October 30, 2006
“Atheists top book charts by deconstructing God” in yesterday’s book review section in the Guardian discusses success of a slew of newly-published books that examine phenomenon of terrorism from an atheistic perspective.
Such books illustrate a fascinating contradiction: while claiming that atheism is a rational alternative to religion, they only succeed in making it crystal clear that atheism is nothing more than just another religion.
While differing from other creeds it such details as the theory of Creation and the number of gods (zero versus one or more), atheism shares with the rest of them the claim to be the ultimate “Truth,” the muddiness of “proofs,” as well as the zeal with which its True Believers advocate their creed – and ignore its problematic spots.
Because, to think of it, atheist’s position is even more vulnerable than that of theists: God’s verbal silence is in no way a proof of his non-existence, and so there is always a possibility that He will reliably reveal Himself (“reliably” is the key word here; because of the problem of the third party, “scriptures” like the Bible or the Koran are signally unreliable as evidence of His revelation or as records of His word). But there is not even a theoretical possibility to prove the atheistic hypothesis. No matter how long we don’t hear from God, the possibility that He exists is still there.
And so, we need a more sensible cure for the malady of terrorism than an unrealistic hope that terrorists will convert to atheism. Solutions offered by its apostles are unworkable because, even in theory, their claims are un-provable.