Consciousness and belief formation are complex topics, but I’d like to take a shot at tackling them here. As a rule, we all tend to assume that people who say things which support our core beliefs are fundamentally like us, even though they might not be at all. Likewise, we tend to assume that people who say things that contradict our core beliefs are fundamentally *not* like us, even though that might not be true, either.
I recently had someone tell me that the statements, “I’m not convinced that there is a God out there, but I don’t rule out the possibility that one exists” and “I’m an atheist because I do not believe in God,” were mutually exclusive. That I myself was guilty of the kind of irrational faith that I question and even occasionally ridicule when I run across it in others.
I can only respond that they absolutely are not contradictory. I don’t personally believe in a god or gods. I have no reason to believe that they exist, in no small part because any such belief about the nature of such a God would be completely arbitrary.. an accident of what sounds best. This does not mean that I utterly rule out the possibility of a god or gods, it just means that I don’t see any evidence to suggest that such god or gods exist. The difference is what ontological arguments are all about. More on that here.
It’s possible that there may very well be a god or gods that set the whole shebang in motion, but our human presence here on this pale blue dot is utterly unimportant to that god or gods. It’s possible that there may very well be a god or gods, and our human presence here is essential to some greater plan for the whole Universe. It’s also possible that any number of scenarios in between these two extremes could exist, but that doesn’t make the ontological argument compelling to me. It just means that these are possibilities. I don’t see any reason to believe them, but they are possibilities. Just like Russel’s teapot and the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
As a former (and, I might add, rather devout) theist, I freely admit that the existence of a supreme guiding intelligence is far more compelling than the existence of an Invisible Pink Unicorn or any other variation thereof. But, and here’s the crucial thing here, I have no *reason* to believe that any of them do exist. I can theorize that the world would be a more perfect place if they did, but that doesn’t make supernatural forces suddenly pop into existence. It doesn’t negate their presence if they do exist. It just means I don’t see a reason to believe that they do.
Even Dawkins doesn’t rule out the possibility of a God. He just states the rather ordinary truth that imagining that the Universe exists solely to give rise to and direct the course of human history is creating God in man’s image in a rather severe way. (If there is a God, I suspect He’s even more partial to hydrogen and helium than He is to beetles.)
Show me evidence of the nature of God tomorrow in a way that no two people can disagree on, a way that meets the traditional definition of God as a supernatural force intervening in human affairs in a way that simply cannot be explained any other way, and I’m a believer. But I don’t find the God of the Gaps a compelling one. “Miracles” as I have seen them so far are simply the holes in our understanding, made clear by the blinding insights of some scientific genius, rendered mundane on close scrutiny, or left decidedly unknown. While it’s technically possible that a God or Gods would care enough about our speck of dust in the Milky Way to intervene directly in our affairs, but not care enough to clarify the “Thou Shalt Not Kill” rule by sweeping away some of the more prevalent confusion about precisely which Will should or should not be done… well, it strains credulity for me.
And as far as the whole “fundamentalist atheist” thing goes–to the best of my knowledge, I have not ever slapped down anyone’s speculation as long as it’s framed in those terms. I have simply pointed out the reasons why I don’t find that speculation compelling. It’s when speculation is presented as incontrovertible evidence for a Truth which cannot be questioned even though it’s completely arbitrary– an accident of geography, and utterly interchangeable with myths from another corner of the globe which would be just as incontrovertible for precisely the same reasons if the person preaching that truth had been born in a different spot or to different parents… yeah, that’s when I get a little slap-happy.
But that’s alright. A True Believer can take it and dish it back, and it’s all in good fun. I know I certainly did when I was a True Believer, and anyone who can’t take the heat isn’t really committed to a spiritual quest, IMO.
