God’s inaction in action

Great interview!

Mysterious Ways Indeed!!!

What’s the Best Religion for Tiger Woods?

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-january-4-2010/the-best-f–king-news-team-ever—tiger-woods–faith

The Day God Did Nothing

One of my favorite shows is HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm.  If you haven’t seen it, you should take a look. It is written by and stars Larry David.  David is the co-creator of the hit TV show Seinfeld and, understandably, the humor on the two shows is similar.  This season on Curb, Larry David (who plays himself in the show) decides to convince the former Seinfeld stars to do a reunion show.  Each one he visits is reluctant (reunion shows are usually lame) but he manages to sway them.  In one of his conversations with a cast member, he is told “Well, it would help make up for that final episode of Seinfeld.”  For the one or two of you who didn’t see it, the final episode of Seinfeld ended with the cast being sent to prison for failing to aid a passerby who was being mugged.  It was surreally disappointing.

It did bring up the point (humorless as it was) that standing by and doing nothing while someone is in need of assistance is, at the very least, not an admirable thing to do.  Interestingly, the Seinfeld characters were prosecuted under something that is often called a “Good Samaritan Law.”  It is named after the New Testament story where Jesus himself tells a story about a man who was robbed and beaten and left on the side of the road.  Several people pass by without helping, but a Samaritan comes by and bandages his wounds, takes him to an inn and loans him some money.  He ends the story with the famous phrase “Go and do likewise.”  It is clear that God believes in helping people if you are able, and many a Christian teacher has referenced this excellent parable and exhorted good Christians to do the same. 

But a few years ago, God was caught in a classic example of “Do as I say, not as I do.”  At 00:58:52 UTC on December 26, 2004, God was going about his business as usual.  It is often hard for us to conceive of what “going about his business as usual” might mean for God.  He is, if the stories are to be believed, not very much like us.  He is what I like to call “omnimax.”  This desciptor recognizes that he is supposedly omniscient (knows everything), omnipotent (can do anything), omnipresent (is everywhere) and omni-benevolent (is all loving).  To put it another way, if you were rolling for the characteristics of a Dungeons & Dragons player that had God’s abilities, you wouldn’t be able to find dice big enough. 

So, what can we know for certain about an omnimax God who is going about his business as usual at 00:58:52 UTC on December 26, 2004.  Well, since he knows everything, we can be absolutely certain that at that time he knows that at 00:58:53 UTC on December 26, 2004 something terrible will happen.  He knows that in one second, enormous pieces of rock that are pressing against each other underground with tremendous force will slip.  He knows that in one second, the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake will occur.  He also knows (again, because he knows everything) that this earthquake’s epicenter will be some miles off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia.  He also knows that this earthquake will cause, through subduction, a giant tsunami that will ravage the coastline of most of the Indian Ocean and will kill around 230,000 people in fourteen countries. 

But God doesn’t just see the big picture.  If we are to believe the Bible, God knows the details too, even the number of hairs on each of our heads (Luke 12:7).  That means he also knows that children will be ripped from their mothers’ arms by the wave to drown in horror and pain.  He knows that there are good people in the path of that tsunami, many of whom worship and follow him.  He knows that people will die drawn out, painful deaths of disease and exposure in the aftermath of the great wave.  You name the horrible story and he knows it. 

And what else do we know about an omnimax God in that moment before the second largest earthquake ever measured occurred?  We know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he could have stopped it.  He wouldn’t have abrogated anyone’s free will and it would not have been any effort at all (when you are omnipotent, nothing really requires any effort).      

And there is one last thing we can know about God.  With the prospect of 230,000 deaths and countless others suffering in the aftermath, God stood by and did nothing.   

Does this really make sense?  Would an almighty, all-loving creator who tells us it is good to help our neighbor really sit on his hands knowing 230,000 people are about to die? By the way, the Asian Tsunami is not the only instance where God himself was not a good Samaritan.  It’s not even the worst case.  If there is an omnimax God, he stood by idly again while Smallpox killed millions of innocent children.  He looked down on the people of Pompeii as the pyroclastic flow preserved their last moments of agony and despair forever.  Even today, he watches the goings on in a pediatric cancer ward, apparently unmoved.  Yet somehow, in churches around the world, religious leaders still have the stones to tell us that there is such a God and that he loves us.

If Seinfeld and company belong in jail for not assisting during a mugging, maybe God should be in the adjoining cell?  Or maybe, when analyzed in the light of real world events, such a conception of God is not compelling.  The world is a cruel and unfair place.  But it is worth noting that there is a force working to make it better.  Humanity!  Humanitarian aid was quick to flow to the victims of the 2004 Asian Tsunami.  Humans stepped in and did something where God did nothing.  They sacrificed money and time, some more than others, to help people halfway around the world that they did not even know.  Is it any wonder that more and more people are placing their faith in humanity rather than the irrational concept of an omnimax God?  Let us hope the trend continues, for there are lots of disasters yet to come, and we’d better be prepared to rely on the right Samaritan. 

Who Says the News is All Bad?

In another first for atheist acceptance, Mayor Bloomberg invited 6 atheists to join in his annual interfaith breakfast.  I was most pleased to read that the religious folks in attendance were respectful and, as the Gothamist article says “unperturbed.”  Can we non-believers become part of a larger ecumenical tent?  If more leaders can be as courageous as Mr. Bloomberg, there is certainly hope.

Atheism and the Great Misunderstanding

It is fair to say that most people living in the world today are annoyed.  My own anecdotal evidence shows that hardly a day goes by that someone isn’t complaining to me about something.  “Jack left the milk in the fridge with about a teaspoon left in the container!” or “Why do drivers intentionally block the merge lane in busy traffic!?!”  or “If I hear George W. Bush say “newkyoolar” one more time….”  It is an odd paradox of human behavior that we often latch onto the things that annoy us most, usually in passionate, personal campaigns aimed at eradicating them.  It is as if, by expressing our own annoyance at a thing, we are telling the people around us something important about ourselves.  “I don’t like it when my son wastes milk because I am thrifty.”  “I don’t like it when people block the merge lane because I am an intelligent person who knows that using both lanes fully makes traffic flow more quickly.”  “I hate mispronunciations because I am well educated.”  In truth, and again paradoxically, we actually nourish and care for our own personal annoyance with these things because they help us define who we are to others.  And thus in 1919, someone coined the phrase “pet peeve”.  This phrase, which means “the thing that provokes one most” is interesting to me because it is so elegantly descriptive and so accurate.   It is one of those words that communicates a subtly nuanced idea in a way that people hear and fully understand immediately.

Sadly, not all words are as easily understood.  Take the word “atheist”.  I have spent many hours arguing with many people about what this word means.  I believe there is a great misunderstanding about atheism, even among atheists.  There are basically two camps in this war. 

• Camp #1: “An atheist is a person who asserts that God does not exist”
• Camp #2: “An atheist is a person who does not assert that God does exist.”

Take a moment and read those two definitions again.  One more time.  Do they seem to be saying the same thing to you?   If so, that’s probably because you are a pragmatic person.  In practice, a person in camp #1 would probably live his/her life (with regard to the existence of God) in the same way that a person in camp #2 did.  However, when people discuss the existence of God, practice isn’t all that important.  I’m reminded of the t-shirts purportedly created and worn by University of Chicago economics students that read “Sure, it works in practice, but does it work in theory?”

Atheists are simply ignorant

It is common for Christians to attack atheist by claiming that all atheists use the definition of atheism found in camp #1 “An atheist is a person who asserts that God does not exist”, or to be more succinct, an atheist says “There is no God.”  Usually, this is because atheists do not see any evidence for the existence of God.  But Christians are quick to point out that this is a classic fallacy.  Just because there is no evidence for something, does not mean that it does not exist.  It is what Aristotle called an “Argument from Ignorance” and Christians LOVE to point it out to atheists.  Between you and me, I think they like the “ignorance” part the most.  It makes it sound like we are ignoring the existence of God or, even better to some Christian apologists, we are just plain “ignorant.”  We’ll come back to this definition of atheism in a bit.

Why would I?

The second camp in the argument over what an atheist really is states “An atheist is a person who does not assert that God exists.”  I am firmly in this camp, and here is why.  Atheism is a negative position: A – theism…NOT belief in God.  As such, it does not assert anything, but merely refuses to make what it considers a groundless assertion.  It does not describe a belief system, but rather refuses to assert belief in a particular thing: God.  Secondly, it does not commit a logical fallacy, which is always nice. 

I also find that this definition of “atheism” completely fits the way most of us atheists behave out in the wild.  As an atheist, I see no compelling evidence for an omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent spiritual supreme being so I don’t live my life as if one existed.  When approached by others about whether or not I believe in God, my core thoughts on the subject can be put forth in a single phrase.  “Why would I?”

Some people will say that this is really agnosticism.  That refusing to make the claim “There is no God” is a cop out.  I suppose that might be true, but I don’t think so. Agnostics say “I don’t know” and so should not reasonably be able to make any statements about the existence of God.  But a camp B atheist DOES make a statement about belief in God.  He/she refuses to assert it.  Maybe a small difference, but a difference nonetheless. 

A difference that makes no difference

So, there’s a clear difference between the definition of atheism in Camp A and the definition in Camp B, but, in a practical sense, does it really matter?  Let’s take another look at the Camp A definition into which Christians love to shoot holes.

There is no God.

When someone says this, Christians will sometimes respond by saying “Wait a minute!  You cannot prove that there is no God.”  They are of course, correct.  Other writers on this subject, most notably Richard Dawkins, will point out that it is not up to the atheist to prove that God does not exist.  Rather it is up to the person making the claim of God’s existence to prove that he DOES exist.  I agree wholeheartedly with Richard, but responding to Christians in this manner usually results in a rhetorical game of “Who’s got the burden of proof?” and it’s a game I don’t much like playing.  I would much rather take a pragmatic approach that demonstrates just how impractical the “You can’t prove it” approach is.

It is absolutely true that I cannot now, nor will I ever be able to disprove the existence of God.  However, here is a partial list of other things whose existence neither I nor anyone else can disprove:

• Fairies
• Elves
• Santa Claus
• The Loch Ness Monster
• The tooth fairy
• Bigfoot
• Living Elvis
• Giant, flying, invisible spaghetti monsters

If anyone were to claim that any of these things did not exist, a response of “you cannot prove it” would be just as valid as it is when the Theist makes the same claim for God.  It would also be just as relevant to our daily lives.  In the end, it doesn’t matter whether I say “There is no God” or “I refuse to assert a belief in God” or even “I don’t know if there’s a God or not.”  Those positions express themselves in exactly the same way in reality.  I live my life without giving consideration to what “God” wants me to do.  I determine my morality based on the good of humanity, not on what “God” had people write down thousands of years ago. 

The Great Misunderstanding

Still, many people spend a lot of time, for better or worse, trying to make atheism seem like more than it really is.  Atheism is, in fact, nothing more than a refusal to take a particular position: God exists.  Sam Harris in his excellent book The End of Faith correctly points out that we do not have a special name for people who do not believe in astrology or voodoo.  Yet somehow, if you do not believe in God, you get a label, and that label often comes with stereotypes.

Getting back to pet peeves, I guess you could say that what people try to do with the label “atheist” is one of mine.  Atheists do not fit into a single mold.  We do not have identical views on ethics and morality.  Various atheists can and do embrace humanism, naturalism, fatalism and even the teachings of Jesus Christ (though certainly not all of them).  Atheism is not a religion.  It is not even, in and of itself, a world view.  It is simply a description of people who refuse to assert something about reality: that there is a God in it.  On this blog, I will be presenting my own world view and atheism is a core part of it, but it is not the whole.  Many people will disagree with my views.  Some of them may even be atheists.  Common ground with one’s detractors is often difficult to find, but trying to clear up a misunderstanding is as good a place as any to start.

No One Likes a Non-Believer…yet…

You dislike me!  You really dislike me!

I have a lot of conversations with people who don’t like atheism.  Usually, this is because the other person is a theist and, as is common here in the United States, a Christian.  It’s hard to blame them.  Their entire lives are devoted to the worship of something that I, when asked, will readily tell them I do not believe exists.  As perceived personal attacks go, telling a person that you think the thing that gives their life meaning is a fairy tale is hard to beat.  For a long time now, atheists have been, well, not well received by the public at large.  How many Hollywood celebrities can you name who openly profess a disbelief in God?  (Actually, upon looking, it turns out there ARE quite a few celebrities who have professed atheism, but you certainly don’t hear about it on Access Hollywood.) Or better yet, how many publicly elected officials deny the existence of an almighty creator?  As it turns out, not that many.

In fact, on May 3, 2007 at the Republican presidential debate, the candidates were asked if any of them did not believe in evolution.  What an absurd question, right?  Evolution was a groundbreaking discovery that enabled an unprecedented understanding of the natural world.  It has been embraced by modern science for over 150 years.  Its postulates have been confirmed by the discovery of genetics 30 years later and its basic tenets have remained largely unchanged since its publication in 1859.  Not only have its principles been used to understand the natural world, but they have been used in other fields as well from economics to computer science with remarkable effect.  How could anyone have the temerity to suggest that an educated person seeking to become leader of the free world would possibly discount 150 years of scientific discovery and confirmation.  Sadly, three of the candidates raised their hands to assert just that.  Why?

It may very well be that these three men (Senator Sam Brownback, Governor Mike Huckabee and Representative Tom Tancredo) actually don’t believe in evolution.  They are professing Christians after all and it certainly would make sense.  Or, it could be that they do recognize the validity of Evolution, but they understand that many conservative Christians would not vote for them if they admitted so.  I honestly don’t know which is true or if there might be a completely different reason for their response, but don’t be too hard on me for suggesting they might lie about it.  They are, after all, politicians good enough at their craft to get elected.

Elections are literally popularity contests.  The paucity of atheist presidential candidates, and complete absence of atheist presidents must certainly be seen as indicators that atheism is, at the very least, not very popular.  But maybe looking at American Presidents is being too narrow in scope.  After all, there have only been 44 of them.  Maybe stepping down a rung will find us a few atheists in political office.  How about the United States Congress?  Maybe some professing atheists have been elected there.

In fact, in the 224 year history of the United States Congress there has been only one member to openly profess a lack of belief in God.  That’s right, only one.  Rep. Pete Stark (D-California) stands alone as the only member of Congress in history to openly profess that he does not believe in a supreme being.  He did so in January 2007.  He was reelected in 2008.  Maybe there’s hope for us yet.

So, the lack of popularly elected atheists and my own anecdotal experiences tell me what is probably intuitive to most people.  Atheists and atheism are not winning any popularity contests.  Or are they?

Growing disbelief

In the Spring of 2009, Trinity College in Hartford, CT published the results of their American Religious Identification Survey.  The survey shows that, since 1990, the number of Americans identifying themselves as Christians has dropped from 86 percent to 77 percent.  During that same time period, atheists were the only group whose numbers grew in every state, from 8 percent in 1990 to 15% in 2008 nationally.  Concomitantly, books promoting a rejection of religion and embracing humanist ideals have been best sellers (The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason, Letter to a Christian Nation, The God Delusion) and local and national atheist organizations have flourished.

So what does this all mean?  I think it means that humanity as a whole is moving toward what I call a “modern enlightenment.”  That people are having a harder and harder time denying scientific truths in favor of religious dogma.  That people can no longer stomach public policy decisions that are based upon ancient writings from civilizations where women were lesser beings and homosexuals were stoned to death.  It is my sincere hope that the belief shift identified in the ARIS survey indicates a move toward a humanist ethic that strives to reduce human suffering and increase human happiness.  On this blog, I will be presenting my own ideas of what values I believe are essential to achieving this ethic, and I hope to hear from others as well.

I should point out that I’m no authority on the subject.  I have a bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and spend a LOT of time thinking about this stuff, but I’m no more expert than you. I’m just a guy hoping the world will change for the better and who wants to talk about it online.