Is It Worth Arguing With Atheists?
Bill Vallicella argues against arguing with atheists.
My advice: don't debate atheists. Read their arguments and consider them carefully. Then think the problem through for yourself in as intellectually honest and existentially serious a manner as you can. Then decide whether to engage in religious practices. Debate with atheists is like debate with leftists: it is unlikely to be fruitful. There is no fruitful debate without common ground, and theists and atheists share very little common ground.1
Here I’ll report my own experience. I used to be an atheist, as many readers know. But I was not a politically motivated atheist. Really, I just did not see good reasons to believe in God and thought there were pretty good reasons not to believe in God. Because my atheism had no deeper connection to anything really meaningful for me – and especially once I saw how naturalism itself was quite incompatible with virtually all I considered meaningful – it was not particularly difficult for me to abandon atheism and consider seriously and fairly theism.
My mistake when entering online debates was thinking most atheists are like how I was. If I just presented the reasons that lead me away from atheism and toward classical theism and eventually Catholicism, perhaps, even if they don’t convert on the spot, they’ll see the position as being, nevertheless, reasonable. How naïve.
Sure, some atheists were like that. However, the majority – the overwhelming majority, in my experience – are politically motivated atheists. By politically motivated I mean that a prior commitment (either to one issue or a set of issues) is the primary determinant of one’s attitude toward God, from which motivated reasoning arises.
Consider, for example:
The dominant indicator of politically motivated atheism is, of course, the wholesale, uncritical adoption of progressive politics.
Look, whatever else one wants to say about the difficulty of certain religious beliefs, I do not think anybody could convince me the progressive dogmas are easier to believe. With religious belief, one may occasionally have to step beyond what is directly evidenced, but with progressive ideology, one quite often has to step against what is directly evidenced. Atheists of this sort do not strike me as sincere seekers of truth — I’m sorry, they just don’t. (Obvious disclaimer: one doesn’t have to be an atheist to engage motivated reasoning, but that isn’t what this post is about.)
So, I agree with Bill, to some extent. We should argue mostly with people we share some common ground with. On the other hand, there obviously remain atheists who do share common ground with theists — who rightly reject the sophistry and intimidation tactics of leftism, but adopt other traditional values, as well — and there I have found very productive conversation indeed. As usual, one must be discerning.
- Pat
PS - Nothing of the above should be taken to mean it isn’t worth engaging atheism as an ideology. The question is whether one should spend time quarreling with this or that atheist online, or wherever.
