Interracting with the Atheistic Worldview

This is part one of the letters I have sent to Ravi Zecharias. Each of these are original letters sent out, and address important issues for Christian Ministry Outreach. I hope you enjoy the writing.

God bless,

Casey Powell

Mr. Zecharias,
I have been hard at work critiquing viewpoints from an Atheistic point of view. I hope you enjoy my article here:
Atheism is a belief that does not allow for any intrinsic value of anything. It is a position that is completely devoid of content, meaning or usefulness. A natural problem I find with Atheism is for some reason, Atheism will not allow the value of necessary Axiological Truths. If Axiology, which is the study of morality and values as they pertain to individuals in society, as to whether they are more or less instilled within us or not. Atheism/Existentialism/Postmodernism/Skepticism fail on account of these principles alone from the Moorean Philosophy(named from Thomas Moore himself). Its interesting against the wishes of one gentleman who promoted the belief that Theism was the philosophically default position, I decided to actually tackle this Atheism itself by accepting its principles to see where I could go from there. No. 1, from both the Atheistic and Christian perspectives, growth is necessary and inevitable within humankind. The only question to the growth condition itself is whether the value that we attribute things is based upon us or if they are based upon society, or if they are ultimately based upon our morality itself, naturally instilled within us. We know these as basically moral relativism and moral objectivism. I have been told in the past we can not prove moral objectivism, but again, I contend, it IS possible to prove just about anything that is rationally sound. Fundamentally there are three principles we ascribe to values: "One is to say that a thing is "intrinsic" means merely that the question of a thing that possesses it and in what degree it possesses it depends solely on the intrinsic nature of the thing in question." This prevents those to say, well that has no intrinsic value in itself or to me. This established by Thomas Moore is the Supervenience Principle. A second principle states that something has value if and only if it is in the same value in complete isolation, known as the Isolation Principle. The final principle is the Necessity Principle, which states that something has value if it exists whenever and wherever it may exist, it still maintains that value as necessary. The only position possible here for the Atheist is to state that Nothing Came from Something, and that we therefore are in charge of creating whatever morals are intrinsically necessary for our own survival. Where then, did the Atheistic position come from one must ask? Of what value may we ascribe it? If nothing came from something, it also violates the Necessity Principle of Axiomatic functionality. Another position that Atheism may take is Anti-Essentialism, otherwise known as, no principles are essential to humankind. Again, this principle asserts enough to rid itself of importance, and essential becomes the Anti-Essentialism of Atheism. In other words, Relativism must be asserted in all manners in order for Atheism to exist, but then, what is Atheism relative to one is compelled to ask? If values are not necessary, then what gives value to the non-necessity? Of course from the Atheistic mindset, they can simply go back and refer to Evolution. Thanks to British Naturalist Charles Darwin, this little trap seems to be the only alternative. One must ask how can values evolve? Again, when we speak of values, we must speak of the principles inherent to their property. Again, the fundamental principle of Supervenience is violated, as Evolution can not account for the fact that the thing-in-itself is necessary to have some sort of initial inherent value in itself. Erego, Evolution becomes impossible to describe this scenario, and we have eliminated excuses from the Atheistic hypothesis. From the Philosophical standpoint, Atheism is simply meaningless in value, but attempts to prescribe this same value to everything including Truth. However, one may not forget that Atheism is halted by its own premises here. Given we accept this principle as true, we shall move forward to more inherent problems with the natural structure of pure Atheism. The first problem is, the structure that Atheism attempts to attribute is that of no structure at all. If it is the case that Atheism has no structure, then one is justified in claiming that Atheists are Theists. Again, tell an Atheist that they are Theists, we will know that this will not go over very well. But in effect, the Atheist simply chooses to not care correct? We have enough to overcome the Atheistic position with that one stance, but the second premise is, who cares? Why care? Whats to care about? How do we know what to care about? When do we care about things? Of course, we all play their little skeptical games as Christians, so we're very familiar with these tactics. The second strategy of the Atheistic mentality to avoid having to answer to a Creator is simply, question everything. If one is to question everything, he must be consistent by questioning why he is questioning everything. If he comes to an answer on this question, then the answer becomes enough so that not everything is questionable. The Atheist's next tactic is to question and doubt the answer obtained. To do this would then be to attempt to resolve an answer by resorting to another answer of a sort, that of questioning. So again, he has undercut his very motives for acting. Actual infinity would be declared possible by the Atheist, in which case he allows for infinite regresses to occur, and that only potentiality and probability are possible. We may know this tactic utilized frequently from David Hume in his Enquiry of Human Understanding. Of course, the Atheist has no problem contradicting himself when you mildly point out to him that he'd have to be certain of this in order for it to be possible. He would assert that you're begging the question. How do we get around this tactic then? Well, we must keep in mind that the position itself is ad hoc. So it is not disingenius and insincere for a Theist to point out that an Atheist may not assert the begging the question fallacy here. To assert this would then mean that the Atheistic points become moot from here on out. Of course, if the Atheist now accepts this premise that he doesn't care, then he has to explain why this point has any inherent meaning in order for him to care about it at all (recall, the Atheist is not at all interested in trying to convert you to Atheism, simply just to hassle and ridicule). Any kind of hassling and ridicule may fundamentally be reverted against itself by proclaiming, "well at least you do this one positive quality in itself." So, again, we are demonstrating that fundamental position that one may not prove a negative of any sort. Again, the Atheist would be hardpressed for an answer besides, well, now I'm doing it and its okay. This is very self-righteous behavior and any Christian would be able to identify this as well. However, instead of actually judging him to be self-righteous, why not undertake a different tactic here. We should demonstrate to him that his own behavior can not be justified. If someone jumps off of a bridge, since this is a bad thing, and you jump afterwards, would this be okay? If the Atheist is not insane, he will say no. However, if we are dealing with one who likes to increasingly play the Nihilism game, we may not be so fortunate here. One may feel its okay or it depends or whatever I feel like doing is right is an appropriate answer here. Again, the value system is what we are attempting to focus on here, and this is the main thing that the Atheist overlooks. So we need to always relate it back to the value system of the Atheist here, notifying to ourselves that since we do live in an Objective Reality, the morality of each of our beings is within us (even a sociopath can be led to have values...absolute insanity is impossible). The Atheist seems to want to follow the path of the negative, or simply is confused as to which path to follow, and really doesn't care one way or the other. Its also possible to have an Individualist on your hands, but this of course can easily be demonstrated false as to show that if everyone was an Individualist, we would be collectively individual, and thats nonsense. Back to getting the Atheistic value system built up. To get an Atheist to care is very difficult, but ultimately can be done when we look at the fickleness within the very nature of the Atheistic morality system. We can add that an Atheist would believe that morals are different for each person, and constitute a different value for each person. Again, note the easy refutation of this position, since if morals are different for each person, he is now stating that this one thing must be similar about morality to each person. This alone is enough to refute moral relativism. We have a new problem here though that many Christians take for granted as obvious truth that the Atheist does not see as obvious due to his obfuscations. The value of the system and how it belong within the Atheist may not be understood as to how it works. It can be demonstrated here that if value relativism were possible, then it would be dependent upon the individual and not the thing-in-itself. If we are to state that the individual is the only thing of worth (again, collective individuality, but we can demonstrate another issue regarding this here) it may not be wise to simply ask, well think about something of value to you (again, this would revert to proving his position). If I am the only thing of value, then there's a problem because how would I know that I'm the only thing of value? What about knowledge in itself? This would have to carry a stronger value. The only response is that he may then say, "I know nothing." But its very self-evident that we can point out to the Atheist that he at least knows that one thing, giving its intrinsic worth at least what he proclaims here. At this point, the Atheist may wake up and smell the roses and proclaim, "Okay, so thats great, but it really doesn't matter what you believe since its all the same." To this, he has violated the principle of Necessity. Each one of those words would necessarily carry a different value since they are all different words, and therefore different things-in-themselves. One may then be compelled to state that they're just words being asserted, but again, if they are just words being asserted, we may ask him how he had that idea in the first place to come up with this statement. If he has stated that he had no abstract ideas to conform this to, we must demonstrate that he must have abstact ideas to conform even the idea that there are no abstract ideas. This is not difficult to do. As Mortimer Adler proclaims, "We are therefore, obliged to ask them whether we are able to apprehend what is common to two or more entities [e.g. the category "dog" is common to both an Airedale and a poodle], or apprehend the respects in which they are the same. If their answer to this question is negative, they have again completely undercut their own explanation of the meaning of common names as applicable to two or more items indifferently (i.e., with respect to some point in which they are not different). If we caannot apprehend any respect in which two or more items are the same we cannot apply one and the same name to them indifferently.
The only alternative left open to them is an affirmative answer to the question: Are we able to apprehend what is common to two or more entities, or apprehend respects in which they are the same?
If they give that affirmative answer, because they must either give it or admit that they have no explanation to offer, then the giving of that answer is tantamount to a refutation of their original position. (Adler, TPM, 44, 45)." The Atheist here may be compelled to again question the nature of argumentation. He may state, "well, we don't really start from axioms and get to truth in the first place. There is no truth except for that which can be perceived." One must wonder how the Atheist can avoid this stance at all. If he is stating that our words can not describe anything, then he's undercut his position by describing the claim. If he is trying to undercut his thinking process, then he must think to derive such a method, which self destructs. If he is inferring or implying that he is not stating anything, then the statement inferrred would be that he is stating at least that one thing. Usually when the Atheist affirms that we have no truth except for that which can be perceived, its not always wise to go with the standard, if everything is perception and thats objectively true, everything is not perception and thats objectively false. The Atheistic position would note a dichotomy between knowledge and metaknowledge. If we are to combine this dichotomy so that the Atheist may note this is a false distinction, the Atheist must be made aware of this position. The Atheistic heart is not willing to see this distinction, so again, its about opening the will of the unbeliever to seek the truth (which we are naturally inclined to do). One must therefore note that his will to believe this distinction can infer a type of metaknowledge and knowledge packed into one thing here. Another response from the Atheist to this might be they are mutually exclusive from his will. To this, respond by asking him why he'd be willing to believe that at all. This is where we usually get word games from the Atheist on the word belief. Belief is something that the Atheistic system of thought would simply take for granted based on what the individual believes, as distinctively the passionate position towards a love for Jesus Christ can be somewhat differentiated only insofar as on relies on self and the other of course God incarnate. This could be to state that the Atheist may have the systematic thinking that, if I believe it it is so, or if Society believes it it is so, such as the thinking refuted by Greg Koukl and Peter Kreeft referring to I Say Relativism and Society Says Relatiivsm. Of course, pointing out several factors from the Nazi community may be enough to explain this to the Atheist and to conform to your point as well taken. We can also ask him if he's ever made a mistake that he regrets in his life and the affirmative yes would be sufficient (and of course whether or not his teacher has ever misled him to get something wrong on a test before to refute the Society Says Relativism). This is just enough to open the door to our next point. To this, a drastic answer must take place to shift the Atheistic worldview (remember it is just a worldview based around the individual so we are talking about the same thing here as to what they person believes) to where we need it to be, since the Atheist may be a bit flustered if we are to simply write him off here. He may claim, I have no belief. Of course the natural response is to ask how he has this belief in the first place, but a better response could most certainly ensue. The Atheist is usually looking for something a bit more here. We can in fact ask him if he knows that George Washington ever existed as an example. If he says no here, then we need only point to the Principle of Sufficient Reasoning and present evidence to the Atheist. This is enough to get him to think otherwise on this point. By now you've got the Atheist wondering, if I can be wrong, and Society can be wrong, can anybody be right? The answer to this of course that it is a necessity by virtue that he ask the question. A forteriori is simply a claim used here, but if we wish to break this down, its necessary by virtue that he as well as ourselves know what the word Right means in the first place. It is impossible to affirm existence without something of its essence to come along with it. Now mind you, the Atheistic Metaphysical position is a bit misconstrued here. His position is more of a pick and choose what is relevant to the topic at hand, since again nothing is more important than himself here. We have two responses to this. First of all, how did you come into existence in the first place? Naturally he will begin to think about his essence. But again, existence precedes essence in the form of mankind for the Atheist. This may not be enough, insofar as all we have done essentially is to get the Atheist to acknowledge that some form of essence exists. But where? Again, we know the answer is God, but the Atheist is not ready to accept this conclusion yet. It is still dependent upon I, and not God yet. God is created in the image of mankind as the Atheist affirms. To affirm the position otherwise that God create mankind, it need only be demonstrated that we do a few several things. First of all, we must demonstrate to him that Solipsism is false. The existence of any other human being is fine to explain this away, but we still have yet another problem. The idea of free will! Believe it or not, the Atheist believes in free will to a maximal extent, to an unnecessarily extreme extent. Or he may affirm Determinism to an unnecessarily extreme extent. We must be quick to point out that this is a false dilemma which ever position he affirms to be the case and demonstrate that he must choose determinism in order for it to work, in which case it would be false, and that in order for him to affirm liberalism, there must be that predetermined position to accept the conclusion to begin with, else there is nothing to accept. This rids us of most of the problems of Anti-Essentialism, and we can now get the Atheist to see the significance of of Fundamental Principles within his framework. Again though, the Tabula Rasa is still a question mark for the Atheist. The Tabula Rasa must first be demonstrated false before we can proceed, else he realizes none of the above can work. The Principle of Consciousness, which states that the conscious mind must always be conscious of something is enough to do away with the Tabula Rasa. Of course, we must also point out that understanding can not be developed by the Tabula Rasa, since this is a Metaphysical item which must therefore be acclimated to the Physical being's mind. If we can not use understanding to come up with the Tabula Rasa, then the idea of the Tabula Rasa is nonexistent, and therefore, the position vanishes along with it, leaving us only with a possibility that pre-instilled items exist Metaphysically for mankind. The only thing we have to worry is he now believes it all comes down to him. If his belief is that it all comes down to him, we must answer that a predetermined belief must be settled first (Metaphysical Principle, nonbeing can not create being), which would then get rid of his Subjective Reality, if this is applicable to see a fully developed Objective Reality independent of himself and that this his belief not enough in itself. Thus Individualism has been thwarted. Now we are to the point that an Atheist may start to see Universals, though this may be a bit foreign to him at first. From here, the cause and effect principle is enough for him to land on the path of the Thomistic arguments for God, and this is enough in itself to prove the existence of God. The solid foundation has been asserted, and we have at least opened the Atheist up to a possibility of God's existence. With this stated, we have completely reconstructed the belief system inherent to the Atheist to where he is now able to see that the mind is predisposed to the truth. The rest is up to the correct guidance and information which can be provided by the Christian himself. While Atheism may be a difficult position to overcome after accepting its premises as true (even though they are false) it is a doable job. We of course can use the usual demonstration of showing how the brain in a vat argument is self defeating and he is well on his way to recovery. Atheism as a position is most certainly not a position that is easy to handle. The position primarily dictates that its position is there is no position. Thus Atheism of course seemingly contradicts itself (to which the Atheist then tries to overcome the 2nd principle of noncontradiction by stating that its only a paradoxical condition, but we must also demonstrate that paradoxes are still demonstratively false from a logical perspective). The difficulty with Atheism is getting the adherents to trust the truth. Once we can open up the heart in order to seek God, from there, the position vanishes and the concern for anything anti-Theistic goes away as well. Of course, since the law of necessity as it pertains to values must concern the truth is necessarily a positive thing, we must therefore have no fear of it conforming the Atheists heart. The truth shall set him free, to where the position of at least Theism can be asserted Philosophically and Theologically as a default. Words in themselves have no meaning to the Atheist. Its our jobs as Christians to demonstrate therefore that words do have inherent meaning that naturally conform to the thing-in-itself. I certainly hope this examination has been as helpful to you as it has been for me. :).