very intelligent people still profess it, is further proof that beliefs pertaining to the question of God comes from somewhere other than the intellect.

            It does not take much imagination or intellect to picture a world governed by a pure and unadulterated atheism, so it would take a blind, irrational faith to continue to work toward creating such a world. It is a very unappetizing idea to eat the fruit of the logical conclusions of intellectual atheism. I am guessing most of us, including most atheists, do not want to.

             Intellectual atheism is “a mythological construct that never existed in the real world.” The fundamentalist zeal with which atheist faith is defended and expressed is at its heart emotional, not intellectual. Reason is a secondary consideration when applying atheistic doctrine to social, political, and scientific policy; therefore, the logical conclusions of applied atheistic ideas are rarely considered when they are introduced to the culture.

            A wide range of our societal ideas are heavily influenced by, if not originating in, atheistic rage-fueled faith and so the arguments for these ideas are emotional ones. These emotional arguments disguised as rational ideas descend upon the population like wolves in (cheap) clothing, without logical foundation or reasoned argumentation. They are immediately controversial, but lack the substance to be discussed rationally and resolved.

            The life blood of democracies is the ability to express, discuss, and incorporate ideas, but when what is being expressed, discussed, and incorporated are emotions disguised as ideas, the people will ultimately lose their way.

            This current danger that intellectual atheism presents is the introduction of an entire class of ideas that cannot be logically resolved but only passionately fought over. Pick any of the most controversial issues about which atheists are vocal and then look for the reasoned atheistic underpinnings of the arguments associated with these issues. If they exist, ask yourself, “How important is reason to the nature of their arguments?” Reason is not very important at all.

            Once enough of these emotions disguised as rational ideas have been introduced, it helps contribute to the dumbing down of the intellectual dialog by common practice. Yes, there are other considerations contributing to the trend of crowning emotional feelings as king, and the manipulation of emotions has always been a part of the public discourse. However, an Intelligentsia that introduces and defends emotions in place of ideas contributes to the smoothing out of this slippery slope. Atheism is becoming a major contributor to this larger trend of the emotionalizing of aspects of the culture that should be dominated by reason.

            The political climate has become so shrill and unreasonable that even presidential campaigns rarely mention issues beyond the point that it allows them to appeal to the public's emotions through attack ads. Discussions in Congress contain so little substance because it is generally understood that it is much more effective to solicit an emotional response from the public and fellow politicians than to present a reasoned argument.

            The legal branch of government is not immune to this trend. People may disagree on the level that emotion-based thinking has entered the judicial branch, but who would argue that the various opinions given across the bench are always only reasoned and logical. How we, as a populace, are made to feel by a law or political policy has become more important than the difficult rational work of building, adjusting, and preserving a free democratic society.

            Feelings are king, and feelings are the driving force in everything informational from the presentation of the news to how the education system is structured, and everything philosophical from how public policy is decided to how personal morality is established.

            Emotions become the shaper of humanity’s body of knowledge when feelings and not reason becomes the governor of what humanity knows. The emotional stimulation of celebrity gossip is more newsworthy than death from war, famine, or epidemic combined as long as the death remains on foreign soil and does not become too entertaining. Teaching students a wide range of ideas and theories is good except for those ideas that compete with the faith-based and therefore emotional ideas contained in the atheistic buffet.

            Emotional expediency is the mother of philosophical choices when there is no God, and how humanity feels emotionally has replaced rational ideas. Killing a newborn is wrong unless “I drop him unprotected in a dumpster to continue to hide my pregnancy from my parents.” “Allowing large groups of people to be poisoned is wrong unless it will give me a political advantage with certain large companies and the regulatory agencies are not likely to find out.”

            Godless emotions disguised as ideas may be good for connecting with daytime talk shows but are dangerous when used as a tool for acquiring knowledge or establishing a moral worldview.

            Intellectual atheism is not a benign alternative to the belief in God. Intellectual atheism and its underlying assumptions are the foundation for a future human condition devoid of any moral standard or the philosophical protections for the concepts and ideas that, for the most part, have protected people from the chaos of human action.  Atheists want to do away with the idea of God and purport that society will be the better for it.

            Yes, it is true that atheists can point to religiously based wickedness and use these examples to argue against the idea of God in society. Everything from the ancient pagan sacrificing of innocent children to the current day murdering of innocent people in the name of religion are pointed to by atheists as arguments for doing away with God and establishing an atheistic society. Atheists do not, however, present reasoned arguments that sustain their own world view because intellectual atheism is nothing more than the shadow cast by religious beliefs and has no sustainable philosophical framework to address the human condition or to replace the moral infrastructure offered by the Judeo-Christian tradition. It is not enough to merely oppose the idea of God without having a competent alternative philosophy for one’s role in the universe and for human interaction.

            No reasonable person will deny that superstition and misinterpreted views of God have had tragic consequences. No reasonable person can also deny the positive influence of the Judeo-Christian tradition on our most fundamental concepts of education, treatment of the ill, our law, our morality, our government, our ideas of freedom, etc. The sweeping away of these foundational societal pillars by an atheistic faith would be devastating. Yes, atheists can point to current negative influences in religion and in our recent and distant past, but to throw out the baby with the baptism is not a reasonable or prudent response.

            As I write this, Western society is most probably safe from a repeat of the secular terrors of Nazi-like doctrine, a Torquemada-like religious torture and oppression, or a Stalin-like atheistic disregard for life, liberty, and freedom, but what is next? What is the next challenge to human quality of life, and who armed with what reasoned moral argument will oppose it?

            War is but the outward expression of irreconcilable worldviews concerning an issue or set of issues, but such worldviews exist in a state of opposition well before they result in physical conflict. Within societies all-out war is usually not the end result of these battles of worldviews, but the intellectual conflict is not any less intense or the results any less sweeping and final on the battlefield of human ideas. You and I will have our lives and our children's lives shaped by the winner of such intellectual battles.

            Popular atheism is the fastest growing faith in the world, and intellectual atheism is tenaciously battling everything that does not agree with it for the power to frame the important issues of our day. As we face the issues of world epidemics, world hunger, controversial scientific advances in various disciplines, population explosions and the other seemingly endless important subjects that we will address as a world society, every free thinking person will have to ask: Is intellectual atheism equipped to provide a sustainable moral framework to address these crucial issues or is it a mythological faith without consistent philosophical or moral substance that can only lead to a downward spiral in the quality of life for individual and corporate humanity?

            To answer this question, however, is not necessarily to choose between Intellectual atheism and a reasoned religious argument. Intellectual atheism has to be judged as a stand-alone idea even though atheists always tie it to religion by using arguments against religion as arguments for atheism. The truth is one can be without religious conviction, a skeptic, or have arguments against religion and still reject the current mythology of intellectual atheism. Intellectual atheism must be judged on its own merit—not accepted as the default belief for anyone who has not embraced the idea of God.  

            What is required of all of us as citizens of the world no matter what our lot, religious beliefs, or education is a rational, objective, and informed assessment of this competing worldview. This question of intellectual atheism is the crucial question of our time for we will shape our future world after the fashion of our answer. What say you of intellectual atheism?

At 3:00 a.m. I am still staring at the screen

watching the sitcom that will never be funny.

The school;

“The Karl Marx Institute for the

Intellectually Atheist.”

And their baseball

Coach, Mr. Darwin,

His mascot:

“Missing Link.”

Only the basketball players are allowed on his team and though swinging and hitless

always end up on base.

At the main entrance and over the door

There appears the credo for the entire school: 

"THERE IS NO GOD, AND I HATE HIM FOR IT."

As I look through the door, I can clearly see the

Cool table atheist in every incarnation.

Some rub their chins trying hard to look so smart. 

Some pray loudly to no one in particular. 

Some blankly relate to the screen of their Smartphone. 

As the science teacher closely monitors the table making sure that everyone is fed.

Now the scene is closing on this happy little school, 

The narrator can now be heard to ask:

Will the cool table atheists survive their latest meal?

Will the science teacher keep everyone at the table?

Will the baseball coach ever find his mascot? 

We will get the answers to these and other questions on the next episode of...

“Buffet the Intellect Slayer."  

The remote stays in my hand,

And I keep pressing the button

But the show just won't stop.

This is our lot.

This is our judgment.

This is the myth we have chosen to deserve.

Vernon L. Harper