Atheists - Really Secret Believers?

[Doug Shaver]

And yes Leonhard, there was a time I really didn't believe in God - the question is, did I really know my own mind - was I self-deceived. Is that possible?

There's a fascinating mirror phenomenon going on here. Plenty of apologists claim that we atheists who used to be believers were never really believers.

I'm a former Christian, and at the time I'd have sworn I believed in God and his only begotten son our Lord Jesus Christ. Nowadays, there are moments when I wonder how real that belief was. Those moments don't come often, and they don't last long, but they do come.

I think that our ignorance about how our own minds work is vast. We might be more deceived than we could imagine about what we think and how and why we think it. But until the relevant sciences discover more facts about our brains, we don't have much choice but to assume that what seems to be going on in our heads is what is really going on.

[seer]

That's a possibility, if we presuppose God's existence. It's the basic idea that Plantinga tried to defend in Warranted Christian Belief.

I think I could defend an explanation that doesn't rely on that presupposition, but I'd have to write own book to do it.

I think Plantinga did a pretty good job of defending that idea. It is interesting that you do have a "scientific" study here that seems to confirm it, or at least leans towards it.

[Leonhard]

But is that the default state, or is it a learned one? I thought that's what the article was getting at.

I definitely think that belief in God is natural, and universal to people. Its something that has to be unlearned, even by many atheists own opinion on the subject. I was just humble saying that atheists weren't secretly god believers.

[seer]

I think that our ignorance about how our own minds work is vast. We might be more deceived than we could imagine about what we think and how and why we think it. But until the relevant sciences discover more facts about our brains, we don't have much choice but to assume that what seems to be going on in our heads is what is really going on.

Well, if science could actually plumb the depths of human consciousness. Certainly thinkers like Chalmers and Nagel (and I might add Sam Harris) don't think we can from a materialistic point of view. At least materialism as we understand it today.

[Catholicity]

I have a friend who is really an atheist. As candid as she is, I don't find her to be holding any secrets. I wouldn't hold any truth to "secret" believer or the default position of there is a god. Children do have a concept that goes with magical thinking which is why a lot of them believe in things like fairies and santa clause etc. Children are impressionable. Babies? who knows. Although as they get older, we adults truly influence them.

[Doug Shaver]

I think Plantinga did a pretty good job of defending that idea.

The only idea he successfully defended was that if the Christian God exists, then theism is justified.

It is interesting that you do have a "scientific" study here that seems to confirm it, or at least leans towards it.

The study is consistent with God's existence. It is at least as consistent with God's nonexistence.

[Juvenal]

Plantinga will be thrilled.

Well, that's only because he's Plantinga and believes his god is "special." The rest of us will recognize that this is yet more evidence that humans create their own gods.

[JimL]

I definitely think that belief in God is natural, and universal to people. Its something that has to be unlearned, even by many atheists own opinion on the subject. I was just humble saying that atheists weren't secretly god believers.

The only reason "God did it" needs be unlearned, is because it was learned in the first place.

[seer]

The only idea he successfully defended was that if the Christian God exists, then theism is justified.

Right, it is in that context.

The study is consistent with God's existence. It is at least as consistent with God's nonexistence.

Well, having an intuitive position for the divine seems more consistent for theism. Especially for Christian theism which speaks to this very issue. I'm not sure why it would be consistent with non-theism. How would that follow?

[Leonhard]

The only idea he successfully defended was that if the Christian God exists, then theism is justified.

I haven't seen much of a good atheist defense against his arguments that the theory of evolution implies Theism, or his proposition that belief itself is evidence of God's existence. As a scholastic metaphysicist I disagree with him on some points, and while I'd agree with him that no one need to justify believing in God, and that theism is more natural than atheism, I don't think I'd call it properly basic

The study is consistent with God's existence. It is at least as consistent with God's nonexistence.

Its consistent with both. I don't mind granting that. However Theism offers a natural account of this, where as atheism offers only an accidental account (its just the way we evolved). So its more plausible given theism, than given atheism.

[JimL]

I haven't seen much of a good atheist defense against his arguments that the theory of evolution implies Theism, or his proposition that belief itself is evidence of God's existence. As a scholastic metaphysicist I disagree with him on some points, and while I'd agree with him that no one need to justify believing in God, and that theism is more natural than atheism, I don't think I'd call it properly basic



Its consistent with both. I don't mind granting that. However Theism offers a natural account of this, where as atheism offers only an accidental account (its just the way we evolved). So its more plausible given theism, than given atheism.

The theistic account is supernatural, not natural, the more natural account is the atheistic perspective of evolution

[Leonhard]

The theistic account is supernatural, not natural, the more natural account is the atheistic perspective of evolution

I meant natural in the sense of "What 'naturally' comes to mind", "Its natural to make such an assumption", basically what is more typical.

[JimL]

I meant natural in the sense of "What 'naturally' comes to mind", "Its natural to make such an assumption", basically what is more typical.

Okay sorry for the misunderstanding, but I would still disagree that creation is the more natural thing to come to mind. It may seem so since the whole idea of creation, the meme if you will, has been impressed upon the collective consciousness for so long, but from an objective perspective I think the more natural assumption would be evolution.

[Juvenal]

I haven't seen much of a good atheist defense against his arguments that the theory of evolution implies Theism, or his proposition that belief itself is evidence of God's existence.

Plantinga's EAAN, and I'm thinking that's what you're referencing, yields a decent philosophical argument that theism is just another incorrect belief bestowed on us by evolution.

[Leonhard]

Okay sorry for the misunderstanding, but I would still disagree that creation is the more natural thing to come to mind. It may seem so since the whole idea of creation, the meme if you will, has been impressed upon the collective consciousness for so long, but from an objective perspective I think the more natural assumption would be evolution.

The theory of evolution does not presume atheism. And I was talking about Theism, not Creationism.