Thread by @EveKeneinan

“Traditional atheism” is the position that there is no God.

So far from “very valid” a position is it to hold, it is so manifestly irrational and indefensible that it has been completely abandoned. Why do you *think* (almost) no one today attempts to PROVE there is no God?

https://twitter.com/LSpartan88/status/1374785893228187651

“Atheism” has very nearly been abandoned as PHILOSOPHICAL POSITION—even as it has grown as an EXISTENTIAL STANCE. 99.9% of “atheists” these days no longer are confident they can DEMONSTRATE that there is no God.

Which is wise, since they CANNOT.

There are really only three or four arguments for atheism, and none of them go through.

1 The Argument to an Alternate Explanation of the Concept of God

FAILS: because offering an account of how how the concept of God might have come about other than there being a God doesn’t do *anything* to disprove there is a God.

2 The Argument to an Unnecessary Hypothesis

Laplace on God to Napoleon “Sire, I have no need of *that* hypothesis.”

FAILS: because God isn’t a hypothesis, and it isn’t clear you don’t need God as the ULTIMATE explainer. It’s irrelevant that you don’t “need” God to do science.

3 The Argument that “God” is Self-Contradictory

FAILS: because the argument rules out God, when God is defined in a self-contradictory way, but has never shown the God of classical theism to BE self-contradictory.

4 The Argument from Evil.

FAILS: Because while *emotionally* very strong, the case can never be established rationally, since it requires premises that require moral perfection and omniscience to establish.

Supplement: I found a good passage from in Alvin Plantinga last night about this.

I like it so much, I’ll share it again here:

As Plantinga points out, modern versions are more sophisticated (and do not forget the link between “sophisticated” and “sophistry”), but they really don’t have more force than “I can’t see any good reason God could have for permitting evil E, so He probably doesn’t have one."

“I, a finite, fallen, morally imperfect, non-omniscient human being, cannot see any good reason God, a morally perfect, all-knowing Being, could have for permitting evil E” doesn’t entail “so God probably has no good reason.”

N.B. The Evidentialist Argument—by far the most popular “atheistic” (really agnostic) argument today is NOT an argument that there is no God.

It is the argument that believe in God is not SUFFICIENTLY WARRANTED TO BE RATIONAL.

It ALSO fails, but it isn’t strictly ATHEISTIC.

Here’s a longer essay on these short one-tweet summaries: lastedenblog.wordpress.com/2017/01/03/ath…