Common Sense Atheism

I wish every philosophy book would open with a list of the author’s philosophical positions. This would make the book much easier to understand. Many times, I’ve been confused by a book and set it aside only to find out later that the reason for my confusion was that the author wasn’t using a correspondence theory of truth, or something basic like that. (This is why I often prefer secondary literature to primary literature in philosophy: secondary literature usually makes a greater effort at clarity.)

I’ve noticed this at Common Sense Atheism, too. My readers often leave comments that they are confused by what I’ve said, and it’s because they don’t know the hundreds of prior assumptions under which I’m operating.

Thus, in an effort to be more clear, I’ll try to illuminate my current philosophical positions.

Epistemology

From my epistemology flows everything else.

The continuous failure of intuition, first philosophy, testimony, subjective experience, and authority-based systems of knowing leads me to be highly suspicious of them. These systems are also undermined by recent discoveries about the capabilities and limits of human psychology. In contrast, the massive success of science leads me to suspect that methods condoned by science are the most successful methods of knowing we have discovered yet. This approach tends toward naturalized epistemology: I think philosophy will be most productive when it functions as an extension of successful science, rather than as a kind of “first philosophy” that works “before” or “above” science. And of course I endorse fallibilism. Even our best scientific theories sometimes fail.

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One of Bertrand Russell’s lesser-known pro-secular works is a 1951 piece for New York Times Magazine called “The Best Answer to Fanaticism: Liberalism.” In this, he wrote a “Liberal Decalogue,” what might be better called today a “Secular 10 Commandments”:

1. Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.
2. Do not think it worth while to proceed by concealing evidence, for the evidence is sure to come to light.
3. Never try to discourage thinking for you are sure to succeed.
4. When you meet with opposition, even if it should be from your husband or your children, endeavour to overcome it by argument and not by authority, for a victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory.
5. Have no respect for the authority of others, for there are always contrary authorities to be found.
6. Do not use power to suppress opinions you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.
7. Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
8. Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence as you should, the former implies a deeper agreement than the latter.
9. Be scrupulously truthful, even if the truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it.
10. Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.

My personal favorite is #8. What’s yours?

This comics panel reminds me of a scene I wrote a few years back for a Superman screenplay I was developing. Superman has just appeared to the world and just averted a major crisis, and he decides to give a press conference. (Text reworked to make sense to those who are unfamiliar with screenwriting conventions.)

Reporters shout questions frantically, but one in particular cuts through the noise.

TALL REPORTER: “Do you believe in God?”

The other reporters turn to Tall Reporter.

TALL REPORTER: “Do you believe in God?”

Pause.

SUPERMAN: “Does God exist? I don’t know. But I do know this: If God exists, he gave you those hands and that head and that heart for a reason. You can’t wait for a superhero from the sky to solve your problems. [Pointing] You and you and you and you… we can work together and save this planet.”

Cornball, I know…

Don’t get too excited. Apparently, Superman is a Methodist, and superheroes in general are a remarkably diverse bunch.

I’ve explained before that by Common Sense Atheism I do not mean to say that atheism is “common sense.” I have little respect for common sense. Common sense was what we used to get the wrong answers about damn near everything before science came along. The way the universe really works is very counter-intuitive.

Rather, what I mean is that if you apply the same reasoning to your god as you do to every other god (your “common” sense) then you’ll see that your god doesn’t exist, either. I just mean “No Doubt Standards” atheism.

Christian Bible scholar James McGrath points out that this approach is really just following the Golden Rule:

…one cannot claim that Christianity is grounded purely in history while other traditions are at best shrouded in myth…

…what does it mean to do history [according to the Golden Rule]? …It means doing to the claims of others what you would want done to your claims. And perhaps also the reverse: doing to your own claims, views and presuppositions that which you have been willing to do to the claims, views and presuppositions of others.

Once one begins to attempt to examine the evidence not in an unbiased way, but simply fairly, one cannot but acknowledge that there are elements of the Christian tradition which, if they were in your opponent’s tradition, you would reject, debunk, discount, and otherwise find unpersuasive or at least not decisive or compelling.

We might call this Golden Rule Epistemology. Don’t retreat to special pleading. Treat claims fairly. Do unto the claims of others what you would want done unto yours: Examine them charitably, humbly, and critically.

My claim is that if you succeed – if you apply the same standards to your theistic beliefs as you do to beliefs about other people’s gods, or to UFO stories, or to ghosts, or to scientific beliefs – then you will see that your god is an illusion just like all the others.

Historian Michael Hart is best known for his ranking of the 100 Most Influential People in History.

He also wrote A View from the Year 3000, a book written under the name “Arturo Kukeni, a descendent of Michael Hart.” The book pretends to be a new ranking of the 100 Most Influential People in History, written from the year 3000. Thus, it contains many invented people of the future, such as Chang Po-Yao, inventor of brain replacement surgery, and Pridi Thanarat, a revolutionary who averted the world’s descent into global dictatorship.

A short chapter on each figure describes, from the view of the year 3000, their impact on world history. Even a thousand years from now, “Arturo Kukeni” ranks Jesus at #8 and Mohammad at #9.

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