Strong and Weak Arguments

[Angrboda]

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I find intelligent design arguments to be the most intuitively compelling.  They also happen to be some of the most shoddily constructed arguments.  You need a bridging principle to get from "It looks designed," to "therefore it is designed," and I've yet to see anyone provide that bridge.

Weakest argument is the argument from personal experience.  Having an unusual perception is not indicative of anything more than that human nature has quirks.  "I know He exists because I've felt Him," belongs in the DSM-V, not a believer's justification.

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I anticipate Chad will want to ask you what you think are the weakest arguments for and against disbelief in gods too.  I'd also be interested in your appraisal.  At first my response was "what positive claims?"  But then I decided I can at least address my reasons for not finding god belief worthy of serious consideration since I don't.  Also, I'd be interested to hear which if any arguments in favor of strong atheism you find weak.

I don't know that these arguments apply specifically to strong atheism, but more on that later. I'll just list several weak lines of attack first.

One of the weakest arguments for atheism I think is when people say "there is no evidence for God." I don't think this is strictly true. You may not find the evidence such as it is to be particularly good or compelling, but to deny any exists is I think an exaggeration. It's more a rhetorical posture than an argument. Even if there is no evidence for God, just what exactly are you accomplishing telling a theist this, when they no doubt are convinced that they have evidence for God? All you're doing is short circuiting the dialogue and convincing the theist that you are unreasonable. It's a losing proposition.

The second weakest argument against the existence of God is that he is a moral monster. Strictly speaking, this may be an impediment to worship, but not belief. And belief in the existence of the deity is what's at issue. The terrifying nature of God or gods has never been an impediment to belief. When the atheist makes this remark, they are doing so within the confines of an already secure disbelief. They've already shut that gate. In addition, it's vulnerable to people who have a different interpretation of God or even a different god. Arguing with a theist that he has the wrong interpretation of their god just seems a total non-starter. It's more likely to alienate than persuade.

My third in the weakest category is a flaw that many atheistic arguments share. That is that the logical conclusion one reaches from the argument is that one should not believe that the god in question exists; it doesn't conclude that God doesn't exist, just that belief in God is unreasonable and to be avoided. This leaves the central claim of the theist that God exists untouched. An example of such an argument is the claim that "there is no evidence for God" that I referenced above. Strictly speaking, absence of evidence doesn't mean evidence of absence, so the most you can conclude from this argument is that it is unsound to profess belief in God at this time, not that God does not exist. This is the conclusion of most atheistic arguments, and it butts heads with a perennial question: Do atheists merely lack belief or do they have an active disbelief in gods? I find the first seems like something of a dodge, and even if not, in some sense it rings untrue. It seems possible to disbelieve in the existence of specific gods without having a disbelief in all gods. Yet most atheists appear to have a blanket dismissal of not just specific gods, but all gods and religion, too. This seems inconsistent. It seems that atheists do deny the existence of gods, yet most of their arguments do not support the conclusion that gods do not exist.

For the strongest atheistic argument, I'd have to go with the argument from the incoherence of God, which aims to show that some set of characteristics of God are incompatible with one another. Unlike most atheistic arguments, this one does get you to the conclusion that God, for one, does not exist. The classic argument from incoherence was stated by Epicurus:

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?"

While I'm here, I'll state what I think is the strongest theist argument. That is, ex nihilo nihil fit. It's the backbone of three of Aquinas' five ways and the most compelling ones, as well as of any cosmological argument. It also tends to render the usual atheist response of "We don't know," sounding rather weak and inapt. If you can't be sure of this, then what can you be sure of? And if nothing from nothing comes, where but from God did all of this come from?