Atheism For Dummies (For Dummies (Religion & Spirituality)) (11 page)

I contend we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.

The passage originated in an online debate he’d had around that time. When a Christian in the discussion asked why Stephen ignored the evidence for the Christian God, he asked in turn why the Christian chose to ignore the evidence for Shiva, Zeus, or any of the other possible gods. He used this quote to point out that believers in any given god are in fact atheistic toward all other possible gods — that they have declined to believe in the existence of those gods in very much the same way Stephen has. Stephen, though, has simply gone one god further.

Russell’s labels: Why most atheists are agnostics and vice versa

British philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) expressed an idea that is both simple and striking: He felt that all opinions, without exception, should be held
conditionally
(capable of being changed), not
dogmatically
(etched in stone). When people feel the evidence for a claim is strong, they can be confident in the claim, consider it true, and act accordingly, but they should always keep their minds open to new evidence or further thinking that might change their opinions.

The idea is quite simple, but people seldom think this way. Russell thought life would be much better if they did. Imagine how different life would be if every statement of opinion ended with the words, “Of course, I might be wrong.” Discussing even the most delicate subjects without coming to blows would be possible. Just imagine:

Theist:
“I feel very strongly that God exists. Of course, I might be wrong.”

Atheist:
“I feel just as strongly that he doesn’t. I might be wrong as well.”

Suddenly, a real conversation becomes possible. Both sides can offer forceful, passionate arguments, and the admission that some degree of doubt always exists allows each to better hear what the other has to say.

Of course Russell couldn’t simply wish this solution on the world, and once in a while, the conflict between his understanding of how opinions should be held and the way other people understood it created a real problem. When he traveled to a foreign country, for example, he was always asked by officials (as was the convention at the time) what his religion was. He never knew quite what to say. Russell was of the strong opinion that God didn’t exist, and he admitted (as he did with all his opinions) that he might be wrong about that. In other words, he fit comfortably in two categories that most people think are mutually exclusive: atheist and agnostic.

Russell was well aware of the popular misconceptions that atheists are entirely certain and that agnostics are precisely in the middle, and he knew that other philosophers shared his understanding. So when speaking to philosophers, as he often did, Russell always described himself as agnostic, because as he put it, “I do not think that there is a conclusive argument by which one can prove that there is not a God,” and philosophers would understand what he meant.

But he also wanted to give an accurate impression to everyday people. If he described himself as agnostic to a general audience, he knew they’d think he was smack in the middle between belief and disbelief, shrugging his shoulders, when in fact he leaned heavily in the direction of disbelief. If he was going to call himself agnostic about the Christian god, he once said, he should really also call himself an agnostic toward Zeus, Apollo, and the rest of the Greek gods as well. He didn’t think they existed either, but he certainly couldn’t prove it. Proof of Zeus could come to light tomorrow afternoon. But it’s so incredibly unlikely that most people would find it strange to say they were agnostic toward the existence of Zeus.

Russell’s position on the God of the Bible is exactly the same as most people’s position on Zeus. Because most people consider themselves fully atheistic toward Zeus and friends, Russell would call himself an atheist when addressing a general audience.

In 1958, Russell hit on a useful analogy to explain this position even more clearly. He asked his readers to imagine their reaction if he said he believed that a tiny bone china teapot is in orbit around the Sun between Earth and Mars — one too tiny to be seen even by our most powerful telescopes. Would you be obligated to believe the teapot exists just because you could not disprove it? Of course not. Nobody thinks the existence of such a thing is likely enough to be taken into account in practice, Russell said. And he considered the Christian God just as unlikely as the teapot.

To understand Russell’s meaning, take a moment to prove conclusively that no such teapot exists or that Zeus and the rest of the gods of ancient Greece don’t exist. (Be sure to show your work.) Russell said doing so is impossible. I certainly can’t do it.

Yet even though such certain proof can’t be found, acting and living as if they don’t exist seems reasonable. Russell felt very much the same about the God of the Judeo-Christian Bible. Agnostics today who share his position often call themselves “teapot agnostics” in tribute to that evasive little piece of china.

Agnostic
underlines the uncertainty;
atheist
underlines the opinion that one conclusion is much more nearly certain than the other.
Note:
Russell opts to capitalize Atheist and Agnostic.

Dawkins’s degrees: The seven-point belief scale

Biologist Richard Dawkins (b. 1941) was renowned as a popularizer of science for more than 25 years before turning his attention to advocating atheism and critiquing religion. Since that change of focus, Dawkins’s direct, forthright approach has made him the ultimate atheist in the popular mind.

Even though most atheists agree that God’s nonexistence can never be stated with absolute certainty, most people who know of Dawkins assume that he, surely, claims to be certain that God doesn’t exist. In fact, he doesn’t say that, and never has, and almost certainly never would.

Science doesn’t work like that, he explains — and despite earnest claims to the contrary, “the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other.” Science is about increasing or decreasing confidence in a hypothesis, not switching between complete doubt and complete certainty.

In his book
The God Delusion,
Dawkins created what he called a seven-point belief scale between the extremes of certainty in religious belief. A “1” on the scale indicates certainty that God exists. Someone who scores a “1” says that no new information can ever change their opinion. On the other end of the scale is the person who claims to be certain that God does
not
exist, and that no new information can ever change their opinion. That person scores a “7.” These are the dogmatic thinkers Bertrand Russell warned about in the previous section.

Someone who scores a “2” believes God is very probable and lives his or her life as if he does exist, but stops short of claiming absolute certainty. A “6” indicates a strong probability that God does not exist, but stops short of absolute certainty.

Russell would surely have called himself a “6” — and he’s not the only one. Dawkins also calls himself a “6” on the scale. In a 2012 interview with the Archbishop of Canterbury and philosopher Anthony Kenny, Dawkins was asked why he doesn’t call himself an agnostic if he says he isn’t completely sure. When he said that he does in fact consider himself an agnostic, there was a shocked gasp from the audience, not to mention the worldwide press the following day. The world’s most famous atheist had admitted he was actually an agnostic!

Of course saying he “admitted” to being an agnostic was as silly as saying a Christian “admitted” he is actually a Lutheran. Dawkins was laying claim to two entirely compatible labels. But unlike Russell, he made the statement in front of an audience that was unlikely to know that the labels are compatible.

Emphasizing Doubt: Agnostics Aren’t Sure (and Neither Are You)

In a world of loud, confident positions, few are as misunderstood as the humble agnostic. Just as atheism means “without god belief,”
agnosticism
adds that same “a” to the Greek word for knowledge
(gnosis)
to mean “without knowledge.” An agnostic is someone who doesn’t know something, or (more usefully) someone who chooses to emphasize his or her lack of certain knowledge. In most cases it refers to a person who emphasizes a lack of knowledge about the existence of God. But as Bertrand Russell pointed out, an agnostic is rarely just in the shrugging middle. (For more information on Russell, refer to the previous section, “
Russell’s labels: Why most atheists are agnostics and vice versa
.”)

According to Richard Dawkins’s seven-point belief scale (check out the earlier section, “
Dawkins’s degrees: The seven-point belief scale
” for more information), people may vary in their opinions, but most, including Dawkins himself, fall between the extremes of certainty that God exists and certainty that he doesn’t. If any degree of doubt qualifies a person for the label, most believers and nonbelievers alike are technically agnostics. They may have strong opinions, but they don’t claim to know for sure.

Just like the word atheism, agnosticism breaks down into a blizzard of sublevels, the two most interesting being weak and strong.

A
weak agnostic
position says, “I don’t know if a god exists, but there might be enough evidence one way or another at some point.”

A
strong agnostic
says God’s existence is both unknown and unknowable. Or, as one of my favorite bumper stickers puts it: MILITANT AGNOSTIC — I don’t know and you don’t either.

The following section traces the origin of the word agnostic and shows that the idea itself was around long before there was a word for it.

Though religious doubt had been around for millennia, the word
agnosticism
itself wasn’t coined until 1869 when the English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley created it as a label for his own beliefs. Huxley felt that atheism implied certainty, and though he was very confident God didn’t exist, he didn’t want to imply he was 100 percent sure. But he was also nowhere near being a religious believer.