“It did seem like a good idea at the time.” The words of regret uttered in the aftermath of a bad idea set into motion. Wisdom is having the wherewithal to navigate away from these sorts of situations. This is something that I appreciate about How to be An (A)theist: Why Many Skeptics Aren’t Skeptical Enough (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016) by Mitch Stokes, who offers a sobering look into the ominous consequences of embracing atheism, and why skeptics are far less skeptical than their atheism really demands. There are real regrets at the end of the atheist train ride.
“I’m a skeptic about religion,” Stokes writes, who goes on to state, “I understand why some people are skeptical about religion. What I don’t understand is how naïve some atheists are about the rational strength of their proposition” (13). For Stokes, “one of atheism’s virtues is its avowed skepticism…yet many unbelievers, it seems to me, don’t take their skepticism seriously enough: (14).
How to be An (A)theist is broken down into three sections addressing the real problems atheists come across in taking for granted their own reliability of sense perception and reason while taking serious the philosophy of Dave Hume, their trust in science as a means of discovering truth, and the presumption that they can be a standard of morality for all people.1 Stokes carefully outlines and explains why this is the case for skeptics who embrace philosophical naturalism — the idea that the material world is all that exists, as Carl Sagan puts it: “the cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.”
Very few skeptics can perceive where the atheist train ride ends. One exception is Alexander Rosenberg, Professor of Philosophy at Duke University, who writes,
Is there a God? No,
What is the Nature of Reality? What physics says it is.
What is the purpose of the universe? There is none.
What is the meaning of life? Ditto.
Why am I here? Just dumb luck.
Does prayer work? Of course not.
Is there a soul? Is it immortal? Are you kidding?
What happens when we die? Everything pretty much goes on as before, except us.
What is the difference between right and wrong, good and bad? There is no moral difference between them.
Why should I be moral? Because it makes you feel better than being immoral.
Is abortion, euthanasia, suicide, paying taxes, foreign aid, or anything else you don’t like forbidden, permissible, or sometimes obligatory? Anything goes.
What is love, and how can I find it? Love is the solution to a strategic interaction problem. Don’t look for it; it will find you when you need it.
Does history have any meaning or purpose? It’s full of sound and furry, but signifies nothing.
Does the human past have any lessons for our future? Fewer and fewer, if it ever had any to begin with.2
Rosenburg does what very few atheists do; rather, than touting that there can be morals and meaning without God, he “bites the bullet” and accepts the real implications of the atheistic worldview he has adopted. Atheism leaves little to offer with respect to morals and meanings, for it is unable to find a rational explanation for their existence. Hence, atheism ultimately leads to nihilism. Nevertheless, Stokes points out “even those naturalists who are convinced by reason that nihilism is true will continue to feel that life has meaning enough to carry on” and “Even if we imagine ourselves in a Sisyphus-like position, rolling the stone up the hill only to watch it fall back down simply so we can repeat the struggle, humans will very often carry on” (239).
Skepticism is easy if one only has to sit in the seat of doubt all day and questions every single proposition that comes up. Is that really the case? How so? Why think that way? But atheism taken to its logical extension ends in nihilism and a skepticism that presumes there is a basic reliability in sense perception (what we can see, hear, smell, taste, touch, etc.), that finds that science can provide answers to the basic structure of the universe, and that there can be a basis for objective moral for the common good of all, they are not nearly being skeptical enough in their atheism, as Stokes rightly contends.
How to be An (A)theist: Why Many Skeptics Aren’t Skeptical Enough is a great read and valuable addition to any personal library in the philosophy and Christian apologetics section. It is hardly fluffy easy reading, but I find it will be totally beneficial to anyone who puts the effort in grappling well with the Mitch Stokes’ arguments.
— WGN
- It is not that atheists are unable to figure out good and bad, nor that that they are unable to do good but not evil, but that they are without a basis for knowing good and evil, and determining whether their code of ethics can be universally applied.
- Alexander Rosenberg, The Atheist Guide to Reality: Enjoying Life Without Illusions (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2011), 2-3.
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