The Complaint Department Is Closed!

I thought I would veer off the beaten path a little and address some of the arguments some atheists make in defense of their atheism. Lately I have been reading some blogs posted by atheists to get a feel of where they are coming from. I have always done my best to do my research to ensure I focus my beliefs on the truth as best I can. This I believe is important, if you do not test your worldview for truth you may be believing something in vain. In the Links page of Truth in Religion & Politics I list a sampling of points of view contrary to my own that the readers of Truth in Religion & Politics can get a feel for what “the other side” has to offer in the market place of ideas.  The truth need not hide from criticism and ought to be able to hold fast against close examination.

One of the foremost principles of examining a worldview’s truth claims is to make sure you are representing the view to be evaluated as truly as possible.  Critiquing a view which is misrepresented or misunderstood does nothing to undermine the view’s claim to truth.  This is the fallacy of making a strawman argument.  A claim which debunked that is misrepresented has not actually been debunked.  This fallacy is easy to commit which is why due diligence must be taken in order to make a solid case.

An additional problem with creating a strawman is that it is likely the perception of the view you are rejecting, rather than a malicious deceptive characture.  Now you are faced with an intellectual problem.  Effectivly you have said to yourself “I believe “X” is true and “P” is false because of reason “R””, however if R is not really true of P, then P is being rejected on false pretenses and you now cannot make a legitimate claim to P being false.

Another problem objection I see is rejecting theism because of some reason and that reason is also true of the atheist, or perhaps even worse.  Often I hear the rejection of theism because of all the violence religion has perpertrated.  However, under atheist political powers, the number of people killed is exponentially higher than all the religious wars and persecutions combined.  Not that this fact refutes atheism, or theism for that matter, but it serves to show that rejection of the truth of theism for that reason is illigitemate.

During my interactions with professed atheists, I routinely am presented with what I believe are strawman argument rejections of Christian theism.  In a series of articles I will assess the claims of the atheist website godisimaginary.com which can also be found under the links tab at the top of this page.  In my years of interaction with atheists, and from the content of other websites dedicated to attempting to refute theism, I can say this is a representative list of what atheists consider to be good reasons for rejecting the existence of God and will therefore be a good place to start. The website offers 50+ arguments for believing God does not exist. I will examine each reason offered and provide an analysis of the strength of the arguments and whether the objection is based on accurate states of affairs as it relates to theism.