I’ve seen references to CARM on the Fundies Say the Darndest Things website, but never actually went to visit until today and have to say there is a lot of crap there.
Let’s take a look at part of their Questions and Objections to Christianity, specifically how to handle it when an atheist tells you they don’t believe in God. It’s a five part answer and it’s amazing how ineffective it is to me now that I have no stake in Christianity being correct.
The following 5 quotes are their suggested response to “I am an atheist. I don’t believe in God.”
An atheist is defined in two senses: Someone who says he believes there is no God, and someone who simply lacks belief in God. An atheist cannot say he knows there is no God, because he would have to know all things in order to know if there is or isn’t a God. If he says he believes there is no God, ask him why he believes that way, and begin there. If he says he lacks belief in God, then ask what he does believe in, and start there. I always get around to the question of, “How did we get here?” Since creation and evolution are the only options, I have something further to work with.
I’ve got to focus on one sentence first. “An atheist cannot say he knows there is no God, because he would have to know all things in order to know if there is or isn’t a God.” That works both ways. I’ve heard Christians tell me they know there’s a God, most of the time citing faith as the way they know. But faith is not proof.
Yes, I cannot say that I know there is not a God. The most I can say is that based on how I see the world the Christian God does not exist. Yes, I may be surprised when I die and come upon a deity leading me into the afterlife. And it may be Yahweh, although I really doubt it. And if it is Yahweh He is certainly not a deity that I find worth worshiping for all eternity.
And one other problem sentence – “Since creation and evolution are the only options, I have something further to work with”. One word was left out – Christian. The argument is that Christian creation and evolution are the only options. That’s absurd. Every culture has some type of creation myth. Why would you limit your argument to one?
An agnostic says he doesn’t know if there is or isn’t a God. (Usually after saying this I challenge them to explain the prophecies of the Old Testament fulfilled in the New. I state how the Bible is unique that way, and that only God can make prophecies that are 100% accurate. Then I ask him to explain how that could be done if there is no God.)
To me, Old Testament prophecies are a terrible way to argue the validity of the Bible. If a commenter wants to come here and post on the importance of prophecy, go for it. But just because a few things written in the Old Testament sort of came true, it doesn’t make any type of valid claim for Christianity.
If there is no God as you say, then in the end I lose nothing. But if there is a God like I say, in the end you lose everything.
Why does Pascal’s Wager always come up in this? The same argument can be made for every religion that has a version of Heaven and Hell. To the Christian, if there is no Allah as you say then in the end I lose nothing. But if there is an Allah, then you’ll end up in the Islamic version of Hell which from what I understand is much worse than the Christian version.
Why don’t you believe in God? Is there any reason for you to intelligently reject His existence? Or, do you simply desire not to believe in Him?
Flip that. Do you simply desire to believe in Him?
Yes, belief in God gives a safe feeling. It was a nice feeling when I was Christian that I “knew” I was going to Heaven after I died and was not going to simply rot underground. But wanting to believe doesn’t make it so. Just because I believe I will win the lottery doesn’t mean I will.
The belief in God also gives people a sense of control. Random actions injure and kill people all the time. It is understandable that we would like to believe that there is control in this world even when it doesn’t seem so. Again, wanting to believe doesn’t make it so.
The Bible doesn’t attempt to prove that God exists. It simply speaks as though He does. Maybe I can’t prove to you there is a God, but I can introduce Him to you through His Son Jesus Christ, and you can judge for yourself if the Words of Christ in the Bible convince you of His existence.
That’s like saying books on Babar the Elephant don’t attempt to prove that Babar exists, they simply speak as though he does. The Bible is a book. No more, no less. It was written by men, recopied by men, read by men, and interpreted by men. It is not a holy book no matter how important it is to you. Why is it so easy for a Christian to read stories of Zeus, Allah, the Egyptian Gods, or any of the other creation myths that have come out throughout human history and dismiss them as myth but be unable to do the same for the Christian creation myth?
What I think is important, and obviously lacking in the CARM answers, is that some answers don’t make sense once you remove yourself from a Christian world view. During my time as a Christian all of these answers would have made perfect sense to me, it would have frustrated me to have a non-Christian not understand them, and they are all things I could see myself saying to a non-believer. But now that I’m able to look at the world without the Christian mindset overriding my mind I can see how absurd many of these arguments are.
