Thread: The "smart" atheists

Who are some atheists that are around now and have been in the past that present the "best" arguments that there isn't a God? We know that even their best arguments aren't good ones, but I'm interested to know who these people are so I can read their books and find out why they think what they think, and also see how Christians respond to it so I can learn how to respond to it.

Please... not the New Atheists. Ugh they make me sick and they don't even know how to think.

Sorry, Megan, I just don't find their reasons (which really aren't reasonable at all) very smart. So I can't help you.

The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. - Ps. 14:1

I agree with you but I'm trying to find out if there are atheists that actually think deeply about these things. Are there no atheists that do this or are they all like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens?

My cousin Christi is a pretty smart atheist, she thinks of interesting arguments which don't last long but they are good for a time lol

I have to agree with Joshua. I've not heard any cogent arguement from the likes of Dawkins, Hitchens or Harris that aren't anything more than the meanderings of a flawed worldview.

Given that, I will be showing my Apologetics class the new DVD, "Collision", a discussion between Hitchens and Douglas Wilson as well as the debate between Richard Dawkins and Alistar McGrath.

Originally Posted by MMasztal

I've not heard any cogent arguement from the likes of Dawkins, Hitchens or Harris that aren't anything more than the meanderings of a flawed worldview.

Are there atheists today or in history that do any better a job than these men have?

Smart is an improper term.

I believe Dawkins to be a smart man. As a biologist, he understands natural processes that possess such a complexity that I couldn't begin to understand them; this said outside the issue of evolution but regarding the processes we commonly understand to occur. That takes intelligence.

However, his arguments against the existence of God are left wanting; not because he isn't intelligent, but because he suppresses the truth.

Man's heart is black and evil. Rebellious to the core. The natural man's heart is inclined against God. In all of his rebellion and sin, he seeks to shirk the responsibility imposed on his soul by the Perfect Sovereign. He seeks to hide from God. Some hide in worldly religions, others deny His existence. Either seeks to flee from the Judgment of God.

For example, Christ presented blatant proof that He was the Son of God. Did miracles, rose from the dead, etc. In such an instance, no intelligence was required to rationally perceive the occurrences and draw the most simple and obvious conclusion: Christ was (and still is) God's Son.

What happened though? Denial. There must have been an alternative reason; theirs? They claimed He was possessed by demons.

I recently illustrated this point to two of my agnostic friends. One remarked that he would believe if God would just do something obvious to him, so that he couldn't deny He exists.

I pointed out the first obvious point, define obvious. I think God is doing very obvious things all of the time, my friend concludes differently. My other friend pointed out the other obvious point. He said in sum, "But someone who denies that supernatural things exist might see something supernatural, but they will attempt to rationalize it and come up with a natural conclusion. Even if God did something explicit, you'd explain it away."

Smart for an agnostic, no? Still an unbeliever, still suppressing the truth.

In general, yes, there have been atheists who are more skilled at making their arguments sound reasonable than Dawkins or Hitchens. I can't think of any names off the top of my head.

You might try Bertrand Russell. Your local public library probably has his works. But even Russell had flaws in his premises.

Sorry, but I can't think of any others besides the usual suspects, Dewey, Santayana, Schopenhauer, Hume and Sartre, etc. These guys were atheists, but in their hey-day, it wasn't fashionable to write specifically about atheism with the vitriol that the "New Atheists" do..

David Hume and Immanuel Kant would be two philosophers who dismantled the natural proofs for the existence of God.

Robert Ingersoll might be a start. Betrand Russell, G. E. Moore, and William Rowe are also intelligent. Most of the better arguers are going to be "friendly atheists" who believe that we can't disprove God's existence, but since we can't prove the existence of God the reasonable thing is to not believe.

Originally Posted by P. F. Pugh

Most of the better arguers are going to be "friendly atheists" who believe that we can't disprove God's existence, but since we can't prove the existence of God the reasonable thing is to not believe.

Don't people usually use Ockham's Razor to draw this conclusion? I find this funny because such a theory would cut in the other direction in light of the modern theory of Darwinism.

What about Anthony Flew? (Didn't he propose an argument against the existence of God? He later he became a "deist." You may want to check him out...I have only read/used his dictionary of philosophy.)

I second Anthony Flew.

Originally Posted by nicnap

What about Anthony Flew? (Didn't he propose an argument against the existence of God? He later he became a "deist." You may want to check him out...I have only read/used his dictionary of philosophy.)

Originally Posted by Pergamum

I second Anthony Flew.

We have one of his books. I can't remember which one it is. It might have been one he wrote after he became a deist. I'm sure it would still be helpful though.

Amazon.com: There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind (9780061335303): Antony Flew, Roy Abraham Varghese: Books

I recommend this book by Flew.

Richard Muller PRRD has a couple sections regarding atheism: Vol 3 Ch 3 Sec 5 has a decent address on "speculative" and "practical" atheism. He gives names of those I'm not familiar with but it gives a start. If you don't have those vols I could research the names for you.

Originally Posted by D. Paul

Richard Muller PRRD has a couple sections regarding atheism: Vol 3 Ch 3 Sec 5 has a decent address on "speculative" and "practical" atheism. He gives names of those I'm not familiar with but it gives a start. If you don't have those vols I could research the names for you.

Please do.

Originally Posted by Zenas

Originally Posted by P. F. Pugh

Most of the better arguers are going to be "friendly atheists" who believe that we can't disprove God's existence, but since we can't prove the existence of God the reasonable thing is to not believe.

Don't people usually use Ockham's Razor to draw this conclusion? I find this funny because such a theory would cut in the other direction in light of the modern theory of Darwinism.

I agree--I just don't think that Russell or Moore would. Not sure what they'd think of Plantinga.

God and Atheism: A Philosophical Approach to the Problem of God
God and Atheism: A Philosophical Approach to the Problem of God by Bernardino M. Bonansea: ISBN 9780813205496

Muller notes Theo Verbeek Descartes and the Problem of Atheism
excerpt:Scepticism and irreligion in the ... - Google Books

Muller speaks much of Spinoza Baruch Spinoza - Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Stephen Charnock Discourse I,"The Existence of God" pg 24 is cited as demolition of the basis for all atheistic remarks.

I've tried to stay away from the very obscure names, but these links seemed to offer the most direct help. Again, I myself am not familiar with most of the works cited by Muller - he's magnificent in scope - but I learned a few things too along the way!

Don't forget Calvin's Institutes 1.3.1, 1.3.3, 1.4.1, 1.4.4, 1.5
and Turretin Institutes Book 1, Third Topic Q 1,2
Hope this helps!

Sure. Atheist philosophers, some of them, are quite smart and their arguments aren't bad.

The smartest atheist philosopher of all-time (whom today's atheists, if they were smart, would do well to study and follow): SPINOZA. Although his philosophy is all about 'God' (which is what throws them off).

Megan, I think that the most honest agnostics are not pure materialists: they recognise the spiritual aspect of our being; and they are more honest about the limitations of science and about their deepest objections to God being of a 'spiritual' nature -- their 'right' to an autonomous will, their own ideas of morality, etc. This sort of agnostic will only claim for science the ability to prove that something is possible, or demonstrate probability: Bertrand Russell (in Our Knowledge of the External World) admits that science can never disprove the claims of mystics, it can only make a plausible case in defense of its own turf (which is rather ironic, given the absolute factual authority that many Christians ascribe to scientific theories).

I would recommend additionally to the above, Lewis' autobiography, and 'The Funeral of a Great Myth' in Christian Reflections, which gets the poetic appeal of evolution. I haven't read much by others listed but agree that things by Bertrand Russell, esp his autobiography and a book I hope to read, The Worship of a Free Man are probably more honest or at least revealing as to the real reasons why otherwise intelligent people reject God -- and they are the reasons that Scripture tells us. I found an essay I wrote years ago on the 'Greek Exercises' in Russell's autobiography, where he recorded his thoughts as a teenager working his way towards rejecting God's existence (a turn of phrase which reminds me of the futile escapism of not being grateful) -- I pulled/summarised a few things, below. However, I think it highly unlikely that most of us will meet an unbeliever of this much reflection: those I have encountered blindly adhere to a party line and aren't familiar with the more cautious statements of their own influential scientists and philosophers (I personally want to throw my hands up and cry, 'Why don't you agnostics try *doubting* something?).

At an age when most people are characterized by a preoccupation with the absurdly transitory, Bertrand Russell was preoccupied with immortality: either God was sovereign, and man, though an astonishing creation, was merely a mechanism for bringing about His will — or man had evolved without a creator, in which case he was a bundle of matter and chemical reactions. Either way, he was a pitiable creature, groping in a half-lit space between black holes: immortality is not for the mechanistic and the molecular . . .

Russell concludes that this truth is not conducive to happiness, and should not be widely disseminated, because the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people is the chief end of man. He identified man's misery with slavery to his 'primitive conscience', rather than to the sin it accuses him of: the morality which teaches us not to covet our neighbor's wife was necessary to the development of the species (not to develop which, would be sin), but is a mere encumbrance to the alleviation of the dying race. -- In other words, he refuses to worship the Creator because he prefers to worship the creature.

(Incidentally Russell doesn't think very highly of Spinoza -- he thinks he used logic merely to justify his more mystical moods. *smiles*)

You might want to consider some of these recent works:
The impossibility of God by Michael Martin
The improbability of God edited by Martin
The non-existence of God by Nicholas Everitt
The Miracle of Theism by Mackie

Good question, Megan. I am embarrassed and saddened for the high-profile atheists today. Their arguments can be dismantled by a well-trained 10 year old.

You might want to consider reading William Rowe's Evidential Argument from Evil. Here is a link that discusses his argument: The Evidential Problem of Evil [Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy]

I'm almost embarrassed to mention her but there's Madame Blavatsky too!

Not atheistic per se, (more of an occultist), but "atheistic" nonetheless.

Blavatsky Net Theosophy - original Theosophy text - focus on Madame Blavatsky
Blavatsky Study Center:* Website on H.P. Blavatsky & Theosophy including Blavatsky Archives.

Moderators: Are the links OK?

about Bertrand Russell. He is worth the time to read. Unlike the "new atheists". Those "brights", as they like to call themselves, are pretty dim.

I think the two that have made the Church have to work to refute them are Voltaire and Kant.

Voltaire - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Immanuel Kant - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Church has refuted them, however. There are no unrefuted atheists in existence.

Some philosophy links (free stuff is good):

EpistemeLinks: For Philosophy Resources on the Internet
Virtual Library of Christian Philosophy
www.vantil.info
Plantingapage
620pixeltable

I included the last one because it has some writings of Hume and Kant.