The Making of an Atheist: How Immorality Leads to Unbelief

[little_monkey]

By James S. Spiegel.

http://www.amazon.com/Making-Atheist-Imm...an+Atheist

Book description:

The new atheists are on the warpath. They come armed with arguments to show that belief in God is absurd and dangerous. In the name of societal progress, they promote purging the world of all religious practice. And they claim that people of faith are mentally ill. Some of the new atheists openly declare their hatred for the Judeo-Christian God.

Christian apologists have been quick to respond to the new atheists' arguments. But there is another dimension to the issue which begs to be addressed--the root causes of atheism. Where do atheists come from? How did such folks as Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens become such ardent atheists? If we are to believe them, their flight from faith resulted from a dispassionate review of the evidence. Not enough rational grounds for belief in God, they tell us. But is this the whole story?

Could it be that their opposition to religious faith has more to do with passion than reason? What if, in the end, evidence has little to do with how atheists arrive at their anti-faith? That is precisely the claim in this book. Atheism is not at all a consequence of intellectual doubts. These are mere symptoms of the root cause--moral rebellion. For the atheist, the missing ingredient is not evidence but obedience.

The psalmist declares, "The fool says in his heart there is no God" (Ps. 14:1), and in the book of Romans, Paul makes it clear that lack of evidence is not the atheist's problem. The Making of an Atheist confirms these biblical truths and describes the moral and psychological dynamics involved in the abandonment of faith.

Them fighting words.

[CleanShavenJesus]

A few quotes from the author:

- "There is really nothing new about the new atheism, except the degree of bombast in their claims" (p. 10).
- "The biblical message is that there are moral dynamics involved in the abandonment of faith" (p. 13).
- "The truth is that atheism is profoundly false. It is a misconstrual of reality at the most basic level" (p. 17).
- "Atheism is not the result of objective assessment of evidence, but of stubborn disobedience; it does not arise from careful application of reason but from willful rebellion" (p. 18).
- "From a naturalist standpoint the objection from evil is incoherent. This is because naturalists have no grounds to call anything evil" (p. 27).
- Since atheism is self-refuting: "What could be more futile than a worldview that undermines itself? Atheism is a sort of suicide of the mind" for as Chesterton noted "Darwinism ... is an attack upon thought itself" (p. 60).
- The author quotes William James: "If your heart does not want a world of moral reality, your head will assuredly never make you believe in one" (p. 84).
- "Perfect objectivity is impossible, at least for mere mortals. Yet some persist in claiming that science gives us an objective, unfiltered view of the world." For scientists are not "immune to the influence of their own beliefs and values as they do their research and theory formulation" (p. 92).
- "All scientific observation is to some extent interpreted though a paradigm. However neutral he or she might pretend to be, the scientist always filters data through a set of unspoken (or unconscious) presuppositions" (p. 100).
- Atheists suffer from "paradigm-induced blindness. Their theoretical framework prevents them from seeing the truth, even when it is right in front of them" (p. 102).
- "If a worldview, such as naturalism, gives us no reason to think that our belief-forming mechanisms are generally trustworthy, then we have no reason to believe that worldview is true" (p. 108).
- The good professor quotes Dawkins: "It is pretty hard to defend absolutist morals on ground other than religious ones" (TGD, 2006, p. 266).
- He adds a citation form Aquinas: "To know that God exists in a general and confused way is implanted in us by nature" (Summa Theologica, vol. 1, p. 12).


I'll be ordering this book soon.

[Lucanus]

Circular reasoning all along, gotta love it

[Cyberman]

I don't think I got the memo about anti-faith. I didn't realise I was supposed to bring any. How can I be a proper rebellious atheist if nobody tells me these things?

I am passionate though, I'll admit that.

[Tonus]

None of that seems particularly new. When I was a believer, one of the more common beliefs about atheists is that they did so in order to live immoral lives without guilt. My recollections may be fuzzy, but the voices of some may have been tinged with a bitter jealously when we, er... they said that.

[Doubting Thomas]

Really, the title of this book tells me everything I need to know about it. Basically it's just saying "all atheists are immoral because all morality comes from God."

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

"The fool says in his heart there is no God" (Ps. 14:1),

Yes. And the wise man shouts it from the rooftops.

Boru

[Anomalocaris]

No, it really says "all atheist are immoral because theism is required for morality". Just how theism may be required for morality depends on to which audience the claim is being sold.

[Rahul]

Looks like a good book for theists to wack off to. I'm sure it'll sell very well.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

No, it really says "all atheist are immoral because theism is required for morality". Just how theism may be required for morality depends on to which audience the claim is being sold.

Too right. I find it telling how theists claim to have the corner on moral behaviour, but almost no two theists can agree on which particular behaviours are moral.

Boru