Persuasion.

“Why call him God?”

I think we can all agree on a few claims prior to any discourse on human nature and the topics that arise from it. Inasmuch as human beings are animals there seems to be some instinctual drive to know truth and appreciate our lives a little bit beyond merely biological functions. In epistemology, the branch of philosophy dealing with knowledge itself, we can relate the empirical, a posteriori, knowledge with claims based on experience, experiment, and basic senses; then we can relate the reasoned, a priori, knowledge with intuition, deduction, and the ever popular font, common sense. If we can agree on this distinction (admittedly the source of knowledge is a debatable topic, but here I intend to continue beyond epistemology), then we can perhaps agree that human beings seek to understand themselves and the world around them in many ways, and spend a great deal of time and other resources to that end. I assume anyone reading this is willing to agree to that. This has been a lot of effort to arrive simply to a small common ground that human beings seek to know in different ways that can be categorized as experience based and as experience independent. My only goal here is to preamble my true intention in this essay with a holistic paradigm of knowledge, because discourse on the topic which occupies my thesis is plagued with breakdowns in communication and the categories of information.

Over two millennia ago a prominent Greek philosopher known as Epicurus framed the argument from existence of evil (Frischer, 142). Most simply it is, “an omnibenevolent and omnipotent God must have both a sufficient motive and the sufficient means to prevent the existence of evil. Therefore, the fact that evil exists must mean that God is impotent, malicious or simply non-existent” as stated by Philip Morgan in his article “Does freedom answer the problem of evil?” a recent academic treatment of the argument (1). There are those for which this argument alone would suffice to decide the merit of worship and theism, and not just because this paradox remains unanswered after two millennia. However, this is merely the battle cry of my grand strategy to win in the campaign against theism in the audience. My thesis is essentially the Socratic form of agnosticism: “Why should we worship deities we have no true knowledge of?” I will deal with both sides of the empirical fence, and in keeping with the structure of persuasion put forth, I intend to use logical, ethical, and sentimental arguments to prevail in this challenge to my audience to define belief itself and defend what beliefs one may have.

Epicurus’ point has catalyzed this type of discussion for a long time. It is an argument that relies on no experience, but instead on the cognition of one considering the argument to understand the terminology. I chose to start with this paradox, which is really only a paradox if one insists on the existence of God, because the empirical arguments surround the worship of deities or the denial of them is wrought with external problems. Scientific inquiry by definition proves the things we believe typically by disproving all other possibilities via experiment and observation. Further, the entirety of our experience is some form of sensory observation, in the sense that “we” the believer, the actor, the thinker, are the observer behind the various senses we employ; the collection of conscious memory then is experience. The rest of our make-up is either innate (natural, genetic, instinctual, etc) or internally engineered. This last bit of our make-up, the internal bit, is where Epicurus’ paradox lies, and while most of the language he and others used, and I will use, are quite plain and simple enough for us all to agree with and understand. There is one particular idea and word that we need to deal with before I proceed with my axiomatic questions. That is, the definition of belief.

It’s really a simple question one must answer before dealing with the rest of this topic. Does one choose what one believes? At times this is the fundamental question of all pursuit of knowledge. With all manner and degree of skeptic and dogmatic running amok, this question seems to have gotten lost in the fray. But it must sometime occur to one to ask oneself this question. And the answer must be very telling, and more than any other dichotomy used in modern culture it must be very divisive. If one does not choose what one believes, how does any belief come about? We will avoid leaving the park of epistemology for fear of getting lost in the jungle of ontology. We must simply understand that belief is not consciously determined or rationalized for one (specifically the conscious ego) who does not choose what one believes, even if all the factors that determine what one believes are cognitive or rational. That is to say, for these people the fact in question is believed or not at some level sublime to decision making faculties we use to decide other things, such as what to eat for dinner. We are talking about what one sincerely claims is true; this is what it means to believe in something, even if it is a poor definition. For others then, the matter of believing in something is rational and cognitive; they choose for whatever other reasons what to believe. The same faculties that they use to name their pets are the ego-based decision-making mechanics that determine what is true to the person that chooses what to believe. That is not to say that what one believes is always rational or not. Certainly people from the group that do not choose what is true consciously are swayed by evidence, just as much as the group that decides what they believe consciously. This is a problematic distinction in some ways, but avoiding the existential questions of being, and just focusing on why we believe anything, we must understand that a truth is known to be true for various reasons and causes but they are either all subconscious or intuitive and the thinking “I” has no say in what it to “believe” or not, or some or all of the reasons are causes are conscious and the thinking “I” is going to “believe” what it thinks it should want to.

I submit this is the very natural and psychological distinction remiss from the discussion of human understanding that would dichotomize people into a holistic duality of skeptics and dogmatics. I further submit that the remainder of the discussion is centered on this distinction, and parallels the discussion between the skeptic and the dogmatic in every way germane to this question of knowing something is true, even though the thesis is questioning the merit of worship and not just the belief in the objects of worship. Let us see how the act of theism is not qualified to populate the halls of truth.
First, on the non empirical question posed to us by Epicurus. Why worship a being that has the capacity to stop evil but does not? Why worship a being that lacks the capacity to stop evil? If such a character exists that is not all powerful it is not responsible for the evil of the world, but innocence is not merit of deification itself, unless everything is to be deified, which the author does not rule out. This is a yes or no question a child could answer. It has been complicated by an attempt to describe an all-powerful all-knowing being as all-loving, and this paradox only increases the bitterness of unfulfilled faith. It has been dealt with on its specifics to exhaustion, the current support of this God is human “freedom”, but as Morgan puts it “Either (1), we are free (wherefore God is not omnipotent or omniscient and the objection succeeds); or (2), we are not free (wherefore the concept of God holds but the theodicy collapses).(3)”

Other logical problems with theism have proliferated alongside the various religions since antiquity, and a great deal of them are internal. It appeals to the human ego that it matters in the world, that its decisions matter in the world, and that it makes decisions at all. This freedom is the existential basis of responsibility and meaning in human endeavors. The problem with omniscient and omnipotent beings always resurfaces logically, because the paradox can be restated in so many ways. Is “goodness” good because the deity believes it to be, or is it believed by the deity because it is good? The same question is fair for the less divine believer. Since we are capable of the same faculties then to maintain the divinity of a deity then the former must be the definition of good, that is, simply what the divine says is good. If this is the case then the deity can change what is good at will, and goodness loses all meaning not left to any other arbitrary label. It is simply not logical to believe an all powerful being exists that cares what is good and knows it too. We are left with anthropomorphic Zeus who, for all his power, lacks the perfection in action and expression which something worthy of our worship should have.

What then, ethically is there to say about theism that is not based on experience? I submit that nothing that amounts to more than wishful thinking can support the idea of a personal deity. The author concedes that it would be rather a relief if some potent figure not only champions goodness in our lives, but maintains a just and meaningful world and rewards the actions we a free to take fairly with whatever form of karma there might be. But is it right to forward this idea if it cannot be demonstrated in our lives? With experience we have a basis to discuss the merits of such a god. But a priori, why would it be more “good” for deities to be the basis of truth and justice in our lives than for us to be the basis of those virtues? Are we not accountable for our compassion or lack thereof? And if so why should we delegate this function of divinity to some external persona? What might a personal god understand about human suffering and the need to end it or prolong it, that we, powerless at times to do either, do not acutely understand? For that matter, even if such a being existed, in light of the equivalence that must exist between human and the divine, outside of the empirical knowledge and temporal power, what possible motivation has humanity to worship that being, except the rather pedantic notion of deference out of fear (that are still prevalent in some places, I must remorsefully admit)?

While it remains outside our epistemology here what exactly the seat of our subconscious and intuition is, we must remain skeptical of our own beliefs, well thought out or not, if we maintain them to actually be truths and not matters of faith. This is the simple credo that separates skepticism from dogma. Since dogma is knowledge taken for granted, literally, it cannot exist a priori. The different religious creeds are distinguishable (superficial trappings aside) only in the mandates and historical facts they maintain, and the mandates are all a matter of record. The only non-empirical basis for theism is internal miracles, such as some revelation of the divine. I can only imagine the vast myriad of perils one would have in isolating such an event from any other internal experience possible for the mind’s “eye”. I hope we can all agree that the relief of waking up and not being in some oblivious public place in your underwear with a pink elephant is as relevant to what we believe is true, as the regret of waking up and not being the singular object of divine attention from some universal supernatural being; that is, not very relevant at all, to what we believe is objectively true. The organic artifice of perception is riddled with hallucination, introducing uncertainty that must be dealt with to the satisfaction of a reasonably objective skeptic, whether through empirical or inductive methods.

So if this can all be addressed in half a dozen sophomoric pages, then most of the debate over theism must take place on empirical grounds then, right? For thousands of years thousands of religions have maintained thousands of fact and commandments, and today thousand, thousand, thousand iterations of theistic claims have receded from explaining everything to a tiny puddle of muddling that explains only what is not explainable in objective terms. Especially if we remove all disagreements and contradictions from the deities and their canons, we have very little empirical information to work with, and every bit of it, other than the existence of anything at all, is simply the word of humans, whether writing millennia in the past or spoken on late-night cable television at the moment you the reader finish this sentence. For all of our many and revered ideals, your experiences and mine demonstrate the fallibility of human society, psychology, and perception. Only the combined effort of explorers and innovators, using consistent and methodical means, over thousands of years have managed to provide us with the vast compendiums of knowledge we have today, and as surely as you can drive your cart down the king’s highway each day and it ends in the same place there is an objective universe we can know. That leaves us with a couple deceptively innocuous questions.

Is it possible to justify theism even if we accept that there is not logical way for deities worthy of worship to exist and we lacking any objective empirical reason to believe in them? The real question here is how we prioritize truth over other dimension of our experience. I for one maintain that truth, immutable as it is complex, chaotic as it is simple, must be maintained above all other things in human endeavors, and let the silent and deaf universe take it for granted as it has no volition otherwise. We forsake all if we forsake truth because we can know nothing else once truth is compromised.

But then, is it possible for this divinity to be a complete mystery, unknowable to the cognitive human, whether they choose to believe things or something subtle inside them is the seat of belief? Are we prepared to simply claim something is true for absolutely no reason other than to make the claim? And if so what meaning can be extracted from these beliefs second hand? These questions will remain unanswered because they themselves are the answers that the dogmatic faithful must give to the skeptical, that these are unanswerable mysteries. This is either satisfactory or not, depending on the person, and I think even my initial dichotomy of those that belief from subtle means or those that “believe” from choice. I hope the audience is clear by now that the latter is not really belief, however it makes one feel. It is hardly even opinion, since even the pontifical faithful are susceptible to skepticism. It is a defense mechanism at best, used to protect the inculcated teachings of our elders, who as frequently as not, have not allowed us the choice to believe or not, at the time of teaching. The harm of these questions is exposed in sheer bombast and disregard for truth that is required to maintain

But all of this is either unable to pierce through the defense mechanism by now, or is want to ever do so in such a forum. For one that has recognized the simple problem before us and the unsatisfactory nature of so many failed solutions to that problem, I am afraid the remaining solutions are a bit rough to accept.

To be clear, all that is left is the small of our universe as we know it, a tiny rock in the cosmos populated by fragile animals that seem bent on self destruction. With only their collective efforts, which are incessantly troubled with inner strife, and their politically and technologically adolescent tools, they are the sole characters of the grand play. They do not have anyone or thing else to turn to besides the oblivion they are persistently on the verge of. Can I really expect you to want to be part of such a life? Of course not, if given the choice I am sure we would all rather that some other fantasy be our lot. But there is a real world we live in. And the truth, as ugly as it seems, is still simply true. And only once this is accepted can we all begin to appreciate what is actually divine. Look within each of us and we find examples of impiety and heresy coinciding with selflessness, with beauty, and with grace. An example of this for each hypocrisy in history can be found, which is a great deal many more than have been counted to be sure. I submit that the lives we live in recognition of the truth, our unique and precious selves raising each other out of the animalistic history of our forefathers, and the honor and compassion that serve to teach us how connected we are to each other and the world we live in – these are the divinity that we must worship. The divinity in each is all the deity we truly need.

Therefore, with no need of an external divinity, we should never have imagined one. Look to history and biology to excuse our forefathers. And with no hand to come from the sky, it must be our hands that undo the damage we have done to each other. With no heavens and hells to land on with religious parachutes, we had better learn how to secure a reasonable future for ourselves and those that survive us. The denial of theism is the acceptance of responsibility for things hitherto left to omnipotent gods, and we must rise to the occasion, or like many in history sink to miserable depths painful enough without brimstone and fire. For if we fail to mature ourselves in time to prevent the many calamities that face us, we will in the end snuff out the only light in the universe we know capable of illuminating the spirit as well as the body: The light of human life.

In review let me say that I am only suggesting that we all accept the world we know to be around us without embellishing it with unnecessary fantasies. The make-believe that is integral to our development as creative thinkers becomes a source of divisiveness, conflict, and general human misery when applied religiously. I have posed simple questions: What is belief? How is it oriented to truth? The answers to these questions frame the point I have argued we must reach if we are honest and fair. A great many specific conflicts have arisen in the world between reason and faith. Science and religion are incompatible in many ways, increasing in number and magnitude from Epicurus and Galileo to Darwin and Einstein. Many modern voices in the academic and entertainment media, such as Richard Dawkins, Stephen Pinker, and Bill Maher have called for a reckoning of their heresies with the demonstrable truth. I do not deal with the specifics, far too complicated and numerous on the whole, in this treatise. It is the primary conclusion I beseech the reader to come to, that we require only humanity to answer the questions of truth and meaning, and most simply, that if no god can exist worthy of worship, then we must make the most of what we do have, our lives, fragile and fleeting as they may be. While the rather disingenuous argument that the non-believer risks hell if they are wrong and gains nothing if they are right seems to justify church membership out of pragmatism, there is another problem with this last and hollow position on theism. The real problem of theism is that in a universe where humanity has only its frail and precious lifetime to find meaning, the cost we have paid to suffer delusions gladly may very well end up being the future of all life, so much resolve lost to wishful thinking, so much resources lost to foolish gestures, and so many lives lost to pointless conflicts and witch hunts. This is a problem we cannot solve with silence or a reluctance to recognize rather inconvenient truths. We must wrest the helm of our world from the madmen their machinations, revenants of our animalistic and barbaric history that they are.

Works Cited
Morgan, Philip. “Does freedom answer the problem of evil? the problem of evil is always popular in A-level religious studies exams. Philip Morgan takes a look at the problem from the perspective of human freedom.” Religious Studies Review 3.3 (April 2007): 18(4). Academic OneFile. Gale. University of MD University College. 15 Oct. 2008
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B. Frischer, B. The Sculpted Word. University of California Press, 1982.